FRANCE 24 LIVE for iPhone – review
Frenchies have just released iPhone app that broadcasts their LIVE TV channel with news called “France 24″ and they claim that it is the first (and only) iPhone app that streams LIVE (!!!) TV! Well, we have taken LIVE broadcast of this TV channel from the satellite Astra 28 and compared it to this app streaming over Internet – to check whether indeed it is live. What is the result of this check? Read on!
So, to check whether this app is really streaming LIVE TV, we have launched a program for Windows Vista connected to satellite tuner (DVB-S) over USB:
… and then checked what is time difference with a stream seen in an iPhone:
Results:
— yes, it is LIVE TV but there is a small delay, around 5-11 seconds between the broadcast from the satellite and the iPhone, i.e. things appear first through satellite and then appear on the Internet.
— as you can see above the quality of stream on iPhone is worse than through satellite, but clearly DVB-S broadcast uses much bigger bandwidth so it is to be expected
Interestingly apart from English, also live streams in French (duh!) and Arabic are available:
Apart from LIVE TV also some downloads are available:
Here is info that we received from France 24 itself:
FRANCE 24 LIVE Now available over 3G on iPhone
FRANCE 24 is the first live TV channel available worldwide on the Apple iPhone via 3G networks. To deliver this service FRANCE 24 relies on the Mobiclip video distribution platform.
Building upon the success of the initial release which supported wifi, users can now access FRANCE 24 LIVE in French, English and Arabic over any wireless data network.
Warmly received by users since its launch on the Apple App Store on 8th of February 2009, the FRANCE 24 LIVE application has been downloaded more than 100,000 times around the world.
Of all the free news applications available on iTunes, FRANCE 24 LIVE ranks among the top 10 worldwide; most notably in the USA, the UK, Germany, Spain, Italy, Israel, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, India, Brazil, etc..
To watch FRANCE 24 LIVE and in VOD anywhere in the world, connect to the Apple App Store to download the free FRANCE 24 LIVE application.
Conclusion: France 24 is a decent news channel and we have seen in it even semi-adult content with Dita Von Teese (when she was visiting Paris this month), so it might be interesting not only for Francophiles but also for people, who are searching for some fun… or latest news (they even sometimes broadcast live stuff from USA, like Obama speeches). Obviously France 24 channel is focused on France, but it covers very well also Europe (France is a member of European Union) and news from all over the world.
Get it here FOR FREE
… and remember: never ever buy Nokia phone! Instead chose a phone powered by Windows Mobile or an iPhone !
Credit: Damien Amadou from France 24 (over e-mail).
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Sounds interesting. Downloading now. I really would like to see more apps like this or an All in One solution closer to livestation on my mac.
[...] Vodafone is in Portugal begonnen met een mobiele tv-dienst voor de iPhone. Vodafone loopt in Portugal wel vaker voorop, want ze introduceerden in januari ook al een MMS-dienst. Mobile TV is de nieuwste applicatie van de operator. Het is verkrijgbaar via de App Store en is gratis te installeren. Om tv te kunnen kijken heb je wel een abonnement nodig: een dag tv-kijken kost €0,89 en een week kost €1,97. Heb je de smaak helemaal te pakken dan kun je ook voor €7,44 een maandabonnement afsluiten. Bij het week- en maandabonnement is de eerste week respectievelijk de eerste maand gratis. Ze zijn trouwens niet de eerste: al sinds februari is het mogelijk om mobiel tv te kijken naar de Franse zender France 24. Dat is een applicatie gemaakt door Mobiclip. [...]
[...] really impressive is BBC’s launch of real-time content available via smartphones or the France24 application for the [...]
[...] Why can’t people just make apps that stream the channels like the "France 24" app does? It’s live tv of their 24 hour news station, it’s free, and it works great over 3g.. FRANCE 24 LIVE for iPhone – review | Mobile Tech Addicts [...]