In advance of a scheduled horserace on a particular day (races will take place every 10 minutes), the home viewer will be able to join the virtual world, select a horse that has a particular gene code associated with it, tell the application how he/she wants it trained, and then enter the horse for a scheduled race the next day. Depending on the virtual weather designated for that race, the "conditions" of the track, the way the horse has been "trained," the skills of the "rider," and an element of chance thrown in, the best prepared horse and rider will win.

According to John Reilly, a spokesperson for the venture, a communications backend is not ready for phase 1 of the project, though VisTV intends to offer it in the future. When it is available, viewers will be able to swap ideas via a chat application and make the virtual world come even more to life. As for the actual interactive application, Reilly says branding has been developed by BBC Media, but the actual interface is not ready for public viewing.

Reilly went on to tell [itvt] that the financials of iRace have yet to be worked out. Most likely, the viewer will pay to enter the world, possibly pay for a horse, be able to bet on the race, and win prizes or money. (Note: Betting on horseracing in the UK is legal, so ITV platforms like SkyDigital and Telewest have begun to develop partnerships with betting brokers like Ladbrokes to offer those services. Though betting on TV is still controversial because of the TV's presence in the home, the popularity of betting over TV is expected to grow as people become more familiar with the interactive platform and aware of the financial restrictions required to keep bets realistic.) Even if people decide they don't want to bet on a horse or even enter a race, says Reilly, they will still be able to participate, as iRace is designed to be its own virtual world.

iRace will include commentary from professional callers, live chat with other viewers, and other services such as tcommerce. The goal will be to make it a "mass market, very consumer-wide product-one that will be affordable by everyone." Sitting as an advisor on the venture's channel will be Bill Oppenheim, a person who counsels wealthy horse buyers around the world. His participation is expected to lend credibility. At first, the deployment will take place on Telewest's cable network, but eventually any cable or satellite digital set-top box network can license the platform and launch its own application based on iRace-or incorporating other conceptual worlds as ideas emerge. [itvt] believes this technology could be very "evergreen."

Producer: VisITV
Network: Telewest's digital cable deployment
Channel: iRace - a 24 hour virtual horseracing channel
Platform: Telewest's digtal set-top box with Liberate middleware
Appearing: 2nd Quarter 2001






iRace logo




Top view of the track




Wideview of the track




Horse and rider




Stampede.


More Screenshots of iRace


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