According to the Open Mobile Video Coalition (OMVC), "the numbers of broadcasters on the air with mobile continues to rise, with 76 stations now on-the-air in 32 markets." OMVC executive director Anne Schelle says the organization forecasts that mobile DTV will reach more than 71 million households in the next 12 months.
At NAB 2011, mobile DTV had a greater presence than ever. The Mobile DTV Pavilion (Booth #N4036), co-hosted by the OMVC and the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), featured a wide array of new consumer products enabling mobile DTV reception. Visitors to the Pavilion tried out new products from LG Electronics, Hauppauge Computer Works, DTVinteractive, Pixtree, Triveni Digital, Crest Technology, Decontis, and Axel Technology. There was an in-vehicle display from Winegard and Dell's prototype netbook computer with built-in mobile DTV. Both mobile DTV broadcaster consortia, the Mobile500 Alliance and Mobile Content Venture, were in the Mobile DTV Pavilion. Also new were live and innovative 'Tweet-TV' social media applications for mobile DTV, demonstrated for the first time at NAB 2011.
The ATSC mobile DTV standard supports a wide variety of mobile services such as customizable emergency alerts, live audio feeds, datacasting with traffic maps, sports and news highlights that can be stored in memory on a device, VOD, time-shifted television, mobile digital video recording, interactive polling, electronic coupons, 3-D TV, targeted advertising, and an electriconic service guide (ESG) for ease of tuning.
