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NBC
Enters Pact With Intel For Enhanced Digital TV
Semiconductor maker Intel Corp. (INTC - news) and broadcaster
NBC will work together on enhanced digital television programming that would
include interactive features, the companies said on Monday. The multiyear pact
with the world's largest computer chip maker will mark NBC's first collaboration
in the digital television arena. The General Electric Co. unit is preparing to
begin digital high-definition TV (HDTV) broadcasting in the autumn. HDTV
features sharper pictures than conventional analogue television. With NBC's enhanced digital programming, viewers will also
have the option of checking an electronic program guide, chatting, sending
electronic greeting cards or taking interactive quizzes. Those extras will help
make the HDTV sets and their price tags -- now well into four figures -- more
attractive for consumers, said NBC spokesman Jeff DeMarrais. The new programming
will ``speed the marketplace into going out and getting the HDTV sets,'' he said
in a telephone interview from Las Vegas. The Intel-NBC pact was announced in Las Vegas as part of the
National Association of Broadcasters convention. In addition to the clearer
picture, HDTV also can pack much more information into digital form, allowing
the interactive features that NBC is planning. U.S. television networks are
scheduled to begin HDTV broadcasting in 30 U.S. cities by the end of the year.
NBC is scheduled to make the enhanced digital TV programming available to
viewers in the fall of 1999. The network plans an average of three hours a week in enhanced
broadcasting content for NBC's Saturday morning block of teenage programming and
NBC sports programs. There also will be some enhanced broadcasting each day
during prime time. he enhanced content will be available to viewers using a
personal computer with a digital TV function, a digital television set or a
powerful set top box that can tune in the new digital signals. Included in the
items that Intel will license to NBC are the software, tools and the
applications to create and insert the enhanced portions of the digital broadcast
into NBC's existing programming. NBC's enhanced content will be developed by the
broadcaster's interactive television production group. Copyright (C)
1998-1999 The Active Network. All rights reserved.
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