Many young generations would say I do not listen to Radio or never watch Television. Then my question to them is how do they consume video content to get information, to learn and for entertainment? 

With the advancement of technology, the access to devices has increased. Some technologies have disrupted how content is created and shared. Large technology-based organisations are profiting from the increased use of platforms which do not care about the harm that their services cause. Why do we have Warrant-of-Fitness (WOF) for private, public or commercial vehicles we use? WOF safeguards and aims to minimise any harm to users or bystanders on the road. Regular WOF of vehicles check the roadworthiness of the vehicle and try to avoid any potential accidents due to failure in the vehicle. Similarly, those who want to drive should have the knowledge and skill to manure the vehicle while driving within the rules set. There are period checks for driver’s licence too.

Both Radio and Television broadcasters make a lot of effort to have trained, knowledgeable and skilled staff to carry out broadcasting activities. They have professional ethics and conduct to follow and those broadcast and media institutions have to follow procedures to make sure that the information is accurate and truthful.

My previous articles highlighted the harm that in general Digital and specifically AI could introduce with improper use of those technologies to manipulate text, sound and visuals contributing to fake news.

Sadly, today everybody thinks they can create content and share. They hardly know any ethics, principles or implications that their content could cause. If someone claims that I am a chef or I am a pilot as technology provides lots of assistance to perform that task, would you eat any food that person prepared without any check or would you board that flight?

I am not going to write too much about media literacy and journalism today in this article. I invite you to share your views with us through social media or possibly via a survey that we may conduct. Instead, I would outline how television evolved during the last two decades in New Zealand from analogue to digital and its readiness to serve the public with trusted information and affordable education and entertainment.

New Zealand commenced its transition from analogue television to digital television broadcasting with satellite direct-to-home (DTH) services. Quickly followed by digital terrestrial television DTT) transmissions started in 2007 in three main cities. Those transmissions covered nearly 75% population and the coverage increased to about 86% in 2013 just before switching off the analogue television broadcasting service (Analogue Switch Off – ASO).

Compared to mobile advancement, DTT advancements are slow. The first mobile service was an analogue service that was later replaced by digital services. The upgrades have gone through five generations and you may have heard about 3G, 4G, 5G so on.

Freeview

The initial digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) service was branded as Freeview where all the over-the-air broadcast programme channels can be selected from a single guide known as an Electronic Programme Guide (EPG). This was a transformation of television guides generally published in printed form in a Newspaper or special television programme magazine to an electronic guide.

Freeview is New Zealand’s free-to-air television platform. It is operated by a joint venture between New Zealand’s major free-to-air broadcasters – government-owned Television New Zealand and Radio New Zealand, government-subsidised Whakaata Māori, and the American-owned Warner Bros. Discovery (operators of Three, Bravo, Eden and Rush).

It consists of an HD-capable digital terrestrial television service to around 86% of the population in the major urban and provincial centres of New Zealand, and a standard-definition satellite television service – DTH, covering the whole of mainland New Zealand and the major offshore islands. Freeview uses the DVB-S and DVB-T broadcast transmission standards on government-provided spectrum.

Freeview was launched in May 2007, preparing for analogue switch-off, which began on 30 September 2012 and was completed on 1 December 2013. In 2014, it was estimated that Freeview made up approximately 61.7% of the television share in New Zealand. Currently, all television receivers sold to New Zealand audiences are equipped with built-in capability to process digital television signals from reception to the display. Some TV receivers are capable of Radio-Frequency RF circuits with built-in features for both DTH satellite and DTT terrestrial TV.

Freeview-certified set-top boxes and Integrated Decoder TVs (iDTVs), as well as Personal Video Recorders (PVRs), were/are available at most major retailers. Uncertified equipment can also be used to receive the service, which may have advantages (cheaper, extra features, international channels) and disadvantages (no/limited EPG, no auto-retuning) over certified equipment. Today, all receivers are capable of DTT and also to connect via Wi-Fi.

Freeviewplus 

In 2015, New Zealand introduced the ability to access online video services seamlessly with the over-the-air television broadcasting service. As the penetration, availability, and affordability of Broadband increased, some video clips of News and television programmes were made available to access from a media server of a broadcaster. A technology known as Integrated Broadcast-Broadband (IBB) paved the way for Hybrid Television or HbbTV. New Zealand also adopted this technology and new services were called Freeviewplus. There are/were similar technology and service advancements happening in the UK and Australia. New Zealand was an early adopter of these technologies and is the reason for these transitions. However, those early adoptions and transitions presented early opportunities for the New Zealand public to enjoy high-quality digital television broadcasting services.

Figure 1 Freeviewplus is a coming campaign in 2015, nearly 10 years ago.

FreeviewPlus was the name given to the HbbTV service in New Zealand (and also in Australia). FreeviewPlus was launched in mid-2015, with a partnership between TVNZ, Mediaworks and Māori Television.

During those transitions in the last decade, TVNZ and Freeviewplus offered catch-up services in addition to alerts, favourites, reminders, searches, recommendations and personalisation based on profiles and so on.

TVNZ+

Recently, New Zealand public television broadcaster TVNZ branded its broadcasting services as TVNZ+. People living in New Zealand can access the same three programme channels that are broadcast linearly (as a scheduled broadcast service) over the air (OTA). To access and view these three channels,  the viewer needs a reasonable broadband service. While OTA service is truly free to access, to access TVNZ+ streaming service requires the viewer to pay for a broadband service. That is the choice that a viewer makes when OTA transmission is available without incurring any cost.   Figure 2 shows a screenshot of the user interface.

Figure 2: Live streaming TV (screenshot of the user interface)

The streaming services of TVNZ can be viewed on any device. Some of the examples are shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3 View on any device

TVNZ+ platform requires the viewer to register, which is free. The audience can navigate using the user interface to select their choice and view.