"RTVE Red Button" Is Born: The New Service for Connected Televisions with HbbTV

• This service is already available. All users have to do is press the red button on the remote control for their connected television sets
• This function provides access to RTVE A la Carta —RTVE’s large video-on-demand platform, which features more than 90,000 broadcasting hours, news programmes and extra and interactive content
• RTVE, ever at the forefront of the latest new technologies, has taken an important step forward in terms of facilitating the way in which we gain access to and consume audiovisual contents
• Learn more at www.rtve.es/botonrojo 

RTVE has combined the best of the Internet with the best of television through our TV set remote control. This consists of a television service based on hybrid technology (DTT signal plus Internet) with which users can gain access to all of RTVE's A La Carta programmes, news programmes and sports simply by pressing the red button on their remote control for connected television sets. RTVE presented its new "Red Button" service at the TV Festival of Vitoria-Gasteiz, which took place in early September of this year, thus confirming its leading role amongst service providers for connected televisions. This is a new multimedia option that charts the way forward for audiovisual Internet.

"Red Button": More Than 90,000 Broadcasting Hours and Extra Contents

RTVE, ever at the forefront of the latest new technologies, launched its latest TV experience within the framework of the Festival, effectively offering society a new means of gaining access to audiovisual contents.

Up until now, if you wanted to watch a programme, read about a news item or view the latest sports results you had to use different media: television, computer, mobile devices.... Now all three have been combined in one at the simple push of the red button on your remote control, thanks to the new services known as RTVE RED BUTTON.

RTVE RED BUTTON is the environment for extra contents that TVE offers you 24 hours a day on television sets that are connected to the Internet when you press the red button on the remote. These contents are offered in two different ways: through a set of HbbTV services constantly available to the users and through the live broadcasting of extra interactive contents.

The HbbTV services always available to the viewers are: more than 90,000 hours of programmes on RTVE A La Carta, the main news and current affairs and access to news programmes, a Sports environment featuring the latest news, calendars and results of the leading sports competitions, and all of the à la carte contents on Clan.

Each of these environments is linked to the coloured buttons on the remote control: RTVE À La Carte (yellow); News (blue); and Sports (green).

Furthermore, for certain programmes RTVE RED BUTTON offers viewers associated contents over and above that which appears on the screen at the time, including extra live contents: details, additional information, surveys and pictures.

If users wish to deactivate RTVE RED BUTTON and return to the programme they were watching, they simply have to press the red button again.

Technology

The RTVE RED BUTTON service has been developed by Interactivos de RTVE ("RTVE Interactive") after more than a year's work. This is Spanish public television's gambit to promote HBBTV technology for connected television sets, based on a standard that has been developed in coordination with different European public television companies, a project headed in Spain by RTVE.

Television sets that offer access to hybrid DTT include SMART TVs and televisions connected to the Internet that permit the use of standard HBBTV. Practically all of the television sets sold in Spain since 2012 offer access to the Red Button. According to RTVE's own calculations, more than one million households can already use this service.

European standard Hybrid Broadcast Broadband Television (HBBTV) is the technology on which this service is based and it has been promoted in Spain by all of the leading players within the industry, including the main television channels, the Government, equipment manufacturers and interactive service developers. By next year, new television sets are expected to include the description "Hybrid DTT", which will make it easier for consumers to identify these television sets.

If the television is not connected to the Internet or does not have hybrid DTT, users can gain access to RTVE RED BUTTON by using an adaptor that is on sale at specialised outlets.

Once users are connected to the Internet, all they have to do is to select the "HBBTV" or "Data Service" option on their remote control adjustment menu, which effectively activates the TV's hybrid connection. Then it is simply a question of pressing the red button on the remote in order to gain access to RTVE RED BUTTON, which enables users to navigate through the endless range of contents offer.