TVNZ TELETEXT HAS IMPROVED

If you've looked at TVNZ Teletext recently and couldn't find what you expected, don't worry. To make the service easier and more logical to use we've reorganised a little. Your favourite content is still there but in a different place.

The reason is simple. We have a limited number of pages available, but need to show more information than ever.

Previously, TVNZ Teletext had similar information spread across many pages unnecessarily. We've reorganised to keep similar pages together. For example, all news content is now grouped together, as is all sport content.

You may also notice that the branding has changed slightly. Teletext is still owned and run by TVNZ, just as it always has been, we are now just reflecting this through the name - TVNZ Teletext. Now more than ever it will be a service that represents the integrity, neutrality and editorial independence you expect from New Zealand's leading broadcaster.

NEW PAGE GUIDE

INDEX PAGES
100 TVNZ Teletext home page
101 News index
102 Sport index
103 Weather index
104 TV index
105 Business index
106 Travel index
109 A-Z index
500 Lifestyle index
600 TAB Text

DAILY NEWS
110 World news
125 New Zealand news
200 Sports news
400 Business news

TV LISTINGS
310 Now/next
301 TV ONE today
311 TV ONE Tomorrow
302 TV2 today
312 TV2 tomorrow
303 TV3 today
313 TV3 tomorrow
304 C4 today
314 C4 tomorrow
331 Monday
332 Tuesday
333 Wednesday
334 Thursday
335 Friday
336 Saturday
337 Sunday
320 Captioned programmes
801 Captions
350 On The Box

BUSINESS
105 Business and finance index
400 Business news
413 NZSX indices
414 NZSX 50
416-419 NZSX listings

TRAVEL
430 Flight arrivals and departures
498 World clock
198 World weather

OTHER SERVICES
555 Lotto
510 Horoscopes

CAPTIONING / SERVICES FOR DEAF AND HEARING-IMPAIRED VIEWERS
320 Captioned programmes today / tomorrow
321 Captioned programmes seven-day listings
801 Captions
501 Deaf newsletter
505 Captioned cinema

NEW FUNCTIONS AND FEATURES

On The Box is the new TV listings area, redesigned and expanded to allow more detail about your favourite upcoming programmes. BBC World TV listings have been added as well.

Captioned programmes now have day-specific pages, so you can access any day's programming quickly and easily. Sports information can be found in one place: between pages 200 and 299.

Horoscopes are published daily on page 510.

Lotto results have moved to page 555.

Weather has been completely reorganised, now just look up Your Town for instant access to all daily forecasts, tide information and marine forecasts for the area, all on one handy page.

Newsreel lets you watch an automatic slideshow of top news stories, without using your remote. The international newsreel is on page 550, the national newsreel on page 551 and the sport newsreel on page 552.

The index button on your remote now takes you directly to the A-Z index (page 109).

Subpages can now be selected individually (check your TV manual to ensure your television remote supports this). Subpages scroll around automatically, but if you don't want to wait you can use your remote to select a specific subpage from the onscreen list.

CAPTIONING
Captioning (sometimes referred to as subtitles) provides onscreen text to help deaf or hearing-impaired viewers to follow television programmes. Captions are also used by migrants and students learning English, or as a tool to assist with literacy education.

As with subtitles, text is added to represent the dialogue, but captions go further in that they also describe sound effects and music ("car engine stalls", "knock on door", "dance music plays"), and are colour-ascribed and placed to identify speakers.

Captions are available by selecting page 801 on channels TV ONE, TV2 and TV3.

When page 801 is selected during a programme featuring captions, the TVNZ Teletext page disappears, leaving the normal television picture. When words are spoken, the captions appear in a black box at the bottom of the screen.

If page 801 is selected during a programme that does not feature captions, then the page remains black and the counter at the top of the page does not rotate.

CAPTIONED PROGRAMMES
With the support of funding from NZ On Air, TVNZ captions over 130 hours of programmes each week across TV One, TV2 and TV3. In addition advertisers can choose to caption their commercials.

A full list of programmes with captions is available on page 320 of TVNZ Teletext.

For more information about TVNZ Captioning, tvnz.co.nz keyword Captioning

ABOUT TVNZ TELETEXT

For over 21 years, TVNZ Teletext has delivered a free news and information service to anyone with a Teletext compatible television. Today, TVNZ Teletext remains a wholly-owned and operated service of TVNZ.

TVNZ Teletext can be accessed 24 hours a day, seven days a week via TV ONE, TV2 and TV3 (VHF) and via TV ONE and TV2 on Sky Digital (satellite) and Saturn Television (cable).

INFORMATION INCLUDES:

• World and New Zealand News
• Extensive weather information, including marine and coastal forecasts
• Sports news, results and statistics
• Business news
• Financial market information
• International and domestic flight arrivals and departures
• TV schedules
• Lotto results
• TAB horse racing and sports betting odds and results
• Lifestyle information like horoscopes

HOW TO USE TVNZ TELETEXT

Access to TVNZ Teletext and all its functions is available through your Teletext-enabled TV remote control. (See your TV manual to discover if your TV is Teletext enabled)

TVNZ Teletext is available on TV ONE, TV2 or TV3 through VHF (ordinary TV aerial) or TV ONE or TV2 through Sky Digital and Saturn Television. To view TVNZ Teletext, first make sure that you are on one of these channels.

Although the following information should describe the operation of TVNZ Teletext for most TV sets, functions do vary between manufacturers and models. For specific information about your particular model, please consult the manual for your TV set.

TEXT BUTTON
Press the text button and Page 100 will appear on screen (it may take a few seconds for the page to appear). This is the home page for TVNZ Teletext.

The TVNZ Teletext page will completely replace the television picture; however, sound will still be available.

To return to television, press the text button again. On some TV sets, TVNZ Teletext can also be viewed "over the top" of the television picture. This feature is usually controlled by pressing the text button.

PAGE NUMBER BUTTONS
Each TVNZ Teletext page has a unique three-digit page number. All pages can be accessed by typing in their three-digit page number using the numbered channel buttons on your remote control.

For example:

Type in 109 to access the A-Z index
Type in 301 to access today's television listings for TV ONE
Type in 100 to return to the main index

UP AND DOWN BUTTONS
It is also possible to change pages by using the up and down buttons (usually the up and down channel buttons). This will take you to the next or previous pages

FASTEXT BUTTON
At the bottom of each TVNZ Teletext page there are four coloured words or numbers. These are Fastext keys. They relate to the four coloured buttons on your remote control - red, green, yellow and blue).

By pressing the corresponding coloured button on your remote control you will be automatically taken to that page.

For example:

On page 100, press the Green Fastext button, to go to the New Zealand Sports Index (Page 102).
On Page 102, Press the Red Fastext Button to go to Page 100 (The Home Page).

HOLD BUTTON
Many pages on TVNZ Teletext contain a series of pages, which rotate in a continuous cycle.
One example of this is the share market pages, which can contain a series of four or five pages. If you want to keep a particular page on screen, press the hold button. To view other pages in the series, press the hold button again.

EXPAND TEXT BUTTON
For viewers who have difficulty reading a TVNZ Teletext page it is possible to double the size of the text. By pressing the expand text button the top half of the page is expanded to fill the entire screen. Press the button again and it will display the bottom half of the page. Press the button a third time and it will return to the normal page.

INDEX BUTTON
Press the index button to be taken automatically to the A-Z index (P 109)

SELECT SUBPAGES (IF AVAILABLE)
When a selected TVNZ Teletext page consists of different subpages, a list of available subpages appears on the screen. Press the cursor right or left to select the next or previous subpage

NEWS REEL
News reels have been reintroduced. Visit the news reel pages and you can watch a slideshow of news stories without having to use your remote. On P550 you'll find the newsreel for international stories, P551 has national news and P552 has sports news.

HISTORY OF TVNZ TELETEXT

THE ABILITY TO SEND SIMPLE TEXT AND GRAPHICS AS PART OF A TELEVISION SIGNAL WAS DISCOVERED BY BBC ENGINEERS IN THE MID 1970S.

Teletext was first screened on New Zealand television on February 1 1984. Money for the introduction of the service was partly provided from the proceeds from the 1982 Telethon for the Year of the Disabled Person.

Although Teletext was originally intended as service for deaf and hearing-impaired viewers, the popularity of the service has grown, and today there are more than 1.3 million viewers.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

WHY IS TVNZ TELETEXT DISPLAYING RANDOM LETTERS?
From time to time, you may notice a page with missing letters, strange characters or one page mixed with another. These errors are generally caused by poor reception.

TVNZ Teletext is a digital service and requires a high quality signal. Over time, the signal from your outside aerial will deteriorate. Because this may happen over a period of years, often it is barely noticeable on your TV picture, however may show up as errors within Teletext.

ATMOSPHERIC CONDITIONS
In poor weather conditions (stormy, windy or heavy rain) then television and TVNZ Teletext reception may also be poor.

INTERFERENCE
Your television set is susceptible to interference from a wide variety of sources. This includes other radio or broadcast signals (typically cellular telephone, satellite or microwave transmissions).

DETERIORATION OF YOUR TELEVISION AERIAL
Poor Teletext reception is often caused by a loss of signal between your TV aerial and your television set. As your outside TV aerial is exposed to the elements including wind and rain, its performance will begin to fall off. A typical TV aerial has an approximate lifespan of between seven and 10 years.

WHY CAN'T I RECEIVE TVNZ TELETEXT
If you can get no TVNZ Teletext service at all, there are two main reasons why this might be.

WRONG TV CHANNEL
TVNZ Teletext is only available through TV ONE, TV2 and TV3 via VHF transmission and through TV ONE and TV2 via Sky Digital (satellite) and Saturn TV (cable). If you select TVNZ Teletext and a page does not display within 15 to 20 seconds, try another channel (as detailed above).

TRANSMISSION FAULT
If you have ruled out all of the above possibilities, then there is the possibility that there could be a transmission fault. TVNZ Teletext is broadcast from around 400 transmission sites up and down the country, which, like any equipment, can be liable to breakdown.

CONTACT DETAILS

For more information on Teletext or Captioning please contact:

TELETEXT
Television New Zealand
PO Box 91 209 Auckland
Phone: 09 916-7000
Fax: 03 308-9614
Email: teletext@tvnz.co.nz

CAPTIONING
Television New Zealand
PO Box 3819 Auckland
Phone: 09 916-7000
Fax: 09 916-7902
Email: captioning@tvnz.co.nz