This talk focused on how TV viewers have companion devices with them while watching and turn to those devices when they are interested in finding out more about something in the TV programme. Indeed, surveys show 25-40% of viewers do this at least occassionally. The problem is the lack of descriptive metadata about what is IN a TV programme and the disconnection between available metadata and external apps to use that metadata means viewers turn to third party sources outside of a broadcasters editorial control (Google, IMDB..) or are left frustrated if they can't even search (e.g. who painted a painting when one doesn't know the painting's name?). LinkedTV addresses this by providing concept and scene level information about TV content to applications that can be on the viewer's companion device synced to the TV playback, offering instant and intuitive information gratification - under the broadcaster's control. While a Web based implementation is already prototyped in the project, Dr Nixon also turned to bringing Linked Television to broadcast TV. The HbbTV specification has taken a significant step in enabling this type of added value enrichment service in its v2.0 release this year, with support for references to fragments of a DVB broacast stream (using the Media Fragment URI specification already used in LinkedTV) and synchronisation between TV and companion screen content (implemented by the Multiscreen Toolkit in LinkedTV). Broadcasters still need to consider the identification and annotation of TV programs beyond the EPG level, which LinkedTV can support with a set of rich analysis and annotation tools, as well as the added value to provide viewers with links to other content alongside TV, whether on a mobile companion app or a future HbbTV 2.0 app, which they can produce and check using LinkedTV's enrichment services and Editor Tool. In our view, the traditional reticience of broadcasters to give viewers the means to browse elsewhere on the Web "away from their content" needs to give way to embracing Linked Television as an opportunity to retain viewers with a more satisfying TV experience, win new viewers and promote archived or long tail content

1. 1
Television Linked To The Web
Lyndon Nixon, MODUL University, Vienna
Jan Thomsen, CONDAT AG, Germany
Linking the Web seamlessly with Broadcast Television
Issues and Lessons Learned
EBU BroadThinking 2015
March 18 2015, EBU

2. 2
Why? Consumer interest in TV content.
ARD/ZDF Online Study 2014 „Second Screen: Parallelnutzung von Fernsehen und Internet“

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Consumers rely on companion devices
Part of infographic courtesy http://socialitv.web.ua.pt
Full image at:
http://socialitv.web.ua.pt/index.php/contents/images/

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Frustration in meeting an information need
„... a true TV ecosystem must functionally integrate the apps with the
television programming service and content being offered to the consumer.“
TVs can't be smart. Stop trying to make it happen. - WIRED Opinion, Gary Myer, Oct 2013

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Companion screen apps haven‘t succeeded
(yet?)
Why aren‘t they succeeding?
• Check-ins and Social Web
aren‘t enough
• Users miss deeper
integration with the content of
the TV program
• Broadcasters prefer control
and access to user instead of
giving it to OTT offers

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The concept of Linked Television
meet the viewer‘s information need
• directly associated with the TV program
• easily accessible for the viewer
• under the control of the broadcaster

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Research and development issues
seed content
Annotation
Enrichment
Related Content
Curation
Multiscreen Viewing
Personalisation
Media Fragments

8. 8
The LinkedTV Solution

9. 9
Scenario implementation (Web based)
LinkedCulture app
 Easy access to
information on the art
objects discussed in the
program
 Secondary screen-
orientation, cast TV
program to main screen

10. 10
Issues preventing broadcast TV use
Issue Explanation
Identifiers Move from Web URL/URI to Broadcast DVB URLs
• Identifiers for a distinct program - not a specific
locator for a program stream (live, repeat, on
demand) - used for association with annotations
Metadata Move from Web metadata best practices to broadcast
metadata lack of best practice; choice of metadata
model
• LinkedTV metadata much more fine grained than
EPG data, lack of a standard model for this
• No best practice how an application can get the
metadata for a TV program
Fragments From W3C Media Fragment URI support to ?
• Used to reference occurrence of entities inside the
program
• Temporal offset needs to be measured against the
start time (0s) of continuous media

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Issues preventing broadcast TV use - 2
Issue Explanation
Multi-screen Browsing enrichments in depth is best done on a
separate screen to the TV content
• The main screen needs to find a companion screen
and establish a connection to it, with permissions to
open content via URL
or
• The companion screen can ask the main screen for
the identifier of the content it is showing to open the
associated enrichment directly
and
• Main and companion screens would stay in sync

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HbbTV 1.5 test implementation
LinkedNews app
 Easy access to
background to the news
 Focus on key concepts of
interest in each item
 hbbTV single screen and
dual screen apps

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• Agreement on identification of TV content
 Support for the Media Fragment URI 1.0 specification in TV media
players, STBs
 Consistent implementation of spatial and temporal markers for
Broadcast TV (e.g. set start point of segments via StreamEvents)
 Description and addressing scheme for rich TV annotations (e.g. via
WebVTT Timed Annotation Track, using TVAnytime extensions)
• HbbTV apps need to be able to send and sync content on a companion
screen
Our position on HbbTV 2.0

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The outlook for broadcast Linked Television?
• Agreement on identification of TV content
 Support for the Media Fragment URI 1.0 specification in TV media
players, STBs
 Consistent implementation of spatial and temporal markers for
Broadcast TV (e.g. set start point of segments via StreamEvents)
 Description and addressing scheme for rich TV annotations (e.g. via
WebVTT Timed Annotation Track, using TVAnytime extensions)
• HbbTV apps need to be able to send and sync content on a companion
screen
Signalling of broadcast-related applications
Transport of data, exchange with servers
Starting applications on a Companion Screen,
Communication with a Companion Screen,
Synchronising with a Companion Screen.
Sync between broadcast and broadband content

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 LinkedTV is funded by the EU under Framework
Programme 7
 Duration: Oct 2011 to Mar 2015
 Consortium:
 Fraunhofer IAIS (DE), MODUL U (AT), EURECOM (FR),
CERTH (GR), UEP (CZ), CWI (NL), Sound&Vision (NL),
Noterik (NL), RBB (DE), Condat (DE), U Mons (BE), U St.
Gallen (CH)
 http://showcase.linkedtv.eu, http://www.linkedtv.eu,
Twitter @linkedtv
 For further enquiries:
Lyndon Nixon
lyndon.nixon@modul.ac.at
Thank you for your attention!