UTStarcom has begun shipping IPTV set-top-boxes in China featuring predictive text input solution eZiText in English and Chinese. The licensing agreement signed last November solidifies Zi Corporation's relationship with UTStarcom and opens the door to other potential applications for Zi's leading input products within the UTStarcom family of products and solutions. Zi is to receive fixed royalties under this agreement.

Now dubbed 'Americas Com', Informa Telecoms & Media ran the conference successfully as 'GSM Americas' for 12 years, working to gather delegates from all over South and Central America for two days of networking and the opportunity to benchmark strategies and technology choices with colleagues from comparable markets. These delegates were drawn from mainly mobile operators, as well as their suppliers and partners.

CCTV has launched its IPTV service pilot in Beijing in time for the start of the Olympic Games using 80 Envivio 4Caster encoders. CCTV is one of the companies licensed to provide IPTV services in China and is the official Internet and Mobile Broadcaster for the 2008 Olympic Games. Envivio is a strategic partner to CCTV.com for the broadcast of the Games.

IPTV subscriber numbers are growing steadily, but widespread uptake of services is yet to reach its full promise. As telcos, service providers and content and technology vendors prepare to gather in Amsterdam for one of the industry’s larger events, BitBand refutes some of the most prevalent myths that deter potential players from entering this booming market.

Find out the top ten myths after the jump.

USTelematics announces an agreement with American Wireless to provide WiMax service in automobiles equipped with USTelematics’ Voyager Mobile IPTV. Howard Leventhal, CEO of USTelematics said “Today and much more in the future, WiMax service will transform reception of video and live TV on the move. As new WiMax services proliferate, such as those to become widely available in the recently announced Sprint, Clearwire, Google, and Intel joint venture, USTelematics expects to become a key player in getting WiMax deployed en masse. Empowering live real broadband TV in the car is a unique capability of WiMax. We expect that our agreement with American Wireless to provide Clearwire service within Voyager will accelerate deployment of WiMax nationwide”.

In late Feburary of 2008 co-founder Steve Chen hinted that live streaming video could be coming this year to YouTube. Chen said, "2008. We’ll do it this year. Live video is just something that we’ve always wanted to do, we’ve never had the resources to do it correctly, but now with Google, we hope to actually launch something this year." However, YouTube won't be getting into the business of live streaming this year or next reports Michael Learmonth.

The 2008 Communications Market Report by Ofcom shows broadband-delivered TV services are catching on with British viewers. Content on demand has consumers of all ages showing a growing interest in accessing audio-visual content online; 17% of those with broadband watched TV over the internet, up by eight percentage points on 2006 – and this is particularly apparent among younger people.

The internet has become an important distribution platform, both for the television industry and for consumers seeking online content. For example, the BBC iPlayer in May 2008 served 700,000 video streams daily. Another increase can be seen in a third of internet users watching online video clips and webcasts in 2007 compared to just over a fifth in 2006. In April of 2008, the number of UK viewers watching YouTube doubled to that of one year ago reaching 9 million.

Building on the initial success of the Boston Pops' online video initiative, the Boston Symphony Orchestra and PermissionTV have expanded the interactive experience to showcase the Tanglewood summer concert series on the Web. The 2008 Festival of Contemporary Music celebrated the award-winning collections of renowned composer Elliott Carter and is available at TanglewoodWebTV.org. Fans can access interactive videos, behind-the-scenes interviews with orchestra members, an exclusive tour of the Tanglewood grounds and a comprehensive documentary about Carter.

TVover.net and Parks Associates are giving away 3 free CONNECTIONS Europe 2008 passes to the first 3 readers that email us at media@tvover.net with name, email, company, address and phone number.

CONNECTIONS Europe is a pan-European event dedicated to advancing the collective thinking of strategists and executives active in marketing products and services integrated under the umbrella term, digital living. In 2007, CONNECTIONS Europe will have a strong focus on entertainment services such as those being introduced for IPTV. As part of the CONNECTIONS Europe mission to accelerate and even develop innovative thinking among the diverse business sectors within the environment, there will be keynotes aimed at analyzing the options of bundled services, business models presented that work to create innovative revenue scenarios, and pertinent consumer data from key Western European nations. The goal then is to look at the national consumer and also to view that consumer profile for digital as he/she sits within the scope of Western European.

For more information, visit http://www.connectionseurope.com.

Attend the CONNECTIONS Europe Summit Series on August 29 in Berlin for high-level sessions on the best strategies for growing revenues now and in the future. CONNECTIONS Europe will provide attendees with international consumer research and feature interactive discussions on advanced television services, new media and digital content, and value-added services.

Verizon FiOS TV now offers 100 HD television channels to consumers in North Jersey. As a result of this major enhancement, Verizon is now offering consumers more HD than Comcast or Cablevision.

The new channel lineup will be offered to existing FiOS TV markets in northern New Jersey. Communities in the southern part of the state will see similar enhancements in the near future.

BitGravity will provide high-definition object and video delivery for CollegeHumor.com. BitGravity’s high-definition, fast-loading content delivery provides an unprecedented high-quality experience for CollegeHumor fans. In addition, BitGravity’s scalability and competitive pricing made it the first choice for CollegeHumor’s growing need for a new delivery network capable of supporting their galleries of images and videos.

Research and Markets has added the "IPTV Launch Guide" report to their offering. IPTV Launch Guide is a flexible offering allowing you to leverage our experience and best-practices and implement them in your timeframe with your own resources. The Launch Guide is designed to save you time and money. Based on best-practices developed through hands-on trials and market implementations, our guide will eliminate costly trial and error implementations, provide consistency across your service provisioning workspace, and ensure the opportunity for continuous process improvement.

Tilgin has won an order of High Definition IPTV technology from a major incumbent telecom operator in the Middle East. This field trial order is part of the operator’s initial IPTV deployment and IPTV technology evaluation taking place this quarter. The order value is limited. The operator plans to later expand its IPTV offering to it’s over 850,000 broadband subscribers.

Verizon is making it easier to enjoy the ultimate home-entertainment experience with a new promotional savings offer for FiOS TV. New customers who subscribe to FiOS TV between now and Oct. 4 will receive their choice of a year's free use of either a HD DVR or an HD Home Media DVR. Verizon is also offering new FiOS TV customers, or existing customers who upgrade to a bundled package, one free month of HBO and Cinemax, which includes the latest hit movies, documentaries and original programming from more than 25 premium channels and access to hundreds of titles on VOD. New customers who take advantage of this offer will save between $200 and $260 the first year, depending upon the DVR customers choose.