Freely (free UK IPTV service from BBC/ITV/C4/C5)

This comes up from time to time.

We were never meant to have free access to the BBC or ITV. Freesat happened as a happy consequence of the BBC (followed by others) wanting out of paying Sky for encryption services. Once that occurred Freesat became a possiblity, but it wasn’t the original aim of going free to air.

The BBC cannot be seen to spend UK license fee payers money being available outside the UK. As a matter of policy BBC Studios is only allowed to offer the UK domestic channels to cable companies in countries that could recieve the BBC during the analogue era from terrestrial overspill - Ireland, Belgium, and the Netherlands. (They are available also in Switzerland for reasons the BBC can do nothing about and have to live with while satellite transmission lasts).

Once satellite goes - at least five years down the road - the BBC will still be available here the same way it was before Freesat existed - through cable TV providers, or their linear streaming successors, Sky, VM, Vodafone, and eir.

ITV is a different kettle of fish, it has sold its content to VMTV, there is a formal relationship there and while that lasts ITV1 & 2 will not be available on any Irish platform.

There’s a separate debate to be had as to how long linear TV itself will last, but I think it’s going nowhere anytime soon and will last longer than a lot of people think.