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Despite being priced similar to services like Netflix and Showmax, the recently launched TelkomONE streaming platform offers limited content and functionality in comparison.
Officially announced Monday, the streaming service enters into a five-year partnership between Telkom and SABC to provide the latter’s content via an independent streaming platform.
This includes all of SABC’s television channels and radio stations, as well as on-demand episodes of some of its most popular shows.
In general, the service offers the following content:
- More than 20 live TV channels
- 22 radio channels
- 30 music channels
- Numerous TV shows and music videos on demand
Customers can browse the catalog and register for free to access a limited content catalog that has a mix of news, inspiration and entertainment channels or subscribe to one of Telkom’s AMP subscription packages that include music, short films, TV series and free content. .
AMP packages are offered in the following options:
- Diary – R7 per day, including 90MB of Telkom streaming data
- Weekend – R17 including 360MB Telkom streaming data
- Weekly – R19 including 720MB of Telkom streaming data
- Monthly – R49 per month, including 1.8 GB of Telkom streaming data
To see what kind of value for money TelkomONE users could get, we signed up for the service to get an overview of its library and features.
However, we soon discovered that the streaming service has a number of issues when it comes to its software interface, hardware compatibility, and content catalog.
Registration process and initial impressions
Telkom said that the platform would be available in an app, but this was not yet the case when we ran our practical test.
Therefore, we enroll in the telkomone.tv website in a desktop browser, which turned out to be a simple and quick process.
We needed to enter a Telkom phone number and create a password for a TelkomONE account.
After going through the necessary OTP confirmation process, our account was created and we were directed to the service home page.
At the top of the page were several tabs: Home, Free, AMP, Competition, Subscribe, and About, in addition to the My Account option to manage profiles and settings.
Reminiscent of Showmax’s design, the content was organized into several categories, including:
- New at TelkomONE
- Best TV of the week
- AMP Top 20
- Sensational series
- Celebrity entertainment
- Shorts
- Comedy corner
- World News
We were unable to successfully log into our account on a mobile browser on three different smartphones, including the device that contained the corresponding Telkom SIM.
We proceeded to use the desktop app, but this is a major hurdle as most TelkomONE users will likely want to access the service via smartphone or tablet.
Payment options
To get a complete picture of the entire TelkomONE offering, we decided to purchase a daily R7 AMP pack to access all the content.
Although Telkom indicated that subscribers have the option to pay for them using their prepaid airtime, we could not find the option to use this as a payment method.
Alternative options were to pay with a voucher, credit card, or add the amount to a postpaid bill.
We opted to use our credit card option, which allowed us to pay with Zapper.
After successfully completing the payment, we had instant access to the paid programs.
Low and dark content
Aside from live TV channels and radio stations, the selection of content on TelkomONE was extremely limited.
Excluding the most popular SABC titles, there were hardly any TV shows or movies that could be described as top offerings.
The catalog included some local Comedy Central sets and roasts, as well as several BET and MTV reality television shows.
Even when it came to SABC’s own soap operas, such as Skeem Saam, Muvhango, Generations: The Legacy, and Laan’s 7, the number of episodes available to watch was very low.
In most cases, only the last five episodes of the current season were offered.
Although the music selection was extensive in terms of local talent, it consisted mainly of scattered tracks from the same albums.
This meant that we had to exit each playback window to hear another song from the same album, which was a very uncomfortable and unintuitive experience.
However, 24/7 news channels were a welcome addition, with BBC World News, Al Jazeera, Euronews, Russia Today, and TRT World being some of the more popular options.
Below is an overview of what the home screen looks like and its categories.
Playback and navigation
When it comes to playback, this required a bit more effort than on platforms like Netflix and Showmax.
First of all, instead of jumping directly to a show or movie after selection from the home page or within individual catalogs, the user needs to click another Play button on the next page for the video player to start.
For shows with multiple episodes, this would often require navigating an additional page.
The structuring of the listed shows and navigation was very basic, with static thumbnails not really differentiating between episodes.
Although we had some issues streaming music videos, the rest of the content was easily stored, and although it would initially start streaming in very low quality, less than 10 seconds later, picture quality seemed to be at its best.
On-demand episodes of SABC soap operas such as 7de Laan, Muvhango and Generations still included commercials at the beginning and during the episodes, giving the appearance of being simple PVR recordings.
However, this could be bypassed by navigating the timeline, and to its merit, Telkom has included playback speed controls as well.
However, there was no option to jump to the previous or next episode of a series, even when adding shows or tracks to a user-created playlist.
While it was possible to pause live TV channels, trying to rewind or go back to a previously played section would only revert to the current live state.
Most of the local content offered a maximum standard definition (SD) broadcast resolution of 1,024 x 768, while several of the international TV shows, including Light as a Feather and Confess, were available in Full HD (1,920 x 1,080). .
Various other problems
In addition to the numerous issues experienced above, we also encountered the following glitches / oversights:
- The name of the episode titles lacked proper grammar and details in terms of episode and season numbers.
- Episode descriptions lacked detail and often only used a general synopsis of the entire series.
- Certain links lead to incorrect programs, for example an episode of Wild Earth Safari Live opened on a recorded SABC sports program.
- Duplicate entries were created for the same episodes, as in the case of MTV’s Lasizwe. However, only one of the two can be played.
- The aspect ratio on BBC World News was also problematic and seemed to stretch the image horizontally. There was no way to adjust this.
The images below show several of the issues listed above.
Alternatives
Although the inclusion of SABC’s free tier of TV channels, radio stations, and various news channels could be valuable to South Africans, the monthly AMP package’s value proposition makes it difficult to sell compared to other streaming services.
For the same R49 per month, you can subscribe to Showmax Mobile, or if you’re one of the lucky first testers, a Netflix Mobile plan.
Both services offer much more content than TelkomONE, and the former also offers a wider selection of local content with higher production value.
This is an opinion piece.
Now Read: Free Version Of Showmax Released In South Africa
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