If the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television strongly promotes TVOS, which companies will be the first to take the lead?

The State Administration of Radio, Film and Television recently issued a notice, deciding to expand the pilot scope of the TVOS smart TV operating system among cable operators. This means that in the future, terminals such as OTT set-top boxes launched by cable operators in various places can only install and use TVOS1.0, and no other operating systems are allowed.

The cross-screen era is approaching. The answer to who will become the mainstream entrance to the next terminal after mobile terminals is undoubtedly Internet TV (OTT for short).

With the influx of Internet technology companies and radio and television giants such as Alibaba, Tencent, LeTV, Xiaomi, BesTV, Mango TV, and China Digital Media, investment in the OTT TV ecosystem continues to enter the industry's vision, such as copyright procurement, hardware subsidies, cooperation between broadcast control licensees, etc.

But I am afraid that the most hot topic at the moment is not these, but the attention attracted by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television's promotion of the TVOS operating system.

According to the People's Post and Telecommunications News, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television recently issued a notice deciding to expand the pilot scope of the TVOS smart TV operating system among cable operators. This means that in the future, terminals such as OTT set-top boxes launched by cable operators in various places can only install and use TVOS1.0, and no other operating systems are allowed.

There is a general view in the industry that the operating system is extremely important to OTT TV, because it will directly involve the boot format of the UI interface, the broadcast of film and television content, and the download rights of many applications. These two are the most important cores of an OTT TV and are related to the so-called OTT ecosystem.

"It's not very clear how the State Administration of China plans to promote it. Those who install first will definitely be the first to be restricted. This is not beneficial to radio and television companies that are in a competitive market relationship with Internet companies." A person from a radio and television company expressed his views.

What is even more interesting is that the above-mentioned news of "expanding the scope of TVOS pilot" did not come from the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, which controls all media channels, but from the People's Post and Telecommunications News, a subsidiary of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. Considering the era of triple play, radio and television and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology have begun a game, and everyone can taste the "connotation" of this...

TVOS promotion has not yet entered the "deep water zone"

. Judging from the current market, almost every company that conducts OTT TV business has its own operating system, such as Alibaba's YUN OS, Suning PPTV's PPOS, and Leshi. Almost 90% of the operating systems on the market are developed based on Android.

Alibaba's YUN OS is not only used on its own Tmall Magic Box, but also lent it to the Micro Whale Technology founded by Li Ruigang. The same is true for Suning's PPOS. It is not only used by PPTV smart TVs, but also some other Smart TV manufacturers are using it.

Wu Chunyong, a research expert in the radio and television industry, said: "In the past, every larger company with OTT services had its own operating system developed, but we can all regard these as 'enterprise standards', and TVOS seems likely to become' industry standard'."

In fact, before the advent of Internet TV, there was no so-called operating system, because TVs at that time could not be connected to the Internet. After connecting to cable, they would at most do live broadcasts and on-demand broadcasts. Before June and July 2014, the OTT TV industry was in a state of barbaric growth. After that, under the tightening of the State Administration's policies, the OTT TV industry was under an unprecedented state of strict control, and TVOS also began to enter the industry. In sight.

On June 5, 2014, at the Beijing International Television Technology Seminar, Wang Xiaojie, Director of the Science and Technology Department of the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, said that the main purpose of developing TVOS 1.0 is to realize the transformation of smart TV terminals from content to application through this system and a unified application store."manageable and controllable".

"Security" is the biggest reason why TVOS is given the right to be born. At present, the supervision rights of Internet websites in China are in the hands of the Cyberspace Administration, while smart TVs also need supervision after they can be connected to the Internet. The rights of radio and television are undoubtedly in the hands of the State Administration of China.

Wang Xiaojie previously said: "Whether it is Android or iOS, there are 'backdoor'. Our country does not allow unsafe or untrustworthy content on TV. After you have your own smart TV operating system, you can be 'manageable and controllable.'"

In layman's terms, the TVOS operating system is subject to technical restrictions from the bottom. Users cannot obtain Root privileges, install third-party software by themselves, swipe the computer, and view some free or prohibited content over the wall. So how much appeal is left of such an OTT TV? The industry's views are quite pessimistic.

From the perspective of "security", it is not just a matter for radio and television companies. As long as technology companies such as Xiaomi, LeTV, and Ali continue to engage in OTT TV business in the future, they will also involve "security" topics. There is no exception. So will TVOS be implemented to all OTT companies? It is still necessary to wait and see now, or it is just a matter of time.

From the current perspective, the promotion path of the General Administration of China is to "cross the river by feeling the stones" in a step-by-step manner and continuously expand the scope of the pilot. At first, TVOS was described as a "non-mandatory industry measure"; not long after, the State Administration required Jiangsu Cable and Shanghai Dongfang Cable to undertake the pilot promotion task of 500,000 units each; now, the State Administration further requested that the scope of the pilot be expanded to include cable operators across the country. The meaning of "mandatory" began to show.

However, it can be judged at present that the State Administration's promotion of TVOS has not yet entered the "deep water zone", because the watershed between whether TVOS can be accepted by the entire industry across the country lies in whether it can be accepted and installed by the seven major broadcast control licensees, as well as Alibaba, LeTV, and Xiaomi.

The radio and television department may be the first to take the lead.

Wu Chunyong believes that if the State Administration of China is determined to promote it to all OTT TV business companies (including the seven major licensees) and Internet companies, it will inevitably have a lot of shock to the industry. "There will definitely be resistance, but it's hard to say how big the shock will be."

The first is the technical compatibility issue, although TVOS1.0 is said to have taken into account the technologies of existing operating systems, such as Linux, Android, etc. But in reality, some industry insiders believe that compatibility between systems poses great challenges, and the current OTT TV operating systems of major manufacturers are developed based on Android.

It is precisely because of the openness of the Android operating system that users can download applications on their own, and the file that "Internet TV is prohibited from live broadcasts" stipulated by Radio and Television has become a dead letter.

"If the State Administration of China further expands the scope of promoting the TVOS system, the next step will depend on the attitude of the seven major licensees. Mango TV, BesTV, and China Digital have all invested heavily in OTT TV and are currently competing with Internet companies. Whoever uses TVOS first means that there are many restrictions, so promotion will inevitably encounter great resistance." A person from the radio and television department said.

As far as the State Administration is concerned, cable TV operators and the seven major broadcast control licensees are the "biological sons" of the radio and television system. If the "biological sons" reject your system, then why should the Internet companies accept TVOS?

Another approach is to develop an operating system that is acceptable to everyone, but this may seem difficult. Among the 15 units participating in the research and development of TVOS 1.0, in addition to the three research units of China Academy of Sciences, this industrial chain brings together terminal equipment manufacturers represented by Changhong Network and Tongzhou Electronics, cable operators represented by Dongfang Cable and Jiangsu Cable, as well as broadcast control licensees represented by China Digital Media, and Liantong Network, which has been engaged in the research and development of intelligent operating systems.

In addition, it also includes companies such as Digital Video and Shenzhen Zhuangzhuang, which are engaged in digital TV software and hardware research and development and services, as well as Next Generation Radio and Television Network Application Laboratory Co., Ltd., which meets the needs of triple play, and communication service provider ZTE.

It is reported that the research and development of TVOS 2.0 is coming to an end. Some media said that Huawei's internal engineers are responsible for the main development work. TVOS 2.0 will be launched in June next year, and Ali is responsible for the TV shopping mall in TVOS 2.0. In addition, the outside world does not know the list of other developers of TVOS 2.0.

At present, the State Administration of Commerce has no exact timetable for the promotion of the TVOS system, and there is no clear agreement on how to punish violators. This also seems to show that the State Administration of Commerce is actually certain about the market's confused mentality and still needs to wait for the opportunity.

Another thing that needs to be considered is the attitude of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. As the author of TV standards, there is now another "colleague" around us. I wonder if this is an important reason why People's Post and Telecommunications is keen on reporting on the promotion of TVOS by the State Administration of China.

Editor: yvonne