Italy's Telecommunications minister, Paolo Gentiloni, has announced that the country's analogue switch-off date will now be 2012. This compares to the current official plan to complete the digital transition by next year, which was always highly improbable. Back in 2000 we wrote: "Italy continues to bemuse outsiders. Decision-making is still geared towards satisfying ever-changing political priorities, rather than developing coherent long-term strategies. ...There has even been a suggestion (by the Communications Minister) that analogue switch-off could occur as early as 2003. To describe such ideas as pure fantasy would be polite." In fact, in 2000 the official "switch-off" date was announced as 2006, which remained the objective until 2006 loomed too close for comfort, and was then revised to 2008. So Italy has an impressive track record of tearing up its old digital TV plans; now realism finally appears to have taken hold. The 2012 objective should be realistic, assuming the proposal for mandated DTT tuners is formally adopted, although there is still a long way to go - half of Italian households still rely solely on analogue terrestrial TV signals. As we predicted, France's new DTT strategy has already had an impact on the rest of Europe. We will watch the details of Italy's transition plan with interest.

The BBC has announced the launch of its iPlayer for July 27th, several months earlier than expected. The iPlayer will be free to use (for UK licence fee payers) and will allow broadband Internet users to watch TV or radio programmes broadcast on the BBC's TV and radio channels in the previous seven days. Programmes will be available for streaming or download up to seven days since first broadcast. Downloaded programmes can be used up to 30 days after broadcast. The iPlayer is only Windows-compatible at launch but a Mac version is in preparation. The BBC says it is in discussions with distribution partners such as MSN, Telegraph.co.uk, AOL, Tiscali, Yahoo, Myspace, Bebo and Blinkx. There will doubtless be plenty of hype around this news for the next few weeks, not least from the BBC news service itself. The real news story is the availability of TV programmes rather than radio, which have been available online for many years. The iPlayer should be a slick application, and it is another step forward for the UK market in the global drive towards web TV. But as I have often pointed out to Strategy Analytics clients, broadcasters in other countries have offered this sort of service for some years. I usually cite NRK, the Norwegian public broadcaster, which offers vast archives of TV programmes available for online streaming (eg here). So while the BBC has been lagging behind other players in recent years, it could now leapfrog competitors with a powerful application and a wide range of valuable content. The concept of "always available" is gradually changing the TV industry as broadcasters wake up to the threat and potential of broadband, but business models still reflect the era of scheduled broadcasting. That will surely begin to change as we learn more about the demand for "catch-up TV" and other emerging digital services.

A dominant theme at CES is what I call Internet TV (as opposed to IPTV, which tends to refer to managed, operator-delivered services). Microsoft have confirmed their intention to add internet TV to the Xbox 360 (something we've predicted since day one). More significantly, Sony announced that future Bravia TVs will be IP-enabled and are demonstrating their Internet Video Link device, which delivers managed internet video content to TV sets. Deals have been struck so far with AOL, Yahoo! and Grouper. FCC Chairman Kevin J. Martin and Commissioner Tate happened to be getting the demonstration when I dropped by (their schedule took priority, naturally enough...). I imagine there are some interesting debates at regulators right now over what exactly they should be calling this thing that gets TV and video content to the TV without involving the TV "providers" they like to regulate.

Cisco is the other firm to watch. Chairman and CEO John Chambers gave a typically powerful keynote suggesting that his firm would be enabling the transformation of consumer electronics over the next five years to a completely IP-based environment. Ambitious timing, perhaps, but a company with this sort of record and business performance cannot be ignored. Whether Cisco's strategy pans out or not, the transformation of digital devices in this timeframe is certainly assured.

Some bits and pieces from today's press conferences and tonight's excellent Digital Experience press event (I should point out that Strategy Analytics clients will get fuller details on this and other CES developments in due course).

LG got the day off to a roaring start by introducing the world's first single-drive Blu-Ray Disc/HD-DVD player. The demonstration even worked first time. But it's not a device that's likely to please the HD-DVD backers or encourage content owners to launch titles on HD-DVD as it doesn't support the HD-DVD interactive platform, iHD.

Pioneer and Panasonic gave us the usual "why plasma is best" indoctrination sessions. At least Panasonic has some products to show: Pioneer spent half an hour telling us how wonderful their completely redesigned plasma technology was but couldn't show us the product. Talk about anti-climax! We'll hopefully see the thing in action if we can struggle through the crowds on the show floor tomorrow.

Toshiba focused on HD-DVD and 1080p. A lacklustre presentation generally, demonstrating once again that if you call something absolutely amazing one year it raises the question why next year's product should be any better. HD-DVD first generation was good. Now there's a new generation. The percentage incremental improvement between the two is probably so small as to be incalculable.

We spent some time looking at Nokia's latest handheld devices. The N76 is a new slimline phone with all the Nseries features except the most important one in my view: WiFi. So I'm still waiting for the perfect phone, but it's tantalisingly close. They're introducing an upgrade to the 770 Internet tablet as well, the N800, which includes loudspeakers, a built-in stand and a webcam. I approve of the focus on sound: my 770 serves as a portable Internet radio but it barely does the job without headphones. The 800 looks like being a significant improvement.

At Digital Experience, a number of companies were showing Bluetooth stereo headphones, including iLuv (www.i-luv.com), which claimed the only noise-cancelling model on the market. I'm a big fan of noise cancelling and have been through several major brands (Sony, Philips, JVC) in the search for the best solution. Bose will be pleased to hear I ended up plumping for their latest model, the Series 3, at considerable expense but worthwhile to the regular plane using music lover. If only they could get rid of the wires.... latest versions of Bluetooth are holding more promise for high quality stereo audio.

Logitech is a company I have admired for some time. Best known for computer mice, they in fact offer a wide range of digital consumer electronics peripherals and control devices. They have recently acquired Slim Devices' internet radio device business, so I will look for evidence that Logitech's financial muscle can drive would should be a rapidly growing market for the millions of wireless home network users around the world.

Finally AOL demonstrated their latest AOL Video offering. We gave them a hard time over claims of DVD or even HD video quality, which they clearly are not offering. But the range of content available is impressive and users willing to spend up to $19.99 on a VHS-quality downloaded movie have plenty of choice. Very little content is paid for today, and that's the challenge for AOL and its content partners. There is some way to go before these models approach the mainstream.