Despite the BBC drawing criticism from non-Windows users for only releasing Windows-only iPlayer compatible version, the company has decided to officially launch its iPlayer IPTV service on Christmas day.

While there is some concern about the availability of enough service support staffs during Christmas, the BBC is confident that it will be OK.

“From our point of view, it’s all about the content available on the platform. The Christmas schedules are the richest time of year for TV programming,” BBC spokesperson told PC Pro.

However, some analysts say that Christmas day is probably not the best day to launch a new piece of software. Although, the service has been in beta testing since July, its support messageboard has managed to gather more than 3,000 posts related to technical issues alone.

iPlayer is an on-demand television service of the BBC which allows viewers to download TV shows for seven days after they are aired and store them for 30 days.

BBC disclosed that the streaming service, for those on non-Windows platforms, such as Linux, will “hopefully” launch within the next two weeks.

The iPlayer launch will be strongly backed up with marketing campaign through TVs, radios and posters.

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Entry was posted on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 11:20 pm under Apple, Microsoft, Online video.

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