Tour de France

UK commercial broadcaster, ITV (note: the name is an acronym for Independent Television Network), says that its broadband video and red-button interactive TV coverage of the recent Tour de France bike race proved popular with viewers. According to the broadcaster, its red-button Tour de France coverage, which, among other things, allowed viewers to access live streaming video of the race, generated approximately 500,000 interactions, around half of which were video views--representing a 250% year-over-year increase. It says that its Tour de France Web site, meanwhile, which offered video highlights alongside news, podcasts, galleries, athlete profiles and more, generated over a million video plays (up 714% from last year), 324,000 unique visits (vs.

Norwegian interactive TV company, never.no, announced Tuesday that it is powering interactive TV coverage of the upcoming Tour de France bicycle race (July 4th-26th) for Norway's largest commercial broadcaster, TV 2. According to the company, viewers will be able to use Twitter, other Web interfaces, and SMS and MMS messages from their mobiles to comment on the action, send in photos, and respond to polls and questions posed both by TV 2 and other viewers, with their submissions appearing on TV 2's broadcast and Web coverage in "almost" real time.