Three channels will now serve Europe. One for German users, another Italian and the third for the rest of Europe. Mr. Vu Tien Khang of SES Astra and Project Manager for Sat@Once informed ESA Telecom on July 24 that use of Sat@Once has risen to over 52,000 users. This is up from 31,000 in January 2003. "We have progressed very quickly, I am immensely pleased with our success."
The operators, SES ASTRA and the CSP research centre in Turin, offer the service to the general public at no cost. It distributes, by satellite and at high speed, the most popular parts of the most popular websites and newsgroups from the Internet.
Using statistical webcasting technology based on keywords set by the user, a local PC automatically determines and filters the huge amounts of broadcast data (20 GB a day) and picks out those pages that are interesting to its owner. This set of preferences is kept local and private. The sites selected are renewed periodically at no recurrent cost.
By selecting categories of interest on the Sat@Once portal, the user can browse offline the sites of interest. Links that are not sent by satellite can be retrieved seamlessly using a standard Internet connection. Users of the Sat@Once service made available to the public can offer suggestions for sites that could be included in the broadcast. The more 'votes' a site gets the more likely it will be included in the next broadcast. When users stop voting for a site, it is removed from the broadcast.
The project jointly financed by SES-Astra and ESA, began in the mountainous region of Piedmont in Italy. Several trials were conducted to investigate how far this technology could offer a solution to organisations with a need to share information and to distribute large files be it data, video, audio, or graphics.
This technology was especially useful in Piedmont because cable Internet connection is often not possible. During the trials, a number of schools and public offices used the technology. Schools access web materials and courseware, public offices are able to share databases.
The service is based on DVB standard. All that is needed to make use of the service is a DVB-satellite dish, a PC equipped with a standard DVB/IP satellite reception card and the free 7.1 Mb download of Sat@Once software.
