Artificial Life's Mobile Participation TV System to Enable Interaction at IAAF Championships

Artificial Life, a company that is headquartered in Los Angeles and that operates a production center in Hong Kong, announced Monday that it has signed an agreement with the Berlin Organizing Committee 2009 to implement its MoPA-TV participation TV platform at the upcoming 12th IAAF World Championships in Athletics in Berlin.

The MoPA-TV platform (note: the name stands for "mobile participation television") is billed as enabling live broadcasters to support real-time interaction with their shows via viewers' mobile phones. According to the company, the platform allows viewers to use mobile Web, SMS and various other supported communications channels to register before or during a live TV show, enter an on-screen moniker and select an animated 3D avatar, and then use their avatar to participate in the show and see themselves represented on the TV screen in real time. Meanwhile, in the television studio, a real-time joystick control allows a studio operator to "generate a camera path flying through the 3D scene of all participating viewers' avatars," Artificial Life says. According to the company, MoPA-TV can animate over 100,000 viewers in real time.

Artificial Life's deal with the Berlin Organizing Committee will see its service made available in the Olympiastadion Berlin to the approximately 70,000 people who are expected to attend the IAAF World Championships on any of its days. Participating attendees will appear as avatars on the stadium's two big digital video screens and will be able to use their avatars to take part in various live "interactive mobile game sessions," the company says. "We are happy to offer to the more than 70,000 visitors of the World Championship also during the competition breaks such a unique entertainment tool," Laruens Lipperheide, marketing director for the Berlin Organizing Committee, said in a prepared statement. "The MoPA-TV quiz show allows the audience to participate directly and interactively at the action in the Olympiastadion." Added Artificial Life CEO, Eberhard Schoneburg: "It is our honor to bring MoPA-TV to such a prominent athletic event. First of all, I would like to thank the Berlin Organizing Committee 2009 for choosing MoPA-TV. The interactive elements that our system provides will definitely add some fun to this intense competition. We are excited about bringing our innovative technology to the spectators so they can enjoy watching world-class athletes compete and partaking in our live MoPA-TV entertainment game shows at the same time!"