"Some companies are throwing a lot of money at mobile TV," says Bill Sanders, vice president for Mobile Networks Programming at Sony Pictures Television International and who has worked previously for many big Hollywood studios and TV networks.
 
Digital technology means a profound change for the studios, one that challenges conventional media wisdom.
 
First of all, a mobile TV is not just a portable TV set. Understanding how mobile viewers' situations differ is, of course, essential. First on Sanders' wish list is a stop-and-resume button.
 
"If there's any viewing situation where you're likely to be interrupted, it's when you're consuming content on a mobile phone while out and about," he says.
 
The flip side for mobile carriers and others trying to find the right model for video on phones, Sanders says, is that people know conventional TV and are used to that experience - which makes it easy to market. 
 
It is crucial that studios and other production companies start tailoring content especially for mobile devices; otherwise they will not be able to charge premium prices for content. Sanders is also surprised at the rush towards DVB-H, DMB and the like, which transmit video one way.
 
"It seems counterintuitive that they are parroting a 70-year-old business model when that very model is under tremendous pressure to change or perish," he says.
 
Operators do not deliver enough of the timely and qualitative data they need to fine-tune their programming or develop the right programs in the first place, and to prove their value to advertisers. This is a big problem for media companies.
 
Sanders says TV-ratings research for mobile video is needed, preferably from an independent third party. The feeling is, he says, that the telecom industry still largely distrusts the internet business model, or finds it difficult to accept.
 
"Operators see mobile data like a health-club membership: they want you to pay your monthly fee but not show up too often."
 
What hampers the dialog with operators is their great fear of becoming "dumb pipes."
 
"That might be the outcome if they get it wrong," Sanders says. "But I would like them to think they could become 'smart pipes,' smart like a probe or robotic lander that continues to send back data about its environment, what is being consumed and so on."
 
There is one market insight that Sanders says may not have sunk deeply enough into the mobile operator psyche: the importance of marketing.
 
"We'd love to apply the ad-supported model to the mobile ecosystem," he says. "Perhaps accurate measurement, internet-style, targeted ad-serving and a less short-term approach from all parties will allow it to take root."