News roundup July 2016
A roundup of July’s news and developments:
The Local Government Association called for the Government to “re-affirm its commitment to a national minimum broadband speed across the country to stop hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses falling into a digital twilight zone”. A timetable for action is needed; the LGA’s Up to Speed campaign is intended to ensure every resident and business has access to faster broadband.
BT published its results for the first quarter to 30th June 2016 following on from Ofcom’s proposals earlier this week to make Openeach a legally separate company from the rest of BT (more on this here); it flagged its proposals to Ofcom for how Openreach should operate in future: “We believe our proposals provide Ofcom with every benefit they're seeking but avoid the extensive, disproportionate costs that would be incurred if, for example, assets had to be transferred into a newly incorporated subsidiary company. Our proposals will also ensure that Openreach continues to benefit from being part of the larger BT group, which helps to reduce the risk it faces when investing in new products.” BT said it would continue to engage with Ofcom over the coming months.
Talk Talk announced and industry-wide coalition and campaign “to give internet users a voice in the future of British broadband” with reference to Ofcom’s current consultation on how Openreach should operate in future.
In its annual Public Service Broadcasting (PSB) Research Report, Ofcom reported how on-demand services have become increasingly popular. Younger viewers have particularly embraced these services, with one third of all viewing among 16-24s now being spent on on-demand services in 2016. Viewing to paid on-demand services has especially increased, rising 14 percentage points to 20% in two years.
Buzzangle Music reported how in the U.S. audio streaming more than doubled in the first half of 2016 compared with the same period last year: “There were 209.4 billion on-demand streams in this half-year. More than half of those, 114 billion, were audio plays, marking the first period in which streams from audio services like Spotify and Apple Music exceeded video streams from YoiTube, Vevo and the like.”
A Computer Weekly blog post considered how new technologies such as 4K and virtual reality are likely to drive consumer demand for gigabit broadband services in the future. 4K and higher resolutions will be the norm driven by the increasing availability and choice of 4K-ready screens from consumer electronics manufacturers. In addition most TVs are now smart making more streaming content accessible than ever before. ISP Review reported on current and forthcoming 4K services from Sky, BT and Virgin Media.
CCS Insight also considered the importance of connectivity in supporting the rapid growth of the app economy, predicting that we are “on the cusp of the next big transition in apps and services in terms of their sophistication, demands on the network and how users interact with them”. It suggested that virtual reality and machine learning will place significant new demands on networks in the future (in terms of supporting higher frame rates and resolutions and ensuring low latency).
Network World considered the impact of virtual and augmented reality (as exemplified by the success of Pokémon Go this month) on network infrastructure: “The network must become smarter and programmable. All of the resources in the infrastructure need to be orchestrated together to provide the desired end-user experience. The network needs to become responsive to applications. It needs to know the times traffic spikes are likely to occur—for example, during the opening ceremony of the Olympics for VR, the lunchtime and weekend for Pokémon Go, the local event that everyone wants to stream—and be able to react and respond in real time by providing the necessary connectivity and capacity.”
Finally, Pokémon Go has also provoked further net neutrality debate this month: Ars Technica reported how T-Mobile’s decision to zero-rate data for the game has provoked criticism from net neutrality campaigners (see this previous post for more on zero rating).
