BSkyB is looking to launch Picnic, a pay-TV service with Sky Sports 1, Sky Movies, Sky One, a children’s channel and a factual channel.
The current plan is to broadcast the channels at various times of the day on MPEG-2 streams, which would be sent to a DSL set-top box likely to be a hybrid of an existing Freeview box.
Permission For IPTV
However, Sky has asked Ofcom for permission to also use IPTV to offer Sky channels over the Web. They also want to employ MPEG-4 to enable Sky News to broadcast 24 hours a day.
This explains why BSkyB chairman James Murdoch recently criticised the BBC iPlayer for inhibiting the chances of rival services to compete on a level footing.
Sky is said to be currently in talks with software partners on the plans.
Picnic & Kangaroo Both On Way
Picnic could launch later this year, and alongside Kangaroo from the BBC, ITV and Channel 4, could provide British viewers with a great choice of content on-demand.
The BBC iPlayer seems to have opened the door for other companies to give Web TV a go, after seeing how successful that type of service could be.
