ESPN have confirmed their intentions to launch an official cricket ‘companion’ app for the iPad, utilising the services already seen on their international sub-website ESPNcricinfo.

Set to become their 3rd iPad app (and only the first to be launched outside of the USA), the service launch will coincide with a test match between England and South Africa in July. ESPN have already described their services as a potential ‘second screen experience’ for viewers, with features set to start with a regular integrated ’homepage’ including headlines, news, opinion, and live scores.

In further detail, big matches will include a dedicated live page with text commentary and scores (both for the featured match and related), statistics (with supporting graphics),  ’player profiles’, and photo galleries, amongst others, with the lack of integrated highlights mainly due to the fact that the company carries little in the way of cricket broadcast rights, and in areas that they do (such as South Asia), the rights do not cover other regions.

However, the app does ensure a smart ’global’ approach in that it automatically detects the location of a log-in through the iPad’s Wi-Fi connection, and adjusts the app accordingly to provide cricket headlines more focused on that region also detects the user’s location from where they log on and then provides content and match information relevant to that region.

Users are also able to directly connect to Facebook for in-play and general interaction with fellow cricket fans, while further features of the app are the personalisation that offers notifications of key scores and alerts, as well as an ‘offline mode’ allowing for articles to be saved to the iPad to be read another time.

ESPN International’s ‘vice-president of digital media’ Arne Rees summarised the upcoming release: “Mobile media and second screens are now an essential part of how fans stay connected to the sport they love. ESPNcricinfo is well established as the leading digital cricket service and this new app will bring the best of that straight to fans’ tablets – wherever they are. The ESPNcricinfo iPad is another example of how we look to serve fans on multiple devices with the very best sporting content.”

It may sound like an obscure wrestler’s stage name, but Turkish digital TV broadcaster D-Smart have revealed that they are the latest global network to bring the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) to their screens, and becoming the first to be broadcasting the franchise in Turkey after the creation of a two-year ‘TV distribution deal’ with the company across all platforms.

The respective weekly hour-long international cuts of both WWE SmackDown and WWE Raw will be shown on Saturdays in a continuous 11:00pm-1:00am slot on the provider’s channel Smart Spor (Smart Sports), #77 on D-Smart’s EPG.

D-Smart CEO Ali Guven said of the arrangement: “It’s show time in Turkey for WWE fans. The vivid action of WWE has huge appeal with fans in Turkey and will add more value to D-Smart’s rich array of content.”

WWE International’s senior vice-president Ed Wells added : “We’re thrilled to announce this new partnership with D-Smart which is representative of WWE’s plans in the region to expand the brand.”

The ‘sports entertainment’ programming, essentially seen (and known) by many as a soap opera in the ring, is a popular source of show in the country, with the WWE brand attracting 13 million viewers in the USA alone (and broadcasting in 30 languages for over 145 countries), while personalities on the show including John Cena, The Rock, Kelly Kelly, and Rey Mysterio are well-known in their own right as a result of its popularity.

D-Smart (owned by the Dogan TV Holding group) will hope that they can capitalise on the popularity of WWE by adding to their digital TV service’s 1.7m subscribers, carrying hundreds of channels and 27 in HD. Will the ‘professional wrestling’ input prove to be a ratings winner for a ‘smart’ network?

In a possible bid to lower the prices of their device even further, Amazon have reportedly been in touch with companies willing to put adverts on the home screen of the next edition of the Kindle Fire tablet computer, with the innovative plans being designed as a small price to pay for users in exchange for a saving on actual cost of the tablet.

A report by AdAge has claimed that the ad-supported device will cost advertisers an average price of $600,000 (£380,000) for a 2-month period, further adding to the already advert-friendly device that uses commercial stills in other areas to cut production costs.

Amazon have not yet commented on their intentions on the ‘welcome page’,  already offers less expensive models of its Kindle e-reader in the US, with advertising revenue subsidising the cost of the device.

While it is not expected to receive the proposed updates, the inaugural Kindle Fire was announced by Amazon as their flagship retail website’s best-selling product, with a second edition due for later this year possibly at an even cheaper price, undercutting Apple’s plans to retain customers by launching a cut-price ‘iPad mini’.

A representative of an advertising agency reportedly in talks with Apple said to AdAge of the issues that consumers would face if the update came in on the older edition: “You’re already paying a premium for the product and then having that unexpected ad experience makes for a worse consumer experience. There needs to be a value exchange.”

Currently only accessible in the USA and Canada, the first Kindle Fire managed to impress with cheap prices and integrated functions to Amazon (which are believed to be an added part of the advert plans), and while the advert proposals for the Kindle Fire 2 will be seen as controversial due to never being tried before, could it end up enhancing the product’s main selling points?

Hulu have revealed their intention to launch up to 10 new shows this summer as part of a seasonal addition to their line-up of programming on the online streaming service, including seven new show licences from overseas, and three original start-ups.

Dipping into their $500m budget for acquiring (and renewing) programming in 2012 that was set aside earlier this year, Hulu are bringing the first taste of their new content in on 4 June, whilst claiming that they are sparing no expense on their original programmes, with each being given a per-episode budget which they feel is equal to counterpart shows on cable TV.

The new shows (all on half-hour episodes) will be travel-based series Up To Speed (produced by Rick Linklater and presented by Timothy ‘Speed’ Levitch), Spoilers (a movie magazine show featuring animated clips and group discussion hosted by Kevin Smith (with a 10-episode order)), and scripted ‘pickup basketball comedy’ We Got Next.

Hulu’s content SVP Andy Forssell said of the launch: ”We’ve got less nighttime hours to work with. That means we were searching for quirky, really well-done shows that can stand up next to last night’s TV. Our shows are made like TV shows or come from network TV partners. We have them watched, followed and talked about like TV shows. It works.”

Up To Speed producer Alex Lipschultz added: “Our show is totally irreverent and unique because Rick [Linklater] was not interested in making commercial concessions. We had no wrangling with finance; Hulu just did it outright with no pressure to change the tone or the style or the content.”

Meanwhile, details have been revealed that four of the the seven new overseas licensed shows come from the UK, with Forssell claiming that the range of experimental content is worth being given a chance online. The shows include magic and hypnosis series Derren Brown: Inside Your Mind, comedy-drama Pramface, sitcom Rev., ” and ‘serial political thriller The Promise. Will a widespread offering of new original and imported content manage to boost Hulu’s online ratings this summer?

Although we all love watching online TV, the biggest growth area for April was the viewing of video advertisements. According to April’s ComScore online video rankings, 181 million US viewers watched almost 37 billion online videos for April, but video ad watching was up by over a billion compared to March.

Web advertising hitting new highs

The top video sites were predictably led by Google’s YouTube with 157 million viewers. They were followed by the usual suspects, Yahoo (53.6 million viewers), Facebook (44.2 million), and Microsoft (42.8 million). The average viewer saw around 1,307 minutes or almost 22 hours of online video in April.

Compared with the previous month not much change in the numbers, until you look at online video advertising.  US web users viewed nearly 9.5 billion video ads last month (around 60 ads per viewer), this compares to March when video ads viewed hit another record of 8 billion.

It looks like a lot of future advertising dollars will be heading online, which may explain why internet companies are making online ads much more attractive to advertisers.

Top for advertising delivery was Hulu with 1.6 billion ads, then Google Sites with 1.3 billion. Frequency of ads delivered was also won by Hulu’s viewers who saw around 49 ads. 52% of the total US population watched on average 60 ads for the month.

In a move made to rectify potential causes for complaint by Time Warner Cable customers, the cable TV service provider has announced that the HBO Go app for Xbox 360 and a number of other connected devices will now be accessable by their subscribers, who were previously unable to reach the catch-up streaming app despite being an HBO subscriber.

The mix-up is said to have happened due to the unusual structure of the service provided by the premium broadcaster, where the TV package provider seems to be responsible for agreeing to allow their customer’s log-in details to be integrated and recognised by the system (as opposed to just using HBO membership details), with TWC announcing that their customers can now get HBO Go on Xbox 360, Roku set-top boxes, and Samsung smart TVs.

The announcement comes just a day after Time Warner Cable added Viacom channels to their iPad app that offers live streams of select TWC-supported channels, meaning a double cause for celebration for TWC subscribers who enjoy viewing their content through alternate sources.

The HBO Go app is notable for allowing its users full catch-up access to their entire original programming backlog (which includes shows such as Game of Thrones, Taken, True Blood, and The Ricky Gervais Show).

TWC’s more open integration to the service (beyond more widespread devices such as the iPad) now sees them join service providers such as At&T, Comcast, the Dish Network, and Verizon, though problems still persist for users of some services, such as Comcast not being authenticated with Roku’s version of the HBO Go service.

It is a set-up which makes for a complicated overview of who is able to watch HBO Go and where, and certainly one which doesn’t compare well to the seemingly compulsory widespread and clear availability of other major network’s online services, but will the situation improve in the near future for hopeful HBO viewers?