Complementing your TV-viewing by web content automatically-transformed into TV-program-type content

Despite much talk about the fusion of broadcasting and the Internet, no technology has been established for fusing web and TV program content. In this paper, we propose ways to transform web content into TV-program-type content as a first step towards the fusion of these media. Our transformation method is based on two criteria - the transmitted information and the dialogue among character agents. The method deals with both an audio component and a visual component. By combining these techniques, we can transform web content into various forms of TV-program-type content depending on the user's aims. We present three different prototype systems, u-Pav which reads out the entire text of web content and presents image animation, Web2TV which reads out the entire text of web content and presents character agent animation, and Web2Talkshow which presents keyword-based dialogue and character agent animation. These prototype systems enable users to watch web content in the same way, they watch a TV program.