Government trusts BBC's iPlayer roll-out plan

The Government has said it is satisfied the BBC will make the iPlayer TV-on-demand service work with a range of operating systems.

The iPlayer service lets people download BBC TV programmes that have been broadcast in the previous seven days; once saved to a PC these programmes can be watched at any time for 30 days.

The service was launched on 27 July but currently only works with Windows XP. This has led to strong criticism that the BBC is biased towards Windows XP and ignoring the needs of people using other operating systems, such as Mac users.

The Open Source Consortium has also been vocal in its condemnation, saying there should also be versions of iPlayer that work with open-source software, such as Linux.

An online petition, which was eventually signed by 160,000 people, called for cross-platform versions of the iPlayer. Now the Government has issued a response to this, saying it is satisfied there is no bias and the BBC is going to make the iPlayer available to other operating systems.

In a statement, the Government said: "The BBC Trust made it a condition of approval for the BBC's on-demand services that the iPlayer is available to users of a range of operating systems, and has given a commitment that it will ensure that the BBC meets this demand as soon as possible."

A Mac version will be launched in the autumn, according to the BBC. This will be followed by versions for Vista and mobile devices.