The interactive viewer: Reality or myth?

The advent of interactive digital television (iTV) in the UK has the potential to revolutionise the use of the television set. But, as past technological innovations reveal, there may well be a great difference between the potential uses of a technology and the actual uses. The key issue is how people in the UK will use iTV in their everyday lives, and whether they will use the interactive capacities made available through iTV or whether they will use iTV as ‘more television’. Available data suggest that the impact of iTV will be less dramatic than often predicted, and will be more of an evolutionary process than a revolutionary change. Interactivity per se may not be as powerful an influence on people's patterns of television use as has been predicted, compared with its core role in internet use.