Do Channel 4 plan to appear on Sky Ireland?

DaBreno · 03-05-2005 2:33pm #1

Hi folks

just wonderin if any of ye have any info regarding C4 appearing on the Sky Digital Ireland service : Do they have any plans, in the forseeable future, to get their channel onto that service for Irish customers? (I have considered FTV cards but getting them is a proving a problem and it seems they turn themselves off when taken out. I only want C4 for one day a week!)

Thanks a million.

TVDX · 03-05-2005 4:28pm

There has been talk before of C4 appearing on the Irish Sky epg, nothing official.

As far as I recall, they said they would create an Irish region or give us the existing NI region when there were a million Irish Sky digital subscribers.
There are in the region of 300,000 subscribers in ROI about now.

Now, when this happens, which I'm sure in time it will, who knows whether they will keep their word?.

They make money from the ROI through the Irish E4 region.

The FTV cards don't turn themselves off when taken out, I assume you only have one Sky box and are planning on swapping the cards.
If so, then the card will re-activate once left in the box for a while, that's if you have left it out for too long. But they still work.
Ideally, you need to pick up a second hand Sky box and card on Ebay and have a permanent residence for the card, though people have been card swapping for years.
You will need to put a twin output LNB or more(quad comes free with Sky Plus installation) to run the extra box.

Hope that helps.
BTW, what do you want to see on C4 one day a week?(just curious!).

10000maniacs · 03-05-2005 4:51pm

TVDX wrote:

As far as I recall, they said they would create an Irish region or give us the existing NI region when there were a million Irish Sky digital subscribers.
There are in the region of 300,000 subscribers in ROI about now.

Hmmm... One Million southern subscribers just about equals 1 subscribed digibox in every household in Ireland. They don't half set targets, do Channel 4.

Mossy Monk · 03-05-2005 5:43pm

the reason Channel 4 exists on cable is because of the fortuitous reception

best excuse ever imo

chorus techy · 03-05-2005 10:22pm

Maybe once the launch on FreeView in the UK, and forfeit subscription revenues, they may launch onto sky digital in the Republic, to increase their advertising market shares.

watty · 03-05-2005 10:51pm

Historically Cable / MMDS and "Deflecteors" just decided to carry various UK channels. They were never asked nor given permission, nor asked, nor paid.

More recent years the Government aggreed that anyone licenced as an Irish Carrier should pay the UK provider.

SKY is NOT an Irish Licenced Carrier, nor had the same background of rebroadcasting without permission simply by reception and re-transmission.

C4 have not ever expressed serious interest in Irish market as they are a kind of Commercial UK Public Service Broadcaster, unlike ITV /UTV who are commercial.

The BBC also never sought carriage here. Which is why you get more BBC with NO card than an Irish Card.

Richard · 04-05-2005 9:38pm

watty wrote:

C4 have not ever expressed serious interest in Irish market as they are a kind of Commercial UK Public Service Broadcaster, unlike ITV /UTV who are commercial.

Though they like taking money from ROI viewers via premium rate phone numbers on Channel 4 Racing!

weehamster · 04-05-2005 9:52pm

And I thought that most of the Ad's on C4 NI is mostly aimed for ROI viewers.

chorus techy · 04-05-2005 10:07pm

weehamster wrote:

And I thought that most of the Ad's on C4 NI is mostly aimed for ROI viewers.

A good bit of it is, as is UTV's advertising. It seems a bit senseless for Channel 4 NOT to broadcast to Ireland - TV3 is UTV's only problem to beaming into Ireland as part of ROI Sky Packages - channel 4 has not much issues as regards programme rights.

DaBreno · 05-05-2005 11:16am

Thanks for the replies guys.

Im interested to know about the FTV cards. I think there is a chance I can get my hands on one, so whats the story with Activation/Deactivation?
I only want it for a few hours in the week so if I leave it on the mantlepiece for the rest of the week, whats the consequnces? How long do I need to leave it in for before I can view the channels? If its going to cause a lot of hassle, the g/f may veto the Idea! :eek:

TVDX wrote:

BTW, what do you want to see on C4 one day a week?(just curious!).

C4 have great Horse racing coverage and thats been lost in the conversion. Id actually consider going back to NTL if I wasnt tied down to a pesky 1 year contract and may yet do this time next year. Ah well.....

d-j-k · 06-05-2005 11:49pm

I honestly can't see why Sky is treated any differently to a cable platform. I mean, it's just a different technology effectively providing the same result. The system's closed, who cares if the signal goes down a fiber optic cable to a head end in NTL or Chorus' network and then out via coax to your house or gets encrypted, uplinked by a satellite and delivered via a closed system to your home.

The two systems achieve exactly the same result.

I assume that the two cable companies have a major vested interest in maintaining the status quo (now that they're operating with in the law). TV3 and RTE have a huge interest in keeping UK terrestrial TV out of as many homes as possible too.

I can only assume that given time C4 and UTV/HTV/whoever... will end up on our EPGs too.

I'd say if sky digital ireland were to be licenced by comreg as a multichannel television provider it would be in quite a strong legal position to demand to be treated in the same way as a cable operator.

i.e. they could arrange to uplink c4 and UTV on a seperate encrypted channel to ROI subscribers only.

Such a move would prob. finish NTL and Chorus off completely though!

chorus techy · 06-05-2005 11:51pm

Well ITV is already on Astra 2D which is pretty much impossible to receive channels from outside UK & Ireland (unless you want a mega big dish) so there is not much need for ITV to maintain CA encryption anymore. Even if UTV does not go on the EPG, if it goes FTA, you can programme it in via "Other Channels" - a lot of people are waiting for this to happen.

d-j-k · 07-05-2005 12:59am

I stumbled across some channel 4 documentation and it makes for some very interesting reading!!

The following is taken from:
Code of Practice for Commissioning Programmes from Independent Producers
(Channel 4 Television Corporation 23/11/2003)

3.2 Definition of Core and Secondary Rights

Channel 4 defines the exclusive Core Rights it requires from any programme commissioned from a Producer as:

* Rights to transmit the programme on the core Channel 4 service in the UK & Republic of Ireland, however distributed, including Channel 4 catch-up services.
* Rights for contemporaneous programme support services targeted at the UK and Republic of Ireland, including but not limited to promotional extract and synopsis rights, premium telephony rights, Teletext rights, secondary on-line and interactive TV rights and mobile technology rights (those new media rights not required to support the programme by Channel 4 will be returned to the Producer).
* Rights for exploitation of the programme format in the UK and Republic of Ireland.
* The ability to exercise a holdback on the rights to exploit the programme on any platform targeted at the secondary transmission market in the UK and Republic of Ireland, including but not limited to multi-channel television, video-on-demand, near video-on-demand, pay-per-view, primary on-line and broadband internet rights.

.....

Option 1: Channel 4 Licence-only model

The acquisition of Core Rights by Channel 4 with holdback on further exploitation in the UK secondary TV market during the licence period.

- Channel 4 will acquire control of the Core Rights for the licence period, enabling Channel 4 to broadcast the programme on its Core Service.
- Channel 4 will retain exclusivity in the UK television market and no sales will be made to any third party channels in the secondary market in the UK or Republic of Ireland for the duration of the licence.

Rather odd for a channel that has no intention of broadcasting into the Republic of Ireland to make so damn sure that it retains absolute exclusive rights to programming in the Republic of Ireland!!

This means that any programme-maker working for C4 cannot sell their product on to RTE, TV3 or TG4 as C4 considers the Republic of Ireland as part of its home market despite the fact that it is not available universally in the Republic of Ireland other than on cable!

All seems very odd!

Ulsterman 1690 · 07-05-2005 4:41pm

C4 have not ever expressed serious interest in Irish market as they are a kind of Commercial UK Public Service Broadcaster,

How then do you explain the ads for various C4 programmes on Today FM

Mossy Monk · 09-05-2005 1:03am

* Rights to transmit the programme on the core Channel 4 service in the UK & Republic of Ireland, however distributed, including Channel 4 catch-up services.

very interesting that. why are they stopping the glorious advertising from being shown on Sky south of the border. who needs the programming when we see what dunnes have on offer

Richard · 09-05-2005 4:55pm

Mossy Monk wrote:

who needs the programming when we see what dunnes have on offer

"Prices apply to NI only"

Do Channel 4 plan to appear on Sky Ireland?

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