Horse tracks, opera houses offer portable info kiosks

The writer is editor of SelfService.org.

Opera and horse racing might not appear to have much in common; but both pastimes appeal largely to a high-income audience, and those audiences tend to be passionate about the topic, always eager to learn more about it.

That's where Opera Glass Networks comes in. The company provides PDAs and kiosks that function as tiny informational kiosks and, for racetracks, gaming machines. The company uses 520 MHZ consumer-grade PDAs and IBM Anyplace kiosks running on the Windows Mobile OS. They're connected via WiFi to a local server that pipes out content, including live performance video, to the audience.

At Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky. — the home of the Kentucky Derby and one of the centers of the horse racing world — 310 Opera Glass units are deployed, where they are provided to high-end customers to enable them to place bets from their seats, as well as access information about races and horses. At other tracks, the PDAs allow patrons to watch the race on-screen, or view ongoing races at other sites.

"In thoroughbred racing, the goal really is two-fold," said Opera Glass chief executive Barry Goldberg. "One is get that track experience to be more enjoyable because tracks haven't been renovated for a long time, there are typically elderly gentlemen smoking cigars, things like that and they want to improve that experience. Two is increasing ‘handle' or money coming through the track through wagering. We've proven that, year over year, we've increased their handle. (From) 2005 to 2006, their handle for people using these devices increased 166 percent. That's an interesting statistic."

At an opera or symphony performance, the units run technology-partner company Concert Companion's software of the same name. According to Concert Companion chief executive Rolland Valliere, the house normally rents the PDAs for $5 to $12, or can include them as part of a subscription or season ticket package. The system includes digital signs outside the concert hall on which locked-out latecomers or those who want to watch from outside the theater can see the show.

Valliere said the multimedia technology appeals to younger opera patrons, a group upon which opera theaters are pinning hopes for the future. Concert Companion also enables multimedia subtitling; for example, the PDAs can offer English subtitles for a German opera. Users also can access all information contained in the traditional printed program, and, through the live video feed, see aspects of performances not always shown, like the conductor's face and gestures. The devices also promote upcoming events.

Eventually, the companies hope to add more bells and whistles, like the ability to inform a valet to ready a car. For now, users still do not have an option to log in from their own PDAs, but that might be a future option.

"What we have found is, once the person has control of their environment, particularly in a place like an opera house or a concert hall, you can have noises or unexpected consequences," Opera Glass executive vice president of operations Mike Jones said. "Once the experience gets better defined, because it's still a new industry, but once it gets better defined and we know exactly what people are looking for, you can provide a consistent experience."

Opera Glass' work has not gone unnoticed. Goldberg said the company already has deployed its technology at two Super Bowls, Qualcomm Stadium, and a variety of concert halls in large cities. In 2004 the technology was presented at The Wall Street Journal's All Things Digital conference, sharing a bill with presentations by Microsoft chairman Bill Gates and Apple's Steve Jobs. And the users, among whom Valliere sites a 90 percent rate of repeat users, seem to share the deployers' enthusiasm.

"(Publicity has) been mainly word of mouth," Valliere said. "We've been renting, on average, 50 to 70 per night. But this is a new technology that people are not familiar with. It's in the early adoption stage. There is a tremendous amount of interest in what this is and what it does."