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 Video-on-demand hopes to do for broadcasting what iTunes did for the record industry. In a VoD world, armchair viewers tap into a vast onscreen catalogue and download the film or TV programme of their choice, which can be stored on a hard drive or set-top box, burned on to a disc or rented. Watching films when it suits a viewer rather than a scheduler is already commonplace in the cable and satellite industries, but the widespread availability of fast broadband connections is bringing VoD within the reach of almost all UK households.
Thanks to iTunes and the ubiquitous iPod, music has a digital delivery system that fights back against the piracy onslaught and suits the demands of the when-you-want-it generation. VoD lags behind its music counterpart, due in part to Hollywood's caution over film libraries appearing on file-sharing sites such as Grokster or BitTorrent, and a row between British broadcasters and independent programme producers over who controls on-demand rights. The British dispute has been resolved and US film studios are beginning to embrace internet delivery, which means the next 12 months should accelerate the roll-out of VoD across the UK.
From zero to £244m
Estimates of the potential size of the VoD market vary. If you include VoD's close relatives of pay-per-view and near video-on-demand (where a film or programme is available every 15 minutes), the global VoD market will rise from $3.2bn (£1.7bn) currently to $10.7bn in 2010, according to estimates from Informa, as cable companies upgrade their networks and broadband enters more households.
The UK market is expected to show strong growth. Screen Digest forecasts that the delivery of films on demand via broadband to home computers, a market that is virtually non-existent in the UK, will generate revenues of £244m by 2010. The market via cable and satellite will be worth £330m over the same period, Screen Digest adds.
Report in full is published in The Guardian
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