Chris Barton: Lack of vision threatens our brave new world

Here is my wishlist for a FreeView TV set top box: a 400 gigabyte disk drive, multiple TV tuners (let's say six), and a multiformat, fast-as-you-can-get DVD burner.

While you're at it, please make the box a multimedia hub so I can insert my digital camera card to play digital photo slideshows; plug in my daughter's iPod to experience the weird music she listens to; and connect the camcorder that I intend to buy to play digital movies.

And hook up a WiFi wireless transceiver so I can get phone calls and broadband through the air.

It's not as silly as it sounds. FreeView, the brave new world of digital TV coming to a set top near you next year, represents a unique opportunity - nationwide installation of new aerials and digital equipment into New Zealand homes. So why not install something that can deliver real converged communications - so-called "triple play" (voice, video and data) services?

Don't hold your breath. Broadcast Communications Ltd, the state-owned enterprise charged with delivering the digital infrastructure, is a doddery organisation so lacking in vision that it wouldn't know what the square is, let alone how to think outside it. And it certainly wouldn't have the gumption to take on Telecom in delivering phone and broadband services. So a golden opportunity will go begging.

Meanwhile, all the attention about FreeView is on the content. It is one thing to have all the extra channels that digital brings, but will they be any good? Of course not. Everyone knows it will be the same old dross, just more of it, but with enough gems hidden among the multichannel stream to keep us watching.

But the focus on content entirely misses the combat zone of digital TV - the real battle is for the set top box.

That's because - as owners of MySky and enthusiasts watching TV through a computer will tell you - the way we watch is changing. No longer will we be slaves to the tyranny of broadcast schedules. In the digital TV world we watch what we want, when we want and without ads.

With MySky everything I watch is recorded, and if I happen upon a programme that's being broadcast, I'll wait until it is 15 minutes under way so I can skip the ad breaks.

Thanks to internet downloads, a growing number of New Zealanders have already watched many episodes of Big Love and The Sopranos before they've been broadcast here.

It is a trend that threatens to wreak havoc with local TV schedules, but from a consumer point of view it's great - no more waiting months or years for your favourite programmes.

The window to digital TV is the electronic programming guide - an onscreen listing, weeks ahead, of programmes for all the channels. Click once with the remote and programme records. Click twice and programme is "series-linked", meaning you'll never miss an episode of Prison Break again.

But herein lies a headache for TVNZ. The moment it makes its advance programme listings available on FreeView, it will have a big job justifying charging newspapers and magazines to run the same schedules.

Good riddance. None of the other broadcasters charge for their listings, and this obscene use of copyright perpetuated by TVNZ has held up the development of a free-to-air electronic programming guide for far too long.

As well as having a feature-rich programming guide, FreeView will need a good set top box to compete with Sky. Hence the need for more storage than the MySky box; more tuners - so you can record multiple programmes at once (rather than just two on MySky); and a DVD burner so you can keep programmes long term (something Sky doesn't offer).

But here FreeView faces a huge problem - the technology allows users to skip the ads which are vital to the FreeView broadcasters' revenue streams. Subscription-based Sky doesn't have that problem.

A likely FreeView response will be to promote castrated set top boxes without the recording ability. But if the FreeView broadcasters were really smart they'd be selling an all-singing and dancing multimedia communications hub.

Phone plus broadband for about $50 a month, with multiple TV channels thrown in, is a sales proposition that would really turn consumer heads. So when the FreeView salesperson comes calling, don't be sold a crock. Demand a set top box that truly sets you free.