Ireland's RTÉ launches catch-up TV service

Tuesday, April 21st, 2009

RTÉ player, a new catch-up web TV service on rte.ie, was launched today giving Irish broadband users the opportunity to watch their favourite RTÉ Television programmes for up to 21 days after broadcast. The player was developed with a view to delivering a new and improved service to reflect audience needs and to offer viewers more choice in how they watch programmes.

More than 200 hours of programmes from all categories of the RTÉ broadcast schedule are now available to view on RTÉ player through a single user interface. When viewers visit www.rte.ie/player it is a “click and play” service, which requires no registration, installation or download.

Soap fans can catch up with all the drama on a 7 day catch up of Fair City, Eastenders and Home and Away. The Den, Den Tots and TTV programmes are all available for catch up for 21 days. Entertainment flagship programmes such as the Late Late Show and Tubridy Tonight, as well as Brides of Franc, Celebrity Bainisteoir, Podge & Rodge and Naked Camera are also available for 21 days. Popular international programmes will be added in due course.

News and Sports fans can watch all RTÉ’s News & Current Affairs output and RTÉ’s top sports shows including The Sunday Game, Monday Night Soccer and OB Sport. Top Gear is available for 7 days for avid fans who have missed it on TV or want to watch it again.

RTÉ player has been developed using the latest MPEG 4 video compression technology and Flash media player. This will ensure the best user experience with fast access and high internet audio-visual quality.

For viewers, access is free, simple and instant. Viewers need access to a computer with an internet broadband connection with at least 1Mbps download speed and a web browser that supports Adobe Flash plug in.

RTÉ.ie is the Irish market leader amongst media websites, with an average of 55 million page impressions per month and 2.3 million unique users. RTÉ.ie users are currently accessing an average of 2 million streams per month. According to Amarach (Life Online 2008), 39% of internet users are watching video content online.

Commenting on the launch of RTÉ player, Múirne Laffan, Executive Director of RTÉ Publishing, said “This is an exciting new opportunity for Irish viewers to access their favourite programmes, whenever they want to. RTÉ player will enhance our service to existing and new RTÉ audiences, extending the availability of our programmes and addressing the challenge to consumers viewing habits beyond traditional appointment to view.

This is a significant enhancement to the consumer experience offered on rte.ie and we expect a subsequent growth in usage and traffic, which will in turn offer commercial advertisers opportunities to reach audiences in new ways”.