Case Studies - The Poker Channel

Background

The Poker Channel is the world's first TV channel dedicated to poker and is the home of quality gambling entertainment. The Poker Channel embodies the culture, lifestyle and attitude of poker fans worldwide and offers a one-stop shop with more live coverage of major poker tournaments than ever before. The channel broadcast the world's first live coverage of the British Poker Open, and counts educational programming, new and exclusive editorial shows and nighttime feeds of "high roller" online games within its entertainment package.

The Poker Channel launched its UK television service on March 7th 2005 and operates a single TV channel for its UK audience.

Requirements and Solutions

When The Poker Channel were looking to launch on Sky, one of their main requirements was to broadcast a reproduction of an internet web game. Integration was required from the Boss Media games engine based in Sweden that runs a web poker gaming engine. EBS was commissioned to redraw the web games in broadcast quality graphics and integrate this function into the scheduling and playout system.

Using our own in-house developed products, a graphics program called MS4 and our scheduling/playout solution Clips, EBS took an XML feed from Boss Media and developed a program to interpret and reproduce the commands that run the poker web games. The graphics for the on-screen poker web feed were designed in-house by the EBS graphics department and were then redesigned for the 2006 re-launch.

The Poker Channel’s web feed is still growing, with more functions being developed such as multi-table tournaments and an in-vision presenter view for live commentary.

Some other features that EBS supplied for The Poker Channel are as follows:

• MPEG playout system
• Scheduling system
• On-screen graphics
• EPG
• Aspect ratio control
• Remote access to playout servers and scheduling systems
• Advertising integration with Dolphin Media
• BARB and MCPS reports from playout system
• Integration to an SMS gaming platform
• Compliance recording
• Teletext
• Web listings for schedules

Testimonial

Crispin Nieboer, The Poker Channel

"EBS provided a good cost-effective solution to get us up and running. We chose EBS because they provided so many different things under one roof at the right price, including scheduling software, playout and servers, teletext, EPG, compliance recording, on-screen graphics and even website development. Their in-house software development team also created a bespoke middleware system for us to broadcast online poker games on TV, on a delay, with the cards face up. For those early stage channels wanting a friendly and flexible service, without taking on the exorbitant costs of some of the providers in central London, then I recommend giving EBS a go."

Examples

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Links

Poker Channel Web Site – www.pokerchannel.co.uk
Poker heaven Web Site – www.pokerheaven.com