ITV Interactive stuff this week on Sky

DMC

ITV strikes interactive deal with Sky

http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,893974,00.html

Owen Gibson
Wednesday February 12, 2003

The BBC has spent the last two years extolling the virtues of its interactive services, which allow viewers to watch what they want when they want.
Now ITV, which spent the last three years trying to take on BSkyB with its disastrous ITV Digital venture, is finally catching up.

It has finally sealed a deal with BSkyB that will allow viewers to play along with shows such as Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? using their Sky Digital remote control.

Sky and BBC viewers used to being urged to "press the red button" to catch up on earlier news bulletins, or watch a Wimbledon match that isn't on BBC1 or BBC2, will now also be offered the chance to do so during ITV shows.

It paves the way for extra nuggets such as goal highlights and statistics during Champions League football matches, storyline catch-ups during Coronation Street and interactive voting on shows such as Pop Idol and Stars in their Eyes.

The first fully interactive ITV programme, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, will launch this Saturday, allowing viewers to play along in real time with the contestants on screen via their remote control.

"This is an important deal for ITV that offers significant commercial potential in the long term," said Clive Jones, the joint managing director of ITV.

ITV will also work with pools giant Littlewoods to develop gaming and betting services, which could allow users to place bets during football matches or bet on the outcome of talent shows such as Pop Idol.

It is now over five years since Sky first launched its own interactive services and two years since the BBC began enjoying massive success with interactive versions of its Wimbledon coverage.

Sky News won acclaim for its interactive general election, which allowed viewers to choose which party's fortunes they wanted to follow.

ITV has belatedly joined the party after concluding hard fought negotiations over how much it should pay.

ITV only joined the Sky digital network last year after throwing in the towel on its efforts to keep rival ITV Digital afloat. It mistakenly believed that by only providing ITV and ITV2 on ITV Digital, it would attract customers away from Sky.

The move will also allow ITV to offer its advertisers true interactivity for the first time, which is expected to provide a serious fillip to the struggling sector. Up until now interactive ads could only run on smaller channels, making advertisers reluctant to invest in the technology.

Mr E

We've been playing along with Millionaire for quite a few weeks now. It definitely makes the show more interesting. So its only officially being launched this weekend?

- Dave.

JDxtra

How have u been playing it for a few weeks? Was the interactive service available on Sky?

I haven't watched Millionaire via my FTV card before.

Cloud

Cool! So how long before we get some interactivity on Winning Streak?

Mr E

jdempsey: Yeah, its available via the FTV card. A message comes up before the program to press the red button to join in. The only catch (and its a clever one) is that you have to stay tuned to the channel during the ads or you lose your score (this is a feature, not a bug! - you are warned about it before the ads).

Pretty sneaky..... I'd say ads shown during this hour cost a bit more....

- Dave.

dmeehan

same as the play-along games on Challenge
they make you watch all the ads about debt consollidation etc.

timpat

Great news altogether(not!) for all of us on Irish subs!

Its a pity they didn't tie in a deal to switch UTV back on on the Irish EPG into their 'agreement'..........but that is a whole other 'thread'!!!!!!!!