• Los Angeles Times, Tuesday, June 9, 2009 1 PM

The specter of live television on cell phones direct from broadcasters is another of the tangled issues raised by the digital TV switch happening Thursday. Companies will be able to use the newly vacant analog spectrum previously used to broadcast television to now send signals to cell phones.

According to Nielsen, approximately 13 million people, about 6% of all mobile subscribers, used their phones to watch video content, but that's a 50% jump year-over-year.

Mobile TV services such as Qualcom's Flo TV, MobiTV and Transpera are all competing to serve this relative sliver of consumers, and broadcasters are hoping customers will use services provided the Open Mobile Video Coalition, which represents 28 stations groups and will broadcast to mobile devices. the share they are fighting over might be small now, but just as the services are expect to get a big boost capabilities come Friday, so is the demand. "This is one of about six or seven or eight things people are going to use their phone for," Rob Hyatt, executive director of premium content at AT&T Inc told the Los Angeles Times.

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