NY10, rechristened TAXI-TV, is finally ready to take New York by storm

MediaWeek picked up a little story on the famously complex TAXI-TV project being spearheaded in New York City. As the story goes:

ABC’s New York flagship WABC-TV with its partner VeriFone Transportation Systems, is the first vendor to get the green light by the New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission to sell backseat touchscreen monitors to cab owners, the companies announced Monday. Tested by WABC-TV and VeriFone for more than a year, TAXI-TV features advertiser-supported content from WABC’s Eyewitness News, the WABC Web site, AccuWeather, ESPN; and restaurant, nightlife, shopping and hotel information from the Zagat Survey.

WABC and VeriFone are one of four vendors the NYC Taxi Commission is considering. By August 1, all NYC taxicab medallion owners must sign up for an integrated payment and content delivery system.

WABC-TV will be the primary sales agency for advertising on the backseat touchscreen monitors. A variety of ad opportunities will be available including video and interactive options.

So after all the previous confusion it looks like the deal is being pitched/sold by Verifone as a integrated payment deal that's probably partially or fully subsidized by planned advertising revenue on the TAXI-TV network. That's actually a pretty clever approach, since all of the past in-cab/bus networks I'd seen didn't offer any immediately tangible benefits to the venues themselves, and instead focused on future shares of advertising revenues (which typically never materialized or were much less than expected). But here there are a bunch of possibilities for spinning the deal, a number of which look like they might actually work.

Previous articles on the TAXI-TV project include:
Clear Channel Outdoor to deploy Taxi Entertainment Network to 5,000 NY cabs
When does TV become digital signage?
ClearChannel clarifies NY10 taxi cab signage network
Just how many NY taxi network projects are there?

Tags: NY10, TAXI TV, digital signage