AT&T’s TV service, using Qualcomm’s MediaFLO technology, costs $15 a month for 10 channels, including CBS Mobile, Comedy Central, NBC 2Go and ESPN Mobile TV. They are some of the same channels offered at the same cost by Verizon Wireless, which is also using MediaFLO.

Verizon Wireless also has a $13-a-month “Mobile TV Limited” subscription that provides Fox Mobile, NBC, NBC News and CBS Mobile.

So far, MediaFLO TV service is limited to more than 50 markets and only to certain phones by both AT&T and Verizon Wireless.

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The $15-a-month subscription service is only offered right now on two phones from AT&T: LG’s Vu, which has a 3-inch touchscreen, and Samsung’s Access, with a 2.3-inch screen.

Verizon Wireless provides V Cast Mobile TV on four phones including the LG Voyager, with a 2.81-inch touchscreen.

Sprint Nextel offers TV on some of its phones via the MobiTV service, for $9.99 a month. MobiTV, with 60 channels, streams TV to phones using the cellular network.

MobiTV also provides service to Alltel, US Cellular and other phone networks, as well as to AT&T for phones such as Motorola’s RAZR V3.

“The most popular mobile TV broadcast services are those that are offered without a subscription, as in Japan and South Korea,” In-Stat market research firm said in a report last month.

“However, mobile TV broadcast services are viewed by many as a way to generate revenue, so many of the mobile TV broadcast services will be subscription-based.”

Technology issues
While MediaFLO is one avenue for mobile TV to be delivered, there are others being tested in the United States, and used, especially in Europe.

The Advanced Television Systems Committee, a nonprofit organization in the U.S. that develops voluntary standards for digital TV, is working to establish a mobile handheld standard, Abraham said.

“There are standards going into trials this year that are expected to be commercially deployed next year,” said Abraham of In-Stat. “The ATSC has several technology proposals that they’re evaluating.”

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Behind those proposals are more than 420 local commercial and 350 public television stations, which have formed the Open Mobile Video Coalition. The group wants an open mobile TV standard that will allow them to transmit their broadcasts directly to mobile devices, including MP3 players, portable game and DVD players, as well as cell phones.

“What we’re seeing is more and more overlapping functions among these different device categories, and a sense of overlapping functionality, allowing the user to pick the device they need, based on the context they’re in,” said Gartenberg of JupiterResearch.

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