Dear iTV Doctor:
We are looking forward at all the interactive platforms available now, and coming down the pike: EBIF, tru2Way, TVworks, PowerTV, MDN, NDS, OpenTV, Verizon Widgets, DirecTV Widgets...the list appears to be getting longer every day! Is there anybody who can help us develop applications for all those platforms?
Overwhelmed in Oregon
Dear Overwhelmed:
Yes, there is an extremely capable company who provides support for your needs: itaas, Inc. has a terrific program named istart that does exactly what you need. In point of fact, the iTV Doctor is so impressed with the itaas approach that he has joined hands with them to accelerate and broaden interactive television
deployment at very reasonable costs!
But to learn more about what a developer's program can do, I turned y
our question over to Vibha Rustagi, president & CEO of itaas, Inc. Here's what Vibha has to say:
Dear Overwhelmed:
At itaas, we do understand your pain! When we entered the interactive TV space 10 years ago, it was expensive to get started and the market was in its infancy. We decided to help kick-start interactive television with:
1) a central repository for application development, tools and support,
2) a pool of resources that could be leveraged across multiple application developers to reduce entry costs,
3) a marketing support mechanism to provide more impact to the industry by aggregating the capabilities of multiple interactive companies into one location.
Interactive television developers, including networks, advertisers and operators, needed a resource for development tools and, more importantly, support for a wide variety of software platforms including client and headend support for native, EBIF, tru2way and IP-based applications. They needed to get their interactive advertising and content running quickly. And they needed lab facilities, remote headend capabilities and testing tools, where they could develop and test their applications without having to invest in a complete headend.
The istart program, which started years ago, was designed to help seed the industry with viable, exciting applications by making development easier and more affordable--and at a faster pace. We currently support seven development platforms with more in the works. And, in many cases, application developers and programmers decide to focus on the business and marketing side of their offerings and outsource the complete development of applications to itaas. istart offers a variety of models for development support, so whether you decide to develop completely in-house or outsource the development, itaas is here to help you through the entire application development lifecycle. Don¹t be overwhelmed, just give us a call or check out the itaas istart program online at http://www.itaas.com.
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The iTV Doctor is Rick Howe, who provides interactive television consulting services to programmers and advertisers. He is the recipient of a CTAM Tami Award for retention marketing and this year was nominated to Cable Pioneers. He is also the co-author of a patent for the use of multiscreen mosaics in EPG's. Endorsed by top cable and satellite distributors, "Dr" Howe still makes house calls. His services include product development, distribution strategy and the development of low-cost interactive applications for rapid deployment across all platforms. Have a question for the iTV Doctor? Email him at itvdoctor@itvt.com
