As the world gears up for the 2010 World Cup, mobile operators abroad are salivating over the prospect of snagging millions of new customers by offering mobile phones that let them watch the matches for free using television signals – a strategy perfected by Chinese telecoms during last year's Olympic games.

Although Americans have yet to catch the soccer bug that affects the rest of the world, we love our sports, television, and electronics as much or more as any country.

So why, especially now that every broadcaster in the country is finally serving up free, digital, over-the-air television signals, aren't cellphone manufacturers taking advantage of those free signals by incorporating DTV tuners into our phones?

Cellphones don't even have TiVo. We'd watch every ad – especially during major sporting events, which don't always keep until we get home to our big screens.

The problem isn't technical, according to industry watchers.

"The biggest hurdle for the North American [mobile television] market is culture," said Tuong Nguyen, lead mobile TV analyst for Gartner Research. "It's just not something that appeals to us."

American cell networks lag behind those in the rest of the world because our country is large, and because our government allowed competing cell network to fight over standards rather than mandating a standard.

But that's just part of the reason we can't (or don't) watch TV on our phones, despite having just shifted to an all-digital broadcast model. For instance, Qualcomm and MobiTV having invested millions in technology for putting television on our cellphones on a monthly subscription basis.

Partly it's about how we get around.

"I'm from California, and everyone in California owns at least one car, and everyone drives themselves to work," said Nguyen. "So we're not watching television [during that time], as opposed to these other regions that people in the industry like to point to [as an indication that Americans will start watching mobile TV]. That's not true, unless everyone starts taking public transportation all the time."

The vast majority of Americans simply prefer to watch television on large screens, and many of us have the technology to do so at our leisure. Those of us who are willing to watch on small screens demand better video quality and the ability to watch whenever we want, using time-shifting or on-demand technologies.

"In the US, a relatively small portion of consumers want it, because of the limitations on programming choice, timing, et cetera," said Flint Pulskamp, program manager for IDC's wireless semiconductor research group. "Those few people [who do want mobile TV] apparently are more particular with the quality of their programming, so the industry has responded with subscription mobile video services such as [Qualcomm's] Flo TV."

Although free digital television signals are omnipresent, the small percentage of Americans who want to watch mobile television are going to have to pay for it.

"Studies suggest that $15 per month is acceptable to a majority of the target audience, to avoid advertising and maintain quality of service [while] others argue that it needs to be free and ad-supported to really gain traction," said Pulskamp. "Regardless, free-over air [broadcasts] will likely have a very slow uptake, and the very limited number of phones with tuners will make it even slower."

Instead, he says, North Americans will have to order programs piecemeal for more expensive, one-to-one delivery.

Since digital television signals are all around us — for free — why are we going to have to pay to watch on our phones? According to Nguyen, the manufacturing costs outweigh the benefit to consumers, even if all the content is free.

"You don't want to make every phone with everything on it, because obviously it adds to total bill of materials," explained Nguyen. "It only adds a couple bucks here and there, but when you talk about all these components, it starts to add up." In addition to a chip for pulling in DTV signals, he said, these phones would need larger, more vibrant displays, touch screens or other controls, and a better speaker. Because Americans won't use the tuner anyway, manufacturers leave it out of most phones sold here.

"Remember those portable TVs from the '80s?" asked Nguyen. "How many people [in America] had those? And that was free. Now, they want 15, 30, 40, or 50 bucks to watch it on a two-inch screen. Are you kidding me?"

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