Carriers offer plenty of video clips and even a few live channels, but their services aren't hits yet.Mobile video is still in its infancy, with a grab bag of live TV channels and three-minute clips, wireless carriers are searching for the special sauce that will get Americans to regularly watch TV on their phone screens. Although mobile video services are not quite there yet, you can find some quality entertainment if you know where to look.
All the mobile video services we looked at—namely Amp'd Live, Cingular Video, Sprint TV, and Verizon V Cast—work on a range of consumer phones. And they all require some patience. Typically, you'll pay a subscription fee to access an ever-changing deck of two- to three-minute video clips and channels from name-brand content providers like CNN, ESPN, and MTV. (A carrier's deck is the tiny, abbreviated menu you use to choose content like ringtones, games, and video content. Companies jockey for position on the deck because being on the first screen of a content deck can mean significantly higher sales.) In areas with pretty good reception, the clips take between nine and 20 seconds to buffer; When they play, clips usually have some visible compression artifacts, but they are clear enough to watch.
This isn't the 500 live, 24-hour channels you're used to on cable TV. Sprint and Amp'd both offer a few live TV channels, including one Sprint channel that shows really bad full-length movies. They vast majority of content, however, involves long menus of little clips, chunks of newscasts, cartoons, and even fashion reports. Clips change anywhere from several times a day to once a week. You pick the little clip you want, watch it, and then pick another.
Cellular Network TV
Our Editor's Choice, Sprint TV, works like a little like a cable TV system (though with a very different selection of content than you get on TV.) For $15 to $25 per month, you get a base set of live streaming TV channels—basic cable. You can then add on a bewildering range of live streaming video, video clips, and radio channels for between $4 to $6 a piece. The array of choices is what makes Sprint special— they really do offer something for everyone.
Verizon V CAST Video goes in the opposite direction. It has no live TV channels, and a much thinner selection of content than Sprint overall. But it charges one flat $15 per month fee for almost everything. This gets you a little bit of news, some sports, some weather, some kids' programming, and some network TV teasers. The service is basically less choice for less money, trying to serve a very broad spectrum of tastes. If Sprint is cable, think of Verizon as broadcast TV.
Cingular and Amp'd remix those two formulas. Cingular Video has a Verizon-like deck of clips with exclusive content from HBO (though the HBO content is unsatisfying). The clips are smooth and clear, but only available on two phones, which can only be bought in a few cities. This will change, however, as Cingular builds out its 3G UMTS network by Christmas. Amp'd mixes together clips and live channels targeted to its young, male audience. The content selection hits the spot, but it's poorly organized and difficult to navigate.
T-Mobile, by the way, doesn't have a mobile video service because they don't have a 3G high-speed network. Mobile video doesn't require 3G – both Cingular's and Sprint's services work, to some degree, outside 3G coverage – but 3G makes clips a lot smoother.
All the services suffer from three flaws that will limit their success. First, nobody has great quality. Mobile video comes down at 176-by-112 or 176-by-132, onto screens that are frequently 176-by-220 or even 320-by-240. Thus, the videos appear either postage-stamp-sized or blocky. Clips are also interrupted by annoying rebuffering every minute or two, though Verizon is better than other services at avoiding that.
The second problem is opacity. No service offers a program guide or any way to figure out which clips are available other than drilling down into dozens of different, little menu options. There's no way to get a catalog of what's on Sprint's or Amp'd's subscription channels before subscribing, either (other than looking at my list.)
Finally, there's still something off about the content mixes, something for which you can blame complex Hollywood revenue arrangements. There's a lot of weird, off-brand comedy and a dearth of good music videos. To some extent, the news and viral-video channels are the best—which isn't surprising if you realize that those are the least complicated content when it comes to who's being paid.
Better Quality is Coming
The quality issue may be solved next year, when true broadcast television comes to mobile devices with DVB-H and MediaFlo technologies. Cingular is sure to go with the DVB-H system being set up by Modeo, and Verizon has signed up for Qualcomm's MediaFlo. Both systems deliver at least a dozen channels of smooth, full-screen video—though you'll have to get new phones to view them. The program-guide and content issues are a little thornier, because they can't be solved by new cell towers, computers or phones. What they need is the business will and cooperation between content producers and mobile carriers to make them better.
For now, mobile video is a curiosity, but feel free to buy in if you're curious. Sprint has the best selection, which makes it my Editors' Choice. But Verizon provides a decent array of clips for a reasonable price, and Amp'd has a good selection for its young, male demographic. Cingular's nascent service is available to too few people, and has too little content, although it delivers its clips very smoothly. While mobile video isn't yet good enough to truly earn the title of "TV on your phone," it can be a fun way to banish a little boredom in your day. Read on to find the one that will keep you plugged in.
Reviewed in this story:
Amp'd Live (from $15 per month)
With its aggressive and encouraging selection of downloadable video, this mobile video service has the kind of content aimed squarely at the teenage crowd.
See Amp'd Live's video selection
Cingular Video (from $19.99 per month)
This service has good bones—it delivers content clearly, cleanly and efficiently. We're looking forward to a time when it becomes available on a wider variety of phones and locations.
See Cingular Video's video selection
Sprint TV (from $15 per month)
With its giant smorgasbord of content, this is the only mobile TV service that makes you feel like you're sitting at home with your digital cable box.
See Sprint TV's video selection
Verizon V Cast ($15 per month)
Though its content may not be as extensive as that of other services, this inexpensive introduction to mobile video services works well and is priced right.
See Verizon V Cast's video selection
