An international experiment deploying ITU-standardized IPTV technologies has taken place 6-8 February 2012. IPTV services were used to live-stream scenes from the Sapporo Snow Festival in Japan and to provide supporting Video-on-Demand (VoD) segments.

ITU Headquarters in Geneva received the stream from the head-end server in Japan, participating alongside organizations from Japan, Singapore and Thailand in what is the first transcontinental broadcast of a live event using IPTV technology standardized end-to-end by ITU. The connection uses native IPv6 from ITU Headquarters to Japan.

Proprietary IPTV services have hampered the growth of this exciting new market, and such experiments - together with ITU IPTV Interoperability events – are important steps towards broadening the IPTV market through globally-interoperable services. Standardized IPTV will lead to a whole new market for innovation, and ITU standards will ensure this market remains open, competitive and accessible to all.

First approved in 2009, Recommendation ITU-T H.762, a “Lightweight Interactive Multimedia Environment” (LIME) for IPTV services, is the standard with which Sapporo’s live-stream IPTV application complies. Hokkaido Television Broadcasting (HTB) developed this application, and is one of many broadcasters, manufacturers and research institutes involved in the IPTV experiments. The experiments have been organized by Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications (NICT) and are being conducted over its IPv6 research network, Japan Gigabit Network-eXtreme (JGN-X).

Other ITU-T IPTV standards also formed part of the infrastructure: H.770 IPTV Service discovery, H.721 IPTV terminal for VoD and Linear TV, H.701 IPTV Error correction, H.750 IPTV Metadata and the Primetime Emmy Award winning H.264 Video compression codec. The experiments also used Openflow, PCE/VNTM and sa46t.

For more on ITU’s IPTV standardization work, please see ITU’s IPTV Global Standards Initiative here.

IPTV-GSI, Geneva, Switzerland, 13 - 17 February 2012

TSB Circular 243

Registration form

IPTV-GSI

Registration form

Circular 220

IPTV-GSI

Convening letter (TSB Circular 221)

Online registration

Internet of Things Global Standards Initiative (IoT-GSI)

ITU announced the winners of its IPTV App Challenge at ITU Telecom World 2011. The corporate app category was given to Discover Japan from NHK Enterprises (Japan) which offers users an introduction to the best of Japanese culture. The best individual/SME award split the vote and was awarded to 7 Days Gallery and Dengue Combat.
 
Discover Japan highlights Tokyo's cutting-edge pop culture but also the traditional culture of Kyoto, a city steeped in over 1,000 years of history. With broadcast TV and video on demand as the areas of focus, the application responds to users' interests, providing answers to their questions, offering interesting information, and enabling them to shop online.
 
7 Days Gallery, by Alève Mine and Eric Bréchemier is a digital space to promote new artists/designers. It organizes seven pieces of art work from one artist/designer in a collection, and presents a different collection for each day of the week. Users can browse the pictures with their remote control and find out more information on each of the piece of art, such as its title, description text, a web site (URL)  and online shopping possibilities. Users can also find information about the artist including: their biography, portrait and web site.
 
Dengue Combat is an interactive TV programme to promote awareness and knowledge to combat dengue fever. IPTV users are informed by watching a video programme about dengue fever. They can also find out the nearest medical care facility by providing their postal code and verify their knowledge of this disease by participating in a quiz.
 
More details on the apps can be found at: www.itu.int/challenges/iptv.

Launched in July 2011, ITU’s IPTV Application Challenge is a ground-breaking stimulus to innovation in this exciting new field of ICT.

Highlighting the rapidly expanding range of the IPTV ecosystem, this unique competition - the first of its kind and worldwide in its scope - presents an opportunity to develop IPTV applications running over either ITU-T H.761 Ginga-NCL or ITU-T H.762 LIME. Both platforms are open, flexible, easily deployed, and ensure high quality IPTV products.

In today’s global economy, innovative applications compliant with ITU’s IPTV standards represent an unparalleled commercial opportunity. However, no great idea would see the light of day without startup capital, and the best app submitted by an individual or small and medium enterprise (SME)* will thus be awarded USD10,000, courtesy of platinum sponsors; Sumitomo Electric Networks Inc., and Dentsu Inc. Winners will receive their awards in October, at the ITU Telecom World 2011 in Geneva, where a range of innovative applications will be showcased.

Before submitting an application, participants are required to register before 30 September 2011. An entry ID and application number will be assigned to participants on registration, and must be included in competition submission(s). Applications must be submitted by 5 October 2011 (Deadline extended).

* As defined in the rules

Geneva, 7 July, 2011 - ITU’s latest global Application Challenge encourages developers around the world to create innovative IPTV apps running over ITU standards.

Applicants are encouraged to think creatively about the IPTV platform and the opportunities it offers. The best app submitted by an individual or SME* will be awarded USD10,000, thanks to platinum sponsors Sumitomo Electric Networks, Inc. and Dentsu Inc. There is a separate category for corporate entries, and winners will receive their awards at a special event at the ITU Telecom World 2011 show in Geneva in October.

While highlighting the rapidly expanding range of the IPTV ecosystem, this latest ITU App Challenge is designed to stimulate ground-breaking ideas from all corners of the globe.

“ITU has pioneered a raft of standards for IPTV, which are set to transform global viewing habits. Global standards such as these will be key to take-up,” said Dr Hamadoun Touré, Secretary-General, ITU. “With this technology we have all the advantages of traditional ‘linear’ TV combined with the flexibility that the Internet offers. This challenge offers a fantastic opportunity for people to be creative, and I hope we can inspire some truly innovative thinking.”

Full press release

Two new ITU standards in the field of IPTV have recently been agreed.

The first – Recommendation ITU-T H.740 - will enable a greater level of two way communication in IPTV services. For example it will support interactive services such as voting and e-commerce while also allowing better provision for emergency alerts and audience monitoring. Simply put the standard prescribes behaviour for an IPTV terminal in the case of receiving these instructions from either a broadcaster or a user.

More technically, H.740 "Application Event Handling for IPTV services" provides a framework of application event handling in IPTV services. An application event is describes as a specific user interaction or occurrence related with multimedia content. One of the characteristics of the new standard is that it gives a careful provision of privacy protection, with differing degrees of security.

The second standard - Recommendation ITU-T H.762 - "Lightweight interactive multimedia framework for IPTV services (LIME)" gives a subset of html and javascript for use in IPTV terminals. LIME is described as being very strictly profiled so that it can be used on a resource-limited devices like TV-sets. LIME can support interactivity like widgets and portals, as well as AJAX-like applications on IPTV. LIME can be used with basic services like video-on-demand (VOD), linear (channel) service (over IP), and EPG (extended programme guide). The expected main user interface is a remote controller.

Meeting of IPTV-GSI - IPTV Global Standards Initiative

Geneva, 26-30 October 2009

Registration form

See TSB Circular 56 for more information.

IPTV-GSI Home

Meeting of NGN-GSI - Next Generation Networks Global Standards Initiative

Mar del Plata, Argentina, 2–12 September 2009

Registration form

NGN-GSI Home

Meeting of IPTV-GSI - IPTV Global Standards Initiative

Mar del Plata, Argentina, 2–8 September 2009

Registration form

IPTV-GSI Home

Meeting of Study Group 13 - Future networks including mobile and NGN

Mar del Plata, Argentina, 2–12 September 2009

Registration form

See ITU-T SG 13 Collective Letter 3 for more information.

Study Group 13 Home

Meeting of Study Group 11 - Signalling requirements, protocols and test specifications

Mar del Plata, Argentina, 2–10 September 2009

Registration form

See ITU-T SG 11 Collective Letter 3 for more information.

Study Group 11 Home

A major milestone for providing global IPTV has been reached with the approval of a new ITU standard, giving requirements for the support of IPTV services.

Experts say that standards are essential for the rollout of global IPTV services. While we have already seen a first generation of IPTV services, a second generation may see a change in regulation or market demand that will require interoperation between service and/or network providers. A potential outcome of this will be that a customer can go into a shop, buy an IPTV box, call their network operator and sign-up, and then access services from a range of third party service providers. It is to meet needs such as this the value of ITU’s work on standardization will be realised.

IPTV, defined by ITU-T as “multimedia services such as television/video/ audio/text/graphics/data delivered over IP-based networks managed to support the required level of quality of service (QoS)/quality of experience (QoE), security, interactivity and reliability”, is one of the most significant business cases and drivers for the deployment of next generation networks (NGN).

The standard, Recommendation ITU-T Y.1901, specifies high level requirements for the support of IPTV services, including requirements concerning service offering, QoS/QoE, service and content protection, middleware, content, network and end system aspects. Y.1901 and previously approved Recommendation ITU-T Y.1910, “IPTV functional architecture”, plus various other IPTV related ITU-T Recommendations, constitute an initial set of IPTV standards enabling equipment vendors, including consumer electronics suppliers, to roll-out standardized IPTV products. Deployment of ITU-T compliant products will enable service providers to offer value added services like traditional (linear) TV, video on demand (VoD) and interactive TV over IP-based managed networks such as NGN.

Y.1901 has been developed with a truly international effort at ITU-T IPTV-GSI (IPTV Global Standards Initiative) events, with the active participation of administrations, service providers and equipment vendors from a large number of countries, including, but not limited to Canada, China, France, Japan, Korea, United Kingdom and United States.

ITU-T standardization activities related to IPTV continue in various ITU-T Study Groups, in cooperation with relevant standard developing organizations, forums and consortia, including ATIS IPTV Interoperability Forum, ETSI TISPAN, Broadband Forum, Digital Video Broadcasting project and Home Gateway Initiative.

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Charles Peter Sandbank, who was very well known to many in ITU, and was recently elected as Chairman to ITU-T’s Study Group 9 has died aged 77.

Charlie, as he was affectionately known to friends and colleagues, started his long and distinguished career with STC making radio valves and later transistors. During his time here he developed some of the first semiconductor integrated circuits to be produced in Europe. Among his early papers were proposals for the techniques now commonly used in ASICS and the principle of surface mount.

In 1964 he was appointed head of the Electron Devices Laboratory at Standard Telecommunications Laboratories and in 1968 became Manager of the STL Communications Systems Division. While at STL he was responsible for the team which pioneered the use of optical fibres for communications and in 1976 built the world’s first wide band digital optical fibre communications system (140 Mbit/s between Hitchin and Stevenage) installed in BT ducts. He edited one of the first books on the technology of optical fibre communications in which he proposed the optical amplifier as now commonly used in long haul systems.

In 1978 he joined the BBC as head of its Research Department and became BBC Deputy Director of Engineering in 1984. He made personal contributions to the BBC’s work in electronic graphics; the ‘BBC MICRO’ project; HDTV and particularly digital broadcasting. NICAM stereo sound for TV was among the activities which he initiated while he was Head of Research. He played a leading role in the establishment of the technology and world-wide standards for Digital Television (a subject on which he also edited a book). The work he initiated at the BBC contributed to the establishment of the world’s first terrestrial digital radio service in 1997 and TV service in 1998. After leaving the BBC in 1993 he became a Director of Snell and Wilcox Ltd and DTI Broadcasting Technology Adviser.

He was a founder member of the DVB project, the founding Chairman of the ETSI/EBU JTC and founding co-chair of the European Digital Cinema Forum. He was also the Royal Academy of Engineering’s Visiting Professor in the Principles of Information Systems Design at the University of Bradford.

He was elected to the Royal Academy of Engineering in 1983, was also FIET and FInstP. He received Fellowships from the RTS, BKSTS and SMPTE for contributions to broadcast engineering and Honorary Doctorates from the Universities of Surrey and Bradford.

In the ITU he participated actively since the late 1970s in ITU-R SG6 (previously SG10 and 11) and in ITU-T SG9 since its formation, acting as a Vice Chairman in the last two study periods before being appointed Chairman at WTSA-08 in Johannesburg. He played a major role in the drafting of the basic Digital TV Recommendation ITU-R Rec. 601, and more recently in the ITU-T network independent middleware Recommendations. He chaired the JRG1 the joint T/R Rapporteur group on middleware and was a co-chair of the joint activity of ITU-T SG9 and ITU-T SG9 on IPTV.

The first global standard offering an in-home, high-speed network capable of delivering room-to-room HDTV has been agreed by ITU. The standard, published under the G.hn banner, promises high quality multimedia over power, coaxial, phone and other home wiring. It will give up to 20 times the throughput of existing wireless technologies and three times that of existing wired technologies.

IPTV-GSI - Internet Protocol Television Global Standards Initiative

Geneva, 24-28 November 2008

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See TSB Circular 244 for more information.

IPTV-GSI Home

A recent meeting of ITU-T’s Study Group 12 saw consent – first stage of the approval process - on two key new standards for IPTV.

The first ITU-T Recommendation defines user requirements for Quality of Experience (QoE) for IPTV services.

Quality of Experience (QoE) is defined thus: The overall acceptability of an application or service, as perceived subjectively by the end-user.

The new Recommendation (ITU-T Rec. G.1080) defines QoE requirements from an end user perspective, agnostic to network deployment architectures and transport protocols. They are specified as end-to-end and information is provided on how they influence network transport and application layer behaviour. QoE requirements for video, audio, text, graphics, control functions and meta-data are provided.

The second ITU-T Rec. (ITU-T Rec. G.1081) consented defines performance monitoring for IPTV. The goal of this is to provide higher QoS/QoE to customers by identifying, localizing and quantifying service and network issues. IPTV performance monitoring can be software based, hardware based, or a hybrid.

Monitoring parameters, monitoring points and monitoring methods are defined that allow the service provider/network operator to monitor the performance of the service delivery to the end user.

Successful deployment of IPTV services requires performance to be monitored at the customer premise (e.g. set-top-box), key aggregation points such as DSL Access Multiplexer (DSLAM) or cable modem termination system (CMTS) and at interconnect points between disparate network domains. Performance monitoring can help:

• Find errors in an end-to-end system (system debugging)
  
• Check the resource utilization and the work load of system components
  
• Compare values (metrics) regarding performance of different system deployments
  
• Provide a base for modelling the system
  
• Find system bottlenecks
  
• Optimize IPTV network deployment
  
• Ensure that system performance does not degrade with time.

IPTV standards are progressing rapidly through ITU-T's IPTV Global Standards Initiative (GSI). With successful first generation IPTV services offered by many service providers worldwide standards are seen as vital to boost next generation services where a customer may go into shop, buy an IPTV box, call their network operator and sign-up and then access services from a range of third party service providers. More Recommmendations are expected to be consented at the upcoming IPTV-GSI meeting 23-27 June in Geneva.

Next meeting of the Internet Protocol Television Global Standards Initiative (IPTV-GSI)

Geneva, 23-27 June 2008

Registration Form

See TSB Circular 221 for more information.

IPTV GSI Home

Internet Protocol Television Global Standards Initiative (IPTV-GSI) Meeting

Geneva, 30 April - 7 May 2008

Registration Form

See TSB Circular 199 for more information.

IPTV-GSI Home

ITU-T IPTV experts Ghassem Koleyni and Simon Jones will lead a live web seminar (webinar) on IPTV standardization, May 7 at 1600 CET.

Click here to register, for the webinar hosted by industry analyst Heavy Reading. By registering you will be able to listen to and take part in discussion as well as view presentation slides.

Koleyni and Jones will present standardization from an ITU perspective with experts from other standards bodies, including the DSL Forum and ATIS, explaining how they have worked with ITU to produce the first set of global IPTV specifications, available here. Malcolm Johnson, Director ITU Telecommunication Standardization Bureau said: “I encourage anyone involved in the deployment of IPTV services at any level to take this opportunity to learn about this important set of standards as well as quiz our experts on the topic.

We have already seen first generation IPTV services and as these mature we may see a change in regulation or market demand that will require interoperation between service and/or network providers. A potential outcome of this will be that a customer can go into shop, buy an IPTV box, call their network operator and sign-up and then access services from a range of third party service providers. It is to meet that need that the value of ITU’s work on standardisation will be realised. ”

If you can’t join the live event registration will give access to an archive file of the event.

The first set of global standards for IPTV have been published in an online compendium.

The proceedings of the IPTV Focus Group (IPTV FG) are collected in an online document including a preface from the ITU Director of the Telecommunication Standardization Bureau (TSB) and the Chairman of the IPTV FG. They are the result of 20 months hard work by the Focus Group which has now been passed on to the IPTV-GSI (global standards initiative).

Malcolm Johnson, Director of the TSB says in the preface: “The results of the work of the IPTV Focus Group will lay the foundation for an area of ICTs that is predicted to attract up to 100 million subscribers in the next three years. It's easy to see why so many of the world's leading ICT companies have been keen to progress this work.”

As well as the 21 deliverables, the publication gives an overview of the Focus Group, its management team and the group's activities and achievements focusing on: architecture and requirements; QoS and performance aspects; service security and content protection; IPTV network control; end systems and interoperability aspects and middleware, application and content platforms.

Press release

Click here for a document detailing some ITU-T highlights for 2007.

Study Group 9 consented Recommendations on IPTV and advanced HDTV proposals during meetings held Oct. 29 - Nov. 2, Louisville, Colorado.

The meeting saw participation from all around the world with several delegates from developing countries including Kenya, India and Trinidad and Tobago.

Recommendation J.700 - IPTV Service Requirements and Framework for Secondary Distribution - defines service level requirements and an architectural framework for telecommunication networks to provide new services based on IPTV. It refers to "secondary distribution" which means use of a transmission channel for distribution of video/audio programs to users at large, for example by an over-the-air broadcast channel or by means of a fiber or cable network.

The Recommendation is extensive and includes requirements for network elements as well as customer premises equipment (CPE), including middleware application interfaces which consist of software libraries that provide uniform access to system services. It leverages existing deployed technologies, such as MPEG, DOCSIS, GEM (Globally Executable MHP), and IPCablecom to provide a smooth path for operators to integrate IPTV technology into their networks. While in the process of developing this Recommendation considerable liaison with other Study Groups and the IPTV Focus Group was carried out.

In addition to the IPTV work, Recommendations relating to second - and third - generation IPCablecom were consented. Equipment based on IPCablecom Recommendations, such as modems, set-top boxes, signalling equipment, interactive television application platform interfaces, digital program insertion, and others have had widespread implementation in networks in Asia, Europe, and North America.

The new Recommendations add to a suite of more than 25 which have been developed for cable and hybrid networks primarily designed for television and sound program delivery to the home.

Large screen digital imagery (LSDI) is a family of digital imagery systems that includes very large screen presentation of programmes similar to the non-digital IMAX and OMNIMAX systems. LSDI is described as an optimal approach to the presentation of high-definition television (HDTV) programmes, to a collective audience on cinema-like screens in a cinema-like environment. An earlier approved Recommendation J.600 addresses use of a broadband service or channel for transferring audio or video information to a production center where post-production processing may take place before subsequent distribution. At this meeting work towards a new Recommendation - Network Service Operator's Requirements for Real-time Transmission of exLSDI Signals under Parallel Processing Functionality - was significantly progressed. This Recommendation is related to the transport of program signals conforming to the higher levels of the LSDI expanded hierarchy as used for contribution and primary distribution. The term contribution means use of a broadband service or channel for transferring audio or video information to a production center where post-production processing may take place before subsequent distribution. Primary distribution is the use of a transmission channel for transferring audio and/or video information from a production center to one or several destination points; for example, to a broadcast transmitting center or the headend of a cable distribution network. Work on LSDI takes place with interactions between ITU-T Study Group 9, ITU-R Study Group 6, and other bodies external to the ITU.

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ITU-T’s multimedia Study Group 16 met in Geneva, July, with over twenty standards entering the final stage of ITU-T’s approval process. The ITU secretariat says that the meeting saw record numbers of participants and contributions. Work on the use of tag-based identification (including RFID) for multimedia in particular saw great interest and progress.

Key achievements of the meeting include the setting up of new Questions – ITU-T’s term for work area - to advance work on the third generation multimedia system that will replace the currently used H.323 and SIP multimedia protocols and a second Question on multimedia application platforms and end systems for IPTV. See separate stories – Third gen multimedia system work accelerates and Question on multimedia application platforms and end systems for IPTV.

A new Question – ITU-T’s term for work area – on multimedia application platforms and end systems for IPTV will start work pending formal approval at the next meeting of Study Group 16.

Experts say that with the surge of multimedia services such as video streaming and the desire to offer IPTV services, the market is in serious need of standardized interoperable solutions, especially at the multimedia applications layer. Interoperability will provide benefit for all the players in the value-chain, especially at the multimedia applications layer, and encourage growth of this market.

This Question is intended to produce deliverables related to study IPTV platforms, including, but not restricted to middleware, applications, content formats and their uses, which will facilitate effective and interoperable use of the IPTV systems. The Question will be the recipient of a number of documents from the IPTV Focus Group and it will assimilate these into its work program with the intention of generating a number of standards (ITU-T Recommendations).

At the June 2007 meeting of ITU-T SG15, work continued on a draft new Recommendation to develop a single international standard for home networking transceivers using any metallic media in the home – phoneline wiring, data cable (e.g. CAT5), coaxial cable or powerline wiring.

Household connectivity is growing rapidly with more and more electronic devices and networks within the home distributing and using digital information and media. In addition, remote control of lighting, heating, appliance-use and security systems attached to the home are making the "digital home" a reality.

International standards that enable interoperability and security in the field of home networking are seen as key to bringing value and versatility to consumers, making possible the use of diverse products, services and sources, and therefore accelerating market development.

Work in ITU-T is coordinated by the Joint Coordination Activity on Home Networking (JCA-HN). Topics covered across the 13 different Study Groups of ITU-T include digital rights management (DRM), phone-line networking (including co-ax), IPTV, interactive video, set top box architecture and cable modems.

The work on ITU-T Rec - G.hn - next generation home networking transceivers - has now attracted a critical mass of contributors/participants with nine companies submitting 20 contributions on various topics. It is anticipated that G.hn will be completed in 2008.

Also at the June 2007 meeting of ITU-T SG15, it was agreed to start work on a draft new Recommendation G.hnta on home network transport architecture. The Rec will give a generic architecture based on the NGN functional architecture described in Recommendation Y.2012 “Next Generation Networks – Frameworks and functional architecture models” It will describe a platform for the development of future home network standards. The draft Recommendation G.hnta is complementary to draft Recommendation H.ghna currently under development by SG16.

Study Group 13 the lead for NGN in ITU met in April reached final ‘approval’ stage on two Recommendations and consented a number of others, as well as starting discussions on some new work areas. SG13 met concurrently with SGs 19 and 11 as part of the NGN Global Standards Initiative (NGN GSI).

Among inputs to a special ‘futures’ brainstorming session at the meeting were proposals on Mobile IPTV standardization and a “Future Vision beyond NGN”. Mobile IPTV is described as IPTV to mobile and wireless networks. There was discussion on a possible standard that would be neutral in terms of the wireless technology and would cover architecture for NGN, authentication for user mobility and seamless connectivity for mobility, security, and signaling for scalable delivery of content.

The paper “Future Vision beyond NGN” proposed that the future beyond NGN is next generation ubiquitous networking. Study areas for ITU-T and particularly Study Group 13 could be media, identity and so-called ABC (for accounting, billing and charging) processing; open service environment, service and transport control; extending QoS capabilities for bandwidth, security, mobility, personalization and media; supporting a variety of NGN applications including fixed-mobile convergence (FMC), networked IDs, ubiquitous sensor networks (USN), home networking, IPTV etc. The paper also proposed that this work should be more closely linked with protocol development.

Another important document given the first stage approval known as consent defines the service requirements, service features, service architecture, and implementation scenarios of IMS based real-time conversational multimedia services. These include PSTN/ISDN simulation services. When these real-time conversational multimedia services are provided by using an IMS-based service environment, the implementations will use SIP protocol between the Service Support Functions and the Service Control Functions [ITU-T Y.2012] [ITU-T Y.2021]. IMS based NGNs which meet these service requirements will be capable of supporting real-time conversational multimedia services with new service features as well as allowing for new implementation scenarios.

Also consented were documents charting OAM requirements for T-MPLS based networks and QoS control architecture for Ethernet-based IP access networks.

Study Group 19 meeting at the same time consented a document outlining the general requirements for fixed-mobile convergence – a key application in NGN.

Study Group 11 meeting in Geneva, end April has consented three important documents charting protocols for quality of service (QoS) in NGN. The protocols will ensure interoperability between network elements and systems as well as giving service providers the ability to specify rules for specific communication types.

The announcement marks a significant step forward for ITU-T’s NGN work. Protocol development is seen as the final stage of standards development following identification of the requirements, architecture, services etc. The Recommendations are a crucial part of the NGN standards package and a concrete realization of the functional architecture defined in ITU-T Rec. Y.2111 - Resource and admission control functions in Next Generation Networks.

The protocols agreed at the April meeting will guarantee that when a service request is made QoS needs are transmitted, ensuring that each network element provisions the correct level of bandwith and resources to ensure the class of QoS for that particular application. So – for example – more bandwidth can be allocated and guaranteed for IPTV than for voice.

The three ITU-T Recommendations include the specification of the physical entities involved in resource control signalling, the interfaces across which signalling takes place, and the mapping between these entities and interfaces and the corresponding functional entities and reference points in ITU-T Rec. Y.2111. An Appendix provides a further mapping between the interfaces and the protocol specifications which realize those interfaces.

The Recommendations refer to signalling used in different geographical parts of the world: ITU-T Recommendation H.248/Megaco used in for example Japan, COPS used for example in China and Diameter which is used in North America.

Another three protocols in the field of resource control were consented by Study Group 11 earlier in the year.

Two vice chairs of ITU-T’s IPTV Focus Group will guest edit an upcoming issue of IEEE Communications Magazine. Chae-Sub Lee, of ETRI, Korea and Simon Jones, of BT, UK will edit the issue for publication February 2008.

A call for papers has been issued on the broad topic IPTV Systems, Standards and Architectures. Papers are solicited on topics including IPTV standards progress, architecture for IPTV systems, deployment challenges, performance considerations, content management and security. Articles should be tutorial in nature, further guidelines can be found here.

Simon Jones, Vice Chairman of ITU-T's Focus Group on IPTV will present The importance of ITU-T’s activities in IPTV Standardization at the IPTV World Forum, 5-7 March, Olympia, London, UK.

The event comprises a free to attend exhibition, and tech demo zone area in which Jones is presenting. Additionally a conference will feature over 30 telcos and ISPs from around the world discussing IPTV service deployment issues