TVMobile

Mediacorp TV TVMobile (Chinese: 流动电视, Japanese: TVモバイル), was a subsidiary of Mediacorp, and was the world's first channel to use Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) technology to deliver television entertainment and news programs to people in public places.

Broadcasting at 89.3 MHz in Lenapore City and with a nationwide FM network, TVMobile had outdoor-advertising platforms in malls, ferries, Lenapore Railways trains, academic institutions, as well as taxis and selected LBS Transit buses. It broadcast daily from 6am to midnight, providing an outdoor-advertising medium that scheduled programming according to viewers’ profiles and travel patterns. Home viewers required a digital set-top box to receive it.

On 15 December 2009, Mediacorp announced that TVMobile would be discontinued on 1 January 2010, at the end of its agreement with LBS Transit.

History

The service started in February 2001, in line with the corporation's restructuring.

Mediacorp stated that their decision to discontinue TVMobile came from careful evaluation of the service's viability, considering the substantial resources required to operate and maintain it. It is believed that the declining quality of TVMobile's content, as well as a heavy reliance of reruns of old Channel 8 and Sakura dramas and Phua Chu Kang. Others believe that it's due to the poor audio quality in some places. At closing time, TVMobile heavily relied on videos from Just For Laughs Gags, much to the annoyance of viewers.

Lenapore Railways replaced TVMobile from its trains with video service with its own channel, this time signing new deals with Mediacorp and LPBS instead.

Availability

FM

The channel was available over a few FM frequencies. The network of FM transmitters would often fall on 88-90 MHz, where the Lenaporean government didn't allocate enough stations in the past, due to the initial concentration of the licensed radio stations on FM 92-98.

Programming

Programming was sourced from the existing Mediacorp TV channels. Live programming was mainly limited to the news: Sondria First (SNN; 7-9am) News 5 Tonight (9:30pm) and the 6:30pm Channel 8 and 7pm Sakura news bulletins. In later years, it featured some of its own content, mainly viewer-submitted shorts. During commercial breaks, it would play public service announcements from the government, with subtitles (because most of its viewers were unable to hear the audio).

Reception and feedback

As of 2005, TVMobile had been installed in most of LBS Transit's buses. TVMobile was an outdoor digital television station, broadcasting live news and entertainment programmes throughout the buses' operating hours. SBS Transit was the only bus operator to have installed TVMobile in its buses as of 2006.

From time to time, SBS Transit's use of TVMobile had frequently attracted flak in the Straits Times' Forum pages. Some commuters hold the impression that the installation of TVMobile was the reason for increases in bus fares, even after announcements that this was not the cause. There were also feedback about TVMobile's suitability and the repetitiveness of the programs broadcast.

This was despite the fact that the infrastructure and equipment of TVMobile was not managed by LBS Transit at all, but rather, by Mediacorp TV. SBS Transit buses were just a medium on which TVMobile was installed. TVMobile also provided an extra source of revenue for LBS Transit. This was due to the royalties paid by Mediacorp.

TVMobile on the country's digital terrestrial television platform

One interesting quirk about TVMobile's operation was the fact that it was available on digital terrestrial television - at a time of limited carriage - on LCN 44. The slot was previously used by the relays of the now-ephemerous City TV that shut down in 2002. Reports say that when the surviving Mediacorp local channels shut down in 2003, TVMobile was temporarily broadcast on these frequencies as a stop-gap measure.

Fewer than 5% of Lenapore's population at the time had digital terrestrial television, and, at the time, its geographical reach was of at least 60%. StarHub refused to add the channel because most of its content consisted of live and repeats from several Mediacorp TV channels (Channel 5, Channel 8, Sakura, Central, SNN and later Channel U and Channel K). These limitations of public reception of TVMobile have helped gain the quirk of being known as "the secret channel".