It’s been interesting to see how our private beta users are using LocateTV’s multi-region coverage. For example, some testers are switching to US mode to find out about the early DVD releases already available there, or because they have a Region 1 DVD player. This has lead to a request for users to see all regions of DVD available, whatever their location. Sound useful?

Our region-specific coverage also leads to some thought-provoking issues around consistency. LocateTV is designed to identify all of the places and times that a particular piece of content can be found, but it’s not always easy to say when one transmission is the same as another. At the very highest level, different countries will use subtle variations in titles for programmes and series; but much more difficult to track are the changes to the content itself that broadcasters and distributors make.

Films usually cause the most problems here. Censorship regimes are different all over the world, sometimes resulting in the removal of not insignificant parts of the work; and then come changes which are made simply to get the timing to fit the broadcaster’s schedule.

Morevoer, films run around 4% faster in Europe than they do in the USA. This is because they are shot at 24 frames per second, and then presented on our European television systems at 25 frames per second. In the USA, where TV systems work at 30 frames per second, they use a strange way of showing films in which one frame is shown for 3 TV fields, and the next for 2 fields. Motion isn’t quite so good, but at least the timing works out to be perfect.

So, is the film the same when shown on US TV as in Europe? Film buffs could argue for hours, and indeed technically speaking they’re aren’t. But the underlying story and characters are the same, and that’s what we think counts.

Simon