6 NGN services
6.3 IPTV

ITU-T defines the IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) by the following definition [14]:

IPTV are multimedia services such as television/video/audio/text/graphics/data delivered over IP-based networks managed to support the required level of QoS/QoE (Quality of Service/Experience), security, interactivity and reliability.

In other words, IPTV is a system which delivers (using streaming technique) television services using IP suite over PSDN networks (LAN, Internet) instead of being delivered through traditional terrestrial, satellite or cable television systems [15]. End to end chain for delivery of the IPTV content to the end user usually contains these 4 main domains that are involved in the provision of an IPTV service (Fig. 8):

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Fig. 8 - IPTV domains

There are two main aspects of the IPTV:

  1. technological aspect - the IPTV architecture,
  2. user’s perspective aspect - provided IPTV services and user experience.

Most of the existing non-NGN IPTV solutions provide only basic set of services like linear TV, VoD, and some of them also PVR.

New NGN based IPTV solution should therefore provide much more services, features and what is the most important also new user experience in watching TV with more interactivity, personalization, mobility and last but not least comfort in consumption of the right content in the right time and right way.

There is no single approach to the IPTV service provisioning [16]. Due to huge costs involved in the network equipment, operators usually follow incremental approaches to network upgrading, always relying on existing premises and procedures.

Interested readers can find more details about IPTV networks and services in Annex of Learning module LM 19 - Modern TV standards – Internet Protocol Television.