Virgin Media (NTL) UK - Sky One, Two, Three, News to disappear from lineup in days.

DMann2006

All.

Q. Given all the relevant information below - are we effected by these changes??

Is NTL Ireland to be rebranded as Virgin Media??

I know that the UK and Ireland are seperate entities - but I thought they operated under one name.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTL_Ireland

Q. Can anyone answer if we here in Ireland using NTL are indeed going to lose these channels??

I've phoned NTL themselves and they don't know jack about squat!!

Regards:
DMann2006

fta keith

This should not affect Irish NTL viewers as upc own the Irish operation not virgin media,

GerardKeating

DMann2006 wrote:

Is NTL Ireland to be rebranded as Virgin Media??

Nope, NTL Ireland is to be re-branded as UPC

DMann2006 wrote:

Q. Can anyone answer if we here in Ireland using NTL are indeed going to lose these channels??

The UK decision will have no effect on Ireland. The reasons that Virgin/NTL are doing this might prompt UPC to do something simular. Do we know why Virgin/NTL are doing this?

We never had Sky-three anyway.

DMann2006 wrote:

I've phoned NTL themselves and they don't know jack about squat!!

Why should they know anything about the UK, they is no longer any connection between the two companies, and even when there was, the was never any relationship between the channel line-up in the countries.

DMann2006

Why should they know anything about the UK, they is no longer any connection between the two companies, and even when there was, the was never any relationship between the channel line-up in the countries.

Thanks for the info. That's why I asked the question. I didn't know the relationship between Virgin Media/NTL and NTL Ireland/UPC. And wouldn't it be in NTL Irelands best interest to say that this does not effect Irish Customers???

And if you've dealt with the NTL Helpdesk (want for a lack of a better word), you'd know that SOME people on there are completely incompetent. Some of them didn't know about the rise in Cable TV costs to €21.49 from a few months back. Even though it was advertised on their website!!

Thanks again:
DMann.

JDxtra

DMann2006 wrote:

And wouldn't it be in NTL Irelands best interest to say that this does not effect Irish Customers???

Nope. Virgin Media is not visible to Irish consumers at all so there is no confusion.

tvbrat

Taken from Digital Spy
see link below

According to a statement from Virgin Media, Sky is to pull its basic channels from the cable operator's platform at the end of the month.

Sky One, Two, Three, News and Sports News will be removed from the Virgin Media service following the breakdown of talks last night. Virgin claimed this morning that Sky were asking for double the previous rate for the cable company to carry the channels.

A statement from Virgin Media this morning said that "following an intensive series of meetings over the last week," it anticipated a withdrawal of these channels by Sky at the end of February.

It went on to say: "The nature of these negotiations leads us to believe that this outcome has been deliberately engineered by Sky in order to suppress competition and coerce Virgin Media's customers into switching to its service by denying them access to the basic channels.

"This view is reinforced by Sky's decision to broadcast, at the height of negotiations on 12 February, a series of promotions claiming that the channels were about to disappear from Virgin Media's network. This was nothing more than a heavy-handed attempt to exert undue influence on the negotiating process."

more here
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/digitaltv/a43031/virgin-media-to-lose-sky-channels.html

Mossy Monk

DMann2006 wrote:

And wouldn't it be in NTL Irelands best interest to say that this does not effect Irish Customers???

why when Virgin Media have absolutely nothing to do with cable in this country. i think them making an announcement like that would lead to confusion

Dodge

This might affect UPC as AFAIK magnet entertainment do not carry Sky Channels. I presume for the same reason.

Mossy Monk

how can this affect UPC? Virgin Media and UPC have absolutely no connection

watty

Sky and Magnet have different explainations as to why they are not on Magnet.

It's about time someone stood up to Sky.

UPC have bigger things to concentrate on at the minute with the massive NTL/Chorus upgrade work going on.

nicelives

I think it's a bit worrying the way Sky seem to be now negotiating with cable companies. They seem happy enough to lose millions of viewers and so make it that bit less effective for advertisers in aid of their long term goal of being a monopoly in the market place. Freeview, Free to Air, ITV's and BBC's distancing from getting too locked into Sky have been very good moves in the past seeing as the way it's going.
It think it's important that Virgin Media don't take this rubbish otherwise it's guaranteed this'll be the way Sky will negotiate with Irish based cable companies and maybe have already with Magnet and others given Sky's recent dominant position in the Republic.
I imagine UPC management are watching these developments with great interest.

icdg

Those of us with long memories will know that there is indeed an (Irish) precedent for this. Cablelink and Sky fell out in 1992 over carrige fees and Sky One and Sky News were pulled from the service. (Then, as now, Sky Movies and the flegling Sky Sports were unaffected). While both companies were promising the return of the channels from literally the day after they disappeared, it took two years for them to return.

And Sky had a greater incentive for them to return in those days. The number of Irish Sky analogue subscribers was tiny compared to the amount of Sky Digital subscribers these days. (Indeed, in 1992 Sky One was still free to air on satellite).

None of that is to say that this will happen again now. Virgin Media is a completely seperate entity to UPC Ireland and aside from some continuing contractural relationship vis use of the NTL brand and the system software owned by Virgin, the two companies are no longer connected. But remains a possiblity that Sky may try to pull something similar here, especially now that all the traditional terrestrial channels are available on satellite.

rogue-entity

Regardless of this, if UPC Ireland loses the right to broadcast Sky One on its network, their are a number of people, myself included, that will get Sky for that channel because it carries some very popular programmes like 24, Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Stargate and some others. What would be nice is for a clearer distinction drawn between Terrestrial broadcast rights and Sattelite broadcast rights, and a distinction between the UK and Ireland when it comes to assigning programming rights. The point being that just because Sky One gets the rights to broadcast something, say, Lost. RTE can still get the rights for Ireland, even if Sky has the rights for both countries for sattelite coverage. This would be one way to stop Sky getting exclusive programming rights on programming on Sky One as well as sports rights.

@icdg: Lets hope Sky realises that its basic channels are not as popular as its premium channels i.e Sky Sports, indeed, Sky channels in general are not near as popular as they were back in the analogue days, and with the wider selection of FTA sattelite channels, Cable Companies can just as easily drop them and Sky will be the one to suffer. It is only the tiny few like myself that would subscribe, just to get Sky One, since we like the programmes shown on the network.

ciaran76

I dont think I have ever watched Sky one only to watch the Simpsons but thats on every channel now. So losing Sky 1 ,2 or news would be no big deal for me.

watty

But the current UK Virgin media (= NTLUK/Telewest) is nothing to do with UPC/Chorus/NTL here.

watty

If you prefer to buy the DVD movies you really like and have no sport interest (50% of folk?) then Sky premium offering have never had any interest.

paulm17781

When I read this I thought it would be awful to lose Sky here (again) after thinking though, I think the only thing Sky exclusively shows that I watch is 24. I would be annoyed to miss the new Simpsons episodes but I don't watch that near as often as I used to. I wonder if Sky are actually making a big mistake doing this in the UK...

GerardKeating

paulm17781 wrote:

When I read this I thought it would be awful to lose Sky here (again) after thinking though, I think the only thing Sky exclusively shows that I watch is 24. I would be annoyed to miss the new Simpsons episodes but I don't watch that near as often as I used to. I wonder if Sky are actually making a big mistake doing this in the UK...

Don't RTÉ2 show 24 as well?

BendiBus

And you can always buy the series on DVD soon after they're broadcast. Or, indeed, you should be able to (legally) purchase & download the likes of 24 pretty soon.

watty

Real DVDs and CDs beat legal downloads easily for convience, quality and often cost!

legalimmigrant

GerardKeating wrote:

Don't RTÉ2 show 24 as well?

Irish FTA channels have, since I moved over 18 months ago, at some point aired new eps of all of the following -- in many cases several weeks before any UK channel:

* Lost
* 24
* ER (currently on and running 3 weeks ahead of C4)
* Studio 60 (not yet begun on C4)
* The West Wing
* CSI and variants

rogue-entity

Actually, once Sky gets the rights to popular programmes like 24 and Lost, RTE cannot get them also, dispite the fact that Sky is Sattelite and RTE is terrestrial (probaby to do with RTE being on Sattelite and conversely, Sky One being on Cable). This means that since Sky currently have the rights to 24, Stargate Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica and Lost, RTE cannot get them.

This means that people who follow these programmes, and want to keep watching them (in the UK at least) will have to get Sky, and we will as well, if Sky One gets pulled from UPC. Unless of course, they illegally download them

And to my knowledge, no Irish channel has shown Sci Fi content on a continuing basis.

ebsa

rogue-entity wrote:

This means that people who follow these programmes, and want to keep watching them (in the UK at least) will have to get Sky

Perhaps not, The Observer reports that Virgin Media has struck a deal to screen all 3 series of Lost on its new video-on-demand channel, Virgin Central.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,2020565,00.html

_Kaiser_

As ICDG mentions, when Sky and Cablelink fell out here in 1992 this was a far bigger problem as there really was nowhere else to see first-run US TV.

These days however there's:
- far better competition (from a programming perspective) from analogue/other satellite channels to Sky One, who back then did indeed have the rights to almost everything that came in.

- The Internet. Regardless of whether you approve/agree or not, the episodes of all the most popular shows are readily available to download, often months before they make their debut here. With the rise of HDTV, this becomes a viable alternative as the quality is vastly improved (though personally I much prefer to buy a show like Galactica on DVD, which leads me neatly to my next point..)

- DVD's. For less than the price of a night out these days (in most cases anyway), you can buy an entire season of a show online, have it delivered in a few days, and watch the whole lot as you like uninterrupted by ad breaks, on-screen graphics/idents, and in better quality (especiallly with new HD-upscaling DVD players coming onto the market) then you get on even Sky One on satellite.

In short this isn't the same threat as it used to be I reckon and ultimately, the only ones it'll really hurt is Sky themselves.

Ciaran500

rogue-entity wrote:

Actually, once Sky gets the rights to popular programmes like 24 and Lost, RTE cannot get them also, dispite the fact that Sky is Sattelite and RTE is terrestrial (probaby to do with RTE being on Sattelite and conversely, Sky One being on Cable). This means that since Sky currently have the rights to 24, Stargate Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica and Lost, RTE cannot get them.

RTE already has the rights to Lost

zilog_jones

rogue-entity wrote:

Actually, once Sky gets the rights to popular programmes like 24 and Lost, RTE cannot get them also, dispite the fact that Sky is Sattelite and RTE is terrestrial (probaby to do with RTE being on Sattelite and conversely, Sky One being on Cable). This means that since Sky currently have the rights to 24, Stargate Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica and Lost, RTE cannot get them.

Bollocks - Sky cannot and do not have any exclusive rights to shows over Irish terrestrial channels. FYI RTÉ Two are currently showing new episodes of Lost (before Sky One as per usual), and they have shown 24 before (dunno if they are now, I don't watch it myself). And previously they have shown the newer episodes of the likes of Friends and Scrubs, often at the same time UK terrestrial channels or Sky were showing the same series but a few episodes behind.

I guess the Irish channels just don't see much of an interest in stuff like Atlantis, which is why they don't show them.

And to my knowledge, no Irish channel has shown Sci Fi content on a continuing basis.

What, is TNG on Channel 6 not enough fer ya?

Personally I could live without Sky One - the Simpsons went attrociously downhill 9 years ago, never mind the state it's in now! The only other show I watched regularly on the channel was Malcolm in the Middle, but that ended last year so Sky One are now of no use to me! :cool:
Sky News is pretty much the TV version of The Sun - most the time there is not enough happening in a day to make a 24-hour news channel like that remotely interesting anyway. At least channels like BBC News 24 and EuroNews have content that's actually half-different every hour.

snaps

i actually thought that there was different regulations in regards to rights/ license issues between cable/sky/terrestrial tv broadcasting.Virgin apparently have struck a deal with HBO which sky do not have?? Ntl/Upc carry MGM movies that Sky do not have? Perhaps cable companies should be trying to do deals with other company/channels to make it more competative against sky.

Mossy Monk

rogue-entity wrote:

Actually, once Sky gets the rights to popular programmes like 24 and Lost, RTE cannot get them also

a lod of bollocks. how are RTÉ showing Lost then? you should really not bother putting lies on here

byte

rogue-entity wrote:

Actually, once Sky gets the rights to popular programmes like 24 and Lost, RTE cannot get them also, dispite the fact that Sky is Sattelite and RTE is terrestrial (probaby to do with RTE being on Sattelite and conversely, Sky One being on Cable). This means that since Sky currently have the rights to 24, Stargate Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica and Lost, RTE cannot get them.

This means that people who follow these programmes, and want to keep watching them (in the UK at least) will have to get Sky, and we will as well, if Sky One gets pulled from UPC. Unless of course, they illegally download them

And to my knowledge, no Irish channel has shown Sci Fi content on a continuing basis.

If you can't post facts, don't post at all.

Misinformation is bad, mmkay?

rogue-entity

Its what I was lead to believe m'kay, I assumed that because RTE had rights to Lost as it is, they wouldnt lose said rights, and that because Sky is broadcasting legally in the republic both on Sat and Cable, and RTE is also on Sat and Cable, in terms of most rights holders, Sky could in theory block RTE from showing later seasons of Lost, much in the same way as sports rights are delt out. FWIH, Sky can aquire the rights to broadcast events like the premiership, and RTE then cant show those same matches live.. or is their a difference between sport event rights and general content rights..

I know that Sci Fi in general is the underdog, and with only 4million people here, there are probably not enough fans to make it worth the expense of securing rights, hence, no Atlantis or BSG. Of couse, RTE 1 & 2 are like BBC, and dont generally show SciFi content (BBC mostly showed what it made itself IIRC). TV3 is basically like ITV and Channel 6 are not showing the new seasons of any of the programmes I watch, hell, not even the older seasons. I mean, the day Channel 6 starts showing Stargate, BSG, Lost, 24, and other programmes normally shown on Sky One, on a regular basis, is the day I start tuning into the channel more and more, though in fairness, C6 are showing Family Guy and American Dad, and Sky One isnt.

UPC would have inherited the carrige contracts from NTL and Chorus, and these will expire at different times, until this happens, all we can assume is that the channels will continue to be present. Virgin Media has nothing to do with here. So, untill their is definate proof that Sky is going to try something like this, I wont be worrying about it for now. I mean, with Stargate finishing up, that just leaves 24 and BSG, nothing else on that channel I watch anyway.. so actually getting in Sky would still be a last resort for me.. and I do believe that trying something like that here will hurt them more then it will hurt us.

@Mossy, Zilog, bite and snaps:
They are not lies, because that implies that I did it deliberatly. No, it was just what I understood to be the situation, my mistake was not adding the obligitory IIRC/AFAIK bit in front. My bad.

Mossy Monk

rogue-entity wrote:

UPC would have inherited the carrige contracts from NTL and Chorus

NTL Ireland and NTL UK were seperate entities

rogue-entity

@Mossy: I was talking about NTL Ireland, not NTL UK. UPC inherited the carrige contract from NTL Ireland and Chorus, and so, if Sky do pull that crap here, the channels will dissappear from one before the other, I am hoping that Sky have more sence, and UPC have the balls to stand up to Murdoch. I want my free* Sky One to stay that way thanks.

* Parents pay for it

soundbyte

zilog_jones wrote:

FYI RTÉ Two are currently showing new episodes of Lost (before Sky One as per usual)

Not since the break after the Season 3 'mini-series' — Sky are showing it on Sunday nights, RTE the following night!

byte

I think Sky's main gripe at the minute is just Virgin Media.

In my opinion, UPC isn't much of a worry for them at the minute, though they presumably find Virgin a threat to their quest for domination of the Pay-TV market in the UK. Whether there will be problems once contracts come up for renewal remains to be seen. Though Sky have quite the monopoly on multichannel pay-TV in this country at the moment.

RTE would be buying different rights packages to TV shows than Sky would. Sky One for example would only be buying PayTV rights AFAIK.

SatelliteTVTalk

ebsa wrote:

Perhaps not, The Observer reports that Virgin Media has struck a deal to screen all 3 series of Lost on its new video-on-demand channel, Virgin Central.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,,2020565,00.html

This was a bold move by Virgin Media, but the mill of rumour is running and it looks like season 3 will not air on 'on demand' until December, after the dvd release. Go here and read about it.

Gerard_Smith

I was just pointed to a very small article in the Herald saying hundreds-of-thousands of Irish customers could be left without certain Sky Channels because of the depute going on between Sky and Virgin media.

This just a case of a journalist not having a clue what he's talking about or does he know something we don't?

lawhec

Was in Belfast last night and this morning, at midnight the screens for the Sky channels went blank, though still carrying EPG data. In the morning there was a still on all screens with Virgin basically blaming Sky ("they've taken their ball and gone home") while there was a rolling promo channel where Sky One used to be.

Personally I say fair ****s to Virgin for at least trying to make a stand, Sky have done enough bullying forcing Flechtech and MTV to accept less Sky Digital subscriber revenue over the past couple of years, about time they got a taste of their own medicine.

Mossy Monk

lawhec wrote:

Personally I say fair ****s to Virgin for at least trying to make a stand, Sky have done enough bullying forcing Flechtech and MTV to accept less Sky Digital subscriber revenue over the past couple of years, about time they got a taste of their own medicine.

do you know what happened in the negotiations? on 5 live this morning they were inundated with pissed off Virgin customers. this decision may backfire on Branson. i remember when Telewest (now a part of Virgin Media) screwed MTV and the History Channel. not much was said about this

patrickmooney

I'd be more then surprised if UPC/NTL don't receive a few more calls tomorrow in light of the article/snippet in the Herald. I've never seen an article to have so many facts wrong. Firstly they suggest that 1000's of irish cable homes will be affected - wrong, none will. And secondly they suggest the channels will be removed any day now - wrong, they are already gone! Or perhaps it's something we're not aware of! UPC/NTL should really have info up on their website to clarify.

lawhec

Mossy Monk wrote:

do you know what happened in the negotiations? on 5 live this morning they were inundated with pissed off Virgin customers. this decision may backfire on Branson. i remember when Telewest (now a part of Virgin Media) screwed MTV and the History Channel. not much was said about this

Obviously I wasn't in the negoations - I can only go by the press releases from both parties. I rarely listen to 5 live so I didn't catch complaints from customers. IMHO this will cause some short term pain for Virgin Media but it might be better in the long run. Right now in the UK Sky One is only available through Sky Digital and a couple of the smaller cable providers. After Sky's announcement of them withdrawing their Freeview Channels in favour of a pay-TV lite DTT service, the only conclusion that can be made by their recent actions is that Sky are going on an all-out assualt to monopolise the commercial TV market in the UK. The average punter will of course not realise what is going on that many of us on boards like these read into, but I wonder if say Virgin for example decided to give into Sky and to cover for it raised their subs by say £2-3 a month to cover it (according to Virgin's sources if you believe them) the same customers would be hammering Virgin for not trying to negoatiate a better deal, which in turn sees them go to Sky instead because they are suddenly cheaper for what they're after. Considering that the ratings share for Sky One has gone down over the last few years, asking Virgin Media for any increase in a cut of subs from Virgin cable viewers is rather cheeky IMHO.

To me Virgin need to stand firm - not in the sense that the channels will never reappear but that they get the same price for the channels to include them again (plus inflation). To back down and end up paying more will hugely deflate their relaunch as Virgin Media.

TBH Mossy, I wasn't aware of Telewest's dealings with MTV and The History Channel in the past though I did know about problems with Nickelodoen.

DMC

lawhec wrote:

After Sky's announcement of them withdrawing their Freeview Channels in favour of a pay-TV lite DTT service, the only conclusion that can be made by their recent actions is that Sky are going on an all-out assualt to monopolise the commercial TV market in the UK.

And that is why every UK resident with an interest in this must tell Ofcom that allowing Sky to launch their own subscription service on DTT in the UK must not happen. They already have their own pay-tv platform, they must not be allowed to enter another. History tells me that Sky will be blocked; Sky were part of the original DTT consortium with Carlton and Granada, but were forced out by the ITC and DCMS on competition grounds. Also on simplicity's sake come DSO in 2012. They might be introducing MPEG4, but its not worth Sky doing it.

Sky News must be worried. Off Virgin Media, and maybe soon off Freeview.... something tells me Rupe might sacrifice the channel.... BBC News 24, alone it stands?

channelsurfer

sky are acting rather cynical in withdrawing the channels from freeview in favour of their own system. they probably know that noone is gonna buy their concept boxes with mpeg4 when there will be nearly 10 million boxes already that dont have it but have reduced the attractiveness of freeview by removing the free channels they provided.

watty

I thought Sky is still a member of the Freeview consortium?
)odd bedfellows(

DMC

Sky still is, watty, but they want to "improve" their offering to Freeview customers.

watty

In theory a reasonable idea, as long as ANY box with CI can get the CAM. As per French MPEG4 --> MPEG2 convertor combo CAM module used in regular CI slots (SD not HD).

Peoples Digital TV with CI have to work without a set box.

A locked box / unavailable CAM as per Sky Digibox on Satellite, should not be allowed and should be stopped on Satellite too. Skys "Other channels" / "Add Channels" is just to keep in letter of EU law. They are breaking the spirit of it.