[webontv] Summary of the W3C Web on TV Workshop

Summary of the W3C Web on TV Workshop

On September 2nd and 3rd, 2010, W3C (the World Wide Web Consortium)
held a workshop on "Web on TV ― Use cases and requirements for
smarter integration of Web technologies, broadcasting and non-PC
devices ―".

The minutes of the workshop are available on the W3C Web server at:
 http://www.w3.org/2010/09/web-on-tv/minutes.html

Also the HTML version of this summary, which includes links to
detailed discussions on each use case/requirement, is available at:
 http://www.w3.org/2010/09/web-on-tv/summary.html

The goal of the workshop was to identify key use cases and important
requirements for smarter integration of (1) existing Web standards,
(2) broadcasting and (3) non-PC devices like television. For that
purpose, we discussed the following key questions:

    * What are the key use cases; i.e. what types of new applications
      do we need to enable?

    * What new standards or extensions of existing standards do we
      need to enable these types of applications?

    * What impediments exist in the current standards that do not
      permit us to fully realize their power?

The workshop had 144 attendees from various industries including
broadcasters, telecom companies, a content provider, device vendors,
publishers, software vendors, standardization organizations, Web
application providers researchers, and the Japanese Government. Please
see the attendees list at the top of the minutes for the detail.

During the workshop, we had very interesting demonstrations of actual
digital TV services by Japanese public and commercial broadcasters,
and six panel sessions consisting of brief presentations of the
attendees' position statements followed by dedicated discussions on
use cases and requirements for smarter integration of Web and TV. The
topics for the panel sessions were:

    * Existing Digital TV approaches
    * Proposals for smarter integration of Web and TV from vendors' viewpoints
    * Proposals for smarter integration of Web and TV from research viewpoints
    * The role of HTML5 in the Web on TV, esp. expectation for HTML5 as UI
    * The role of HTML5 in the Web on TV, esp. TV as the hub within home network
    * The role of HTML5 in the Web on TV, esp. Device APIs for TV

During the afternoon break on the second day, we held a vote on use
cases and requirements proposed at the workshop so that we could
prioritize them and identify potential new languages and language
extensions. One representative from each participating organization
was chosen and voted on their preferred use cases and requirements
using five points. The top 9 categories of the use cases and
requirements, roughly in order from most interest to least, were:

   1. APIs for TV functions: 41 points
   2. Richer user experience: 37 points
   3. Smarter integration with CE (Consumer Electronics): 32 points
   4. Content rights: 12 points
   5. Personalization: 8 points
   6. TV as broadcasting service (rather than a device): 8 points
   7. Accessibility: 7 points
   8. Relationship with existing approaches: 7 points
   9. Security: 4 points

See the minutes for the detail of the vote results.

During the summarization session, we discussed the possible next steps
about how to deal with the above use cases and requirements, and the
conclusion from the session includes the following:

    * There was a consensus to create an Interest Group to discuss the
      details of the use cases and requirements presented during the
      workshop. The time frame for the expected group is by the end of
      the year (=Christmas).

    * Yosuke Funahashi from Tomo-Digi and Masahito Kawamori from NTT
      volunteered to be the co-Chairs for the Interest Group. Charles
      McCathieNevile from Opera volunteered to help them generate a
      draft charter for the group.

    * Kazuyuki Ashimura from W3C will help them as the W3C staff
      contact.

    * We will soon create a mailinglist for detailed discussion on the
      details of the next steps, e.g., how to form the proposed
      Interest Group.

    * All the workshop attendees are encouraged to join the W3C and
      participate in the proposed Interest Group.

The above mailing list for the discussion on the next steps has been
created as a public list, <public-web-and-tv@w3.org>. To subscribe to
the list, send an email to <public-web-and-tv-request@w3.org> with the
word "subscribe" in the subject line. The archive for the list is
accessible on-line. The subscribers of the list will review the use
cases and requirements presented during the workshop and discuss how
to form the proposed Interest Group. Note that the possibility of
creating a Working Group rather than a Interest Group for the expected
requirements is not excluded even though the consensus during the
workshop was to initiate the efforts with an Interest Group.

Masao Isshiki, Michael Smith, Deborah Dahl and Kazuyuki Ashimura,
the Workshop Organizing Committee

-- 
Kazuyuki Ashimura / W3C Multimodal & Voice Activity Lead
mailto: ashimura@w3.org
voice: +81.466.49.1170 / fax: +81.466.49.1171

Received on Wednesday, 15 September 2010 08:12:26 UTC