[UPDATE: I've now run some tests at NBR Towers, too, where Vodafone 3G reception is stronger. The video quality now a lot closer, but in a blind test, three colleagues still preferred Telecom's mobile TV. Both services pixelate when the onscreen action gets too fast, which doesn't bode well for sports coverage.]

Read also: Revealed: how many people subscribe to Vodafone mobile TV

Last week, Telecom soft-launched its new mobile TV service, which anyone with a compatible phone on its new XT network can watch (I’m not exactly sure how set-ups on the front page of major newspapers plus prime time news profiles constitute a soft launch, but never mind).

Performance
Since Friday, I’ve Telecom’s service via a Sony Ericson C510, and Vodafone’s on a Motorola Razr and a Nokia N95.

From my experience so far, Telecom’s video looks a little smoother. It also has the advantage of offering a landscape mode, though at times the re-orientated picture is not scaled correct, giving Charlie Sheen an even fatter head than usual.

Vodafone’s video took longer to buffer and was more noticeably pixelated. It did get smoother the longer it played - thanks to buffering, I guess - but it also suffered drop outs when I tried to use it in the car (both telcos push “pass back” or getting some TV going on your phone then passing it to the kids in the back seat as one of the killer apps for mobile TV. I wasn’t surprised I got drop-outs. Video is a demanding 3G app at the best of times, let alone when you’re in a moving target - that is, a vehicle bouncing between cell towers). Bear in mind that Vodafone is being more ambitious - broadcasting Sky TV channels live, while Telecom is offering re-runs.

I found Vodafone had stronger audio, but that may just be a handset issue.
Telecom’s mobile TV uses a player called QuickPlay, Vodafone the better-known RealPlayer.

Both tout their superior encoding and compression technologies.

But I think the more decisive factor is network speed. It could simply because the newer network is less trafficked overall, but XT has the edge for TV.
Winner - Telecom

Above: staff at Vodafone's Auckland office monitor live mobile streams combing through from broadcast partner Sky TV. The pay TV provider handles most of the back-end infrastructure.

Content
Vodafone offers mobile versions of seven Sky TV channels (Sky Sport, Sky News, E, MTV, Comedy Central, Cartoon Network, the Discovery Channel and Playboy), while Telecom offers a selection of content from its partners TVNZ and MediaWorks (TV3, C4).

When a big game is on, Vodafone drops a couple of its regular channels to make room to be able to live stream the All Blacks or Black Caps.

Here, I think, there’s a genuine use for mobile TV. I can’t ever see myself handing my TV-playing phone to kids monkeying around in a shopping trolley (a least, not if I wanted to see it in one piece again).

But I can see someone caught away from a TV watching the All Blacks on their mobile. Or the Black Caps. Afterall, given it's a flate $2.50 rate a week, why not leave a test match screening on the mobile on your desk at work - especially if your main network's monitored (just don't call NBR after you get fired).

And on the occasion that I bus to work, I sometimes check out Sky News on my mobile. It passes the time.

Telecom promises One News and 3News updates.

Most of its content is a selection of US sitcoms, dramas and, um Wipeout, available for your phone 12 hours after they screen on regular TV.
There are also two local shows, Outrageous Fortune and Target.

Watching 45 minutes of Outrageous Fortune on a cellphone screen would be hard work. It’s broken up into chapters, which will help commuters. I like the show, but I only lasted a few minutes with a catch-up episode. Still, I could imagine watching, say, Two and a Half Men on the bus, which is only 22 minutes stripped of commercials.

But if sport is the killer app - as it’s proved on other platforms Vodafone has this one wrapped up.
Winner - Vodafone.

Adult content
Porn has been at the vanguard of many high-tech breakthroughs.
Watching pixelated softcore images on a two-inch screen doesn’t exactly chop my parsley, but apparently, along with sport, “men’s programming” is one of mobile TV’s killer apps. And Vodafone has not one but two adult channels. Telecom sticks to regular programming. But, again, this is largely a function of the two telcos’ respective broadcast content partners.
Winner - Vodafone

Cost
Vodafone mobile TV costs $2.50 a week.

Telecom’s mobile TV is free, though you do need to upgrade to XT to get it. There will be subscription-based charges after November, but the telco refuses to say what they will be.

Vodafone is quick to point out that its offering channels from a pay TV provider, while Telecom faces the prospect of charging its subscribers for content that is free-to-view elsewhere.

Neither telco counts TV toward your monthly data cap.
Winner (for now) - Telecom

iPhone support
Apple’s iPhone is one of the few handsets in Vodafone’s line-up to not support live!, which means no Vodafone mobile TV.

And although you can happily run an iPhone on XT, it’s not part of the official line-up, which means no XT World, the front end for Telecom’s TV offerings.

That doesn’t mean no TV on your iPhone, of course. You can still hit TVNZ or TV3’s regular websites via Safari (or many other channels online offerings) and watch live or delayed streams to your heart’s content (TVNZ on demand does automatically recognised if you're on a smartphone. I found its video content better - and larger format than Vodafone or Telecom's mobile TV services, but much more temperamental).

The catch: the data is not zero-rated data, so your costs will quickly mount up.
Winner - neither

Long term champ
For all their growing capability, neither Vodafone 3G or Telecom XT has the chops to deliver TV streams to hundreds of thousands of viewers at once.
For such mass viewership, you’d need the video signal to be broadcast independently via DVB-H.

Last year, Kordia demonstrated DVB-H (digital video broadcasting - handheld), and results were superior.

But currently there’s only one phone on the market that supports DVB-H (Nokia’s N97), and a roll-out is years away if, ever.

One thing’s for sure: long before then, walled gardens like Vodafone live! and XT World will be short-lived, both for TV and other content. In a few years, they’ll look as quaint as Compuserve does now for the internet at large.

All data will become zero-rated, and anyone wanting to watch TV on their mobile will surf to the channel of their choice, and watch whatever they want. Getting to choose what channels you can watch, or subscribe to. Imagine that.
Winner - neither

More
Vodafone mobile TV home page
Telecom XT mobile TV home page