BBC3,4,CBBC,BBC New 24 etc

freeasabird

Hey Guys,

If all the above channels are available FTA, why in the name of GOD has Sky not put them on the Irish EPG???.
Jaysus it's a pain in the a**e to have to go to Other Channels etc....

Has anyone put this to Sky yet??

I'm sure if enough complained Sky could sort it out.

Sorry if its been asked before.

P.s Lets all hope ITV goes FTA. Jaysus we would never have to watch Julian on UTV...........ohhhhh to have ITV1 and not Ulster

Gonzo

freeasabird wrote:

P.s Lets all hope ITV goes FTA. Jaysus we would never have to watch Julian on UTV...........ohhhhh to have ITV1 and not Ulster

Amen to that, no-one in our house can bare a second of Julian... when ITV1 was fta for the first few weeks it was great having ITV1 London tuned in... much much better than ulster television.

DMC

If the BBC pay Sky enough money, they would put them on the Irish EPG. But the whole point in the exercise was not to give Sky money, or at least, as little as possible.

In conclusion, it won't happen.

Charles Slane

Sky would have to pay money to BBC Worldwide.

The BBC has nothing to gain from their channels being on the Irish EPG unless Sky pay for them to be there.

Sky on the other hand, would gain more subscribers who would be attracted to getting Sky installed in order to see BBC3, 4 etc.

Sky already pays money to BBC Worldwide for BBC 1 and 2.

Obviously NTL Digital realise the attraction of the extra BBC services, but Sky haven't copped onto it yet.

Mossy Monk

for shame Sky, for shame

all i want to do is be able to record some programmes off BBC3 and BBC4 on Sky+

Wiggy

I sent the following mail to viewerr@sky.com, but have not had a response as yet.

Hi Folks,

I have been a subscriber to the Republic of Ireland Sky World package for almost two years, and I upgraded to Sky+ and Multiroom in October 2003.

Firstly, I'd like to compliment you on the service. Sky is vastly more reliable than the previous cable system that I subscribed to, and your customer support lines are helpful, and readily available without undue delay, in my experience.

However, I am very frustrated that I cannot access BBC3 and BBC4 via the Republic of Ireland EPG. I can of course add them via 'Other Channels' but I cannot record them for time-shifted viewing. And so my enjoyment of the Sky+ system is severely impaired.

I understand that this situation arises because you would have to pay a fee to the BBC to include these channels, in the same way that you pay them to include BBC 1 and BBC2 NI currently.

Surely it would not be beyond your negotiating powers to get these additional channels included in the existing deal? The fact that they are minority interest channels would surely mean that the BBC would not require an exorbitant fee to afford this measure of convenience to a small audience who can receive them in any event? These are FTA channels after all - when your original deal was done they were encrypted.

I await your response with interest.

Regards

If any of you Sky+ subscribers are interested in being able to watch BBC3 @ BBC4 in the same way that you watch the rest of television can I ask you to write similar mails to Sky. If they perceive that there is a demand for this I can't see why they would not attempt to meet it.

In terms of competing with other service providers, Sky are ahead (in my opinion) because of reliability, football and Sky+.

If ITV goes FTA, then a FTA PVR will provide me with reliability and a reasonable alternative to Sky+.

However, if Sky were to treat their customers better by catering to their wishes in relation to the EPG (i.e allowing users to customize it to suit their preferences etc ) then I personally would feel that they are offering good value for money.

Tom Dunne

I think it is down to money again - why would Sky pay the BBC to put the extra channels on the EPG for Irish subscribers (all 300,000 or so of them) and not for the UK subscribers (all 6 million or so of them)?

It just doesn't make financial sense.

Wiggy

tom dunne wrote:

I think it is down to money again - why would Sky pay the BBC to put the extra channels on the EPG for Irish subscribers (all 300,000 or so of them) and not for the UK subscribers (all 6 million or so of them)?

It just doesn't make financial sense.

The BBC pay Sky to put these channels on the UK EPG.

My point is that Sky would not likely have to pay the BBC much more than they already do to add 3 & 4 to the ROI EPG.

freeasabird

I agree, we should all email sky about this. I never thought about the fact that one would not be able to record bbc3,bbc4 etc on Sky+.
And I was thinking about getting Sky+.

What do you think guys, any point in emailing Sky/getting a campaign together???. We have a better chance of getting the bbc channels on the EPG than ITV (unless they go FTA),Ch4,Five.

Capt'n Midnight

freeasabird wrote:

Hey Guys,

If all the above channels are available FTA, why in the name of GOD has Sky not put them on the Irish EPG???.
Jaysus it's a pain in the a**e to have to go to Other Channels etc....

SKY exist to seperate you from money, everything else in secondary, don't ever expect them to do anything that would make it easy for you to ignore pay channels or ads.

If you knew that you could see BBC for free then you might cancel your subscription and then subscribe back for a month at chrismas to see the films and then again three months later for another month to see all the new progs.

DMC

Just to clear something up. What I posted here earlier, and what Charles Slane said are quite correct.

The BBC could pay Sky to appear on the Irish EPG, like they have to for the UK EPG. Likewise, if Sky see the commercial sense, they could pay the BBC (BBC Worldwide) to get the other channels on the Irish EPG. This has happened before, in 2001.

But, another thing... Sky might not like to have them on the EPG, as clearly they dont see eye to eye at the moment, and if the BBC are to challenged the Sky position with their possible "Freesat" service in the near future, they would'nt want a rival taking market share, away from their advertising.

Wiggy

DMC - the BBC have no reason to pay Sky anything to provide a service to Ireland.

However, Sky have a huge reason to pay the BBC for the right to include their channels in the EPG. As you say, if all of the UK terrestrials end up FTA, Sky have to come up with something to justify their charges.

And the only justification for those charges (in my case anyway) are football and Sky+.

If Sky don't wise up in the customer satisfaction department, they are doomed in a FTA world.

corm500

If ITV go FTA then I think it will put Sky under pressure to put them on the epg along with bbc3... etc. You could not really market sky+ in ireland with that many channels available through add channels but not recordable on your sky hard drive. It would make a mockery of it.

Corm500