TORONTO . Canada's digital media landscape got a little more British Thursday.
IPlayer, the online streaming service of the British Broadcasting Corp., became available to Canadians early Thursday as a free app for Apple Inc.'s iPad tablet. Users who download the app will have access to a limited amount of BBC content for no charge, or pay $8.99 a month to utilize more than 1,500 hours of regularly updated on-demand video.
Canada is the 16th country to get the iPlayer, though it is the first market in which Netflix Inc. operates a similar service. Worth noting is the Global iPlayer is very different from the U.K. version, which offers live television and broader archive.
Daniel Heaf, executive vice-president of BBC Worldwide's digital division, said during a pre-launch demonstration of the Canadian iPlayer app he wasn't trying to pick a fight with the Los Gatos, Calif.-based streaming-video juggernaut.
"Netflix is a very different type of service, it is very broad" Mr. Heaf said. "It offers tens of thousands of titles across several genres, whereas [iPlayer] is a branded service where we aggregate a very deep type of content; TV content as opposed to film."
"Netflix is a different experience, so I'm not really concerned as there isn't a particularly large demographic overlap," he said.
The demographic argument is an interesting one, as it will also limit the BBC's ability to establish a foothold in Canada's thriving online-video market. Being accessible on a wide variety of devices and Web browsers has helped Netflix amass more than one million Canadian subscribers barely a year since Canada became the U.S. company's first international market.
IPlayer, by comparison, will be accessible only through the iPad. Under two million tablets will be on Canadian soil by the end of this year, estimates market research firm International Data Corp.
IDC said the iPad accounted for more than half of all tablets in Canada as of late June - likely pushing the total past one million by New Year's - and it is safe to assume not all of their owners are BBC fans. Overlap also applies to content, as popular BBC shows such as Blackadder and Fawlty Towers are among Netflix's Canadian library.
"[iPlayer] is no threat to Netflix," said Michael Pachter, a Los Angelesbased analyst with Wedbush Securities. "It is just such a niche product."
While Mr. Heaf said expansion to the iPhone and other devices was "on the list" for iPlayer, the BBC has no immediate plans to launch the Canadian service on new platforms.
Krista Napier, senior digital media analyst at IDC Canada, agreed the market opportunity for iPlayer is small. However, she cautioned that will not be the case for long.
"It is still early days in terms of the number of people who actually own a media tablet today," she said, noting prices as low as $200 is expanding Canada's market. "That becomes increasingly relevant when someone like the BBC launches an app."
jberkow@nationalpost.com
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