Digital Forty Four was a Sydney-only trial

datacasting Datacasting (data broadcasting) is the broadcasting of data over a wide area via radio waves. It most often refers to supplemental information sent by television stations along with digital terrestrial television (DTT), but may also be applied ...

service that was licensed by the Australian Broadcasting Authority (now the Australian Communications and Media Authority) beginning on 17 March 2004 for an initial three-year run until late 2007. The license was extended on several occasions past 2007, however on 29 January 2010 it was announced that

Broadcast Australia BAI Communications, formerly Broadcast Australia, is an Australian telecommunications systems company. History Macquarie Bank completed its acquisition of National Transmission Agency in 2002 the seed asset in the publicly listed Macquarie Com ...

's datacasting licence for Digital Forty Four would not be extended past 30 April 2010. At midnight on 30 April 2010, all services from Digital Forty Four ceased broadcasting. The services provided at various times during its six years of operation have included a television guide for

free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscripti ...

television, a community service channel providing information on road, weather and surf conditions, with live broadcasts every fifteen minutes, the Australian Christian Channel, Expo shopping channel,

NITV National Indigenous Television (NITV) is an Australian free-to-air television channel that broadcasts programming produced and presented largely by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It includes the half-hourly nightly ''NITV News'' ...

, Teachers TV information channel and live broadcasts of the meetings of the

Australian Parliament The Parliament of Australia (officially the Federal Parliament, also called the Commonwealth Parliament) is the legislative branch of the government of Australia. It consists of three elements: the monarch (represented by the governor-g ...

, with audio-video coverage of the

House of Representatives House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...

and Senate.

Channels

Under conditions associated with the datacasting licence, channels on the Digital Forty Four service had to be either text based or narrowcast services. Entertainment programming was not allowed on the service, however some programming on the Australian Christian Channel was shown in a reduced screen format with text content around it, as that satisfied the datacast requirement.

Former Channels

As it was a long term trial, many channels that started on the service did not continue until the cessation of broadcasts.

Legacy

The ACMA decided in closing the service that it was unlikely that datacast services would come to auction in the near future, and decided continuing the trial was unnecessary for that reason. NITV, which gained coverage on the service, considered the closure of the service a blow to its chances of gaining permanent spectrum for the service, and put the long term viability of the service into question. Most of the other channels on Digital Forty Four are available unencrypted on satellite or via online streaming.

References

{{Australian free-to-air television networks Television stations in Sydney Digital terrestrial television in Australia Defunct Australian television channels English-language television stations in Australia Television channels and stations established in 2004 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2010 2004 establishments in Australia 2010 disestablishments in Australia

Channels

Former Channels

Legacy

See also

References