Check the data allowance on your mobile plan before watching TV over the mobile network.

The ABC has launched an iview app for the iPhone. It follows on from the iPad app which was launched in December 2010. It's the latest platform to secure its own version of the iview player which can also be accessed on newer internet-connected TVs, set-top boxes, video streamers and games consoles.

The ABC is also announcing that the app will be able to stream over 3G for the first time - previously Apple didn't allow apps on to its store if they consumed large amounts of data using the cellular network.

Kim Dalton, Director of ABC TV said, "ABC iview was one of the important first steps in the evolution of ABC TV's content offering. It provides choice in terms of what people watch, when they watch it and on what device. Today we are taking it another step forward... ABC iview on iPhone has been the most requested service since the launch of ABC iview on iPad. The universal app is an innovative response to changing audience behaviour, preparing for the future and for the explosive growth of the mobile internet."

Features

The app features iView's complete catch-up TV offering including programs from ABC1, ABC2, ABC3 and ABC4Kids, the ABC News 24 live stream and ABC iview 'exclusives'.

In addition to all of the popular features in the previous version of the ABC iview iPad app, such as AirPlay support, parental control and support for closed captioning, the highly-anticipated app includes adaptive streaming - video quality that adapts to a user's available bandwidth and network conditions, resulting in a better, more consistent viewing experience.

ABC iview on iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch offers the following features:

Instant and unlimited access to ABC TV programs following TV broadcast

Live streaming of ABC News 24

Access through 3G or WiFi

AirPlay support: wirelessly streaming programs on the app to the living room TV and speakers via AppleTV, while keeping the device free for multi-tasking

The ability to start a program on one iOS device and continue watching from the same point on another iOS device

Watchlist syncing between iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch via iCloud

Sharing programs to social networks

Parental control functionality

Support for closed captioning

It should be noted that live streaming of other ABC channels is still not possible due to complex licensing issues.

Android and other platforms

With every new platform release comes complaints of apps not appearing on other platforms. Bruce Collier, iview's technical lead, said the following:

"We understand the demand for an Android app, and are working towards achieving official Android support following a planned redevelopment of iview in HTML5. We are approaching wider Android availability in this way for a few important reasons: it will make it easier for us to target a greater number of Android devices and screen sizes (the fragmentation of the Android platform and the number of devices makes it challenging for us to develop, test and support these devices at present. An HTML5 version of iview will give us the widest coverage as well as future-proofing for new Android devices.) It also makes sense in terms of streamlining the technical effort and cost for new developments "Another hurdle is ensuring video security and encryption of content on various Android devices, which isn't easily solved. "Also taken into account is the fact that iview is already available to many Android users via the Flash website version, though we acknowledge and appreciate that this isn't ideal. "We hope to overcome the overriding constraint, which has been the cost, technical effort and resources required to support Android, given its complex eco-system, within the limitations of the small but dedicated iview team. "But we do want to assure the audience that we do take mobile very seriously and now that the iPhone app is released we will be focussing our attention on better platform support across the board and reducing our own fragmentation so that we can tackle Android."

Techie bits

The iPad app is also being updated at the same time to support 3G streaming and not just WiFi.

iview uses something called "adaptive bitrate HLS (HTTP Live Streaming)" as per Apple's specification, so image quality (bitrate) will dynamically change according to your network conditions. The bitrates offered on launch are:

650 Kb/s (same as iview on desktop)

496 Kb/s

206 Kb/s

59 Kb/s (audio only)

These are subject to change in future, but the top bitrate is unlikely to increase "Without extra funding."

Collier says, "The rule of thumb we are telling users is that an hour of iview streaming will use up to 300MB of data. Most programs on iview are only 30 minutes long and many kids programs are shorter."

This brings with it issues with pricing of mobile data. Users of the apps are strongly recommended to monitor their data usage and adjust their data plans if they are going to be heavy users of the catchup services. The potential for bill shock is extremely high. Viewers are advised to check the ABC iview FAQ for further information and advice about data consumption.

As yet there are no announcements of unmetered access from any of Australia's telcos.

Traffic

Currently, Apple's devices dominate in regards to ABC website access and app downloads. The ABC's main iPhone app has been downloaded almost 2.2million times while the iPad app follows with over 721,000 downloads. The Android app, by comparison, which was recently updated, stands on 75,000 installs. However, the iPad's iview app currently stands at almost 980,000 installs.

With this in mind the potential to suddenly have hundreds of thousands of people watching catchup TV over the mobile networks may produce significant congestion. News 24 can already be streamed using existing ABC apps, but adding catchup TV to the iPhone and iPad mix could create network congestion issues. However, a spokesman for Telstra said that they did not expect any problems.

Nonetheless, if your mobile internet slows to a crawl during the next week, let us know!

The iview app can be downloaded from: http://itunes.com/apps/abciview