Virgin wont pay for RTE retransmission

brick man

Sam Russell wrote:

Add to that, RTE cannot do anything with RTE NN and there is waste put upon waste. Also RTE are restricted as to how much advertising it can carry, and even what programmes it shows on RTE 2.

They could look to allow adverts on News Now by applying under section 103 of the 2009 broadcasting act .

Sam Russell

Elmo wrote: »

Not there is not one such bill interestingly there is not one such bill for Electricity any more either.

And yes the current system doesn't work and a new name won't change that. Nor will adding it to Airtricity, Bord Gais and Electric Ireland bills!

The fee would be part of VAT, and would be passed from Revenue to the BAI would would then deliver the fund to RTÉ, Sound and Vision, TG4 and their running costs.

There is only one supplier of electricity in Ireland - ESB Networks. They read the meters and send the charges to each bill charger. It is ESB Networks that will be the collector of the licence fee if that is the way it is collected. As for VAT, well if it is zero rated, then zero VAT will be collected.

Simplicity is that every house that has electricity would be hit with the same charge. If a rebate scheme was introduced for people who claim not to have a TV, then that could be arranged. However, it would be easy to check those that actually claim, as opposed to check those that currently choose not to pay the current licence.

They introduced the 'off the road' declarations for Motor Tax that appears to be successful. It just needs to be extended to make the purchasers of untaxed cars liable for arrears and we will be done. Apply the same logic to TV licence, and the non-payer list will tumble towards zero.

Johnboy1951

Elmo wrote: »

Not there is not one such bill interestingly there is not one such bill for Electricity any more either.

And yes the current system doesn't work and a new name won't change that. Nor will adding it to Airtricity, Bord Gais and Electric Ireland bills!

The fee would be part of VAT, and would be passed from Revenue to the BAI would would then deliver the fund to RTÉ, Sound and Vision, TG4 and their running costs.

Also unfortunately my 0.06% looks way off :mad::rolleyes::o

On an average mobile bill/top up of €25 an additional €1.50 would be required, or €18 per year. 6.6%. Again you can and prob should correct me on this.

And yes the loop hole is anyone that doesn't have a landland, mobile phone, pay TV, broadband and so on would not have to pay.

The best option seems to be similar to present ....... a licence fee per household.
The only problem would be how it should be collected.
I wonder if the eircodes could be used to good effect.
The eircode would tie the charge directly to the premises regardless who the occupier might be.
The owner would be responsible for paying the charge or proving the charge should not be levied.

So what is the best method of collecting the charge in that case?

icdg

I fear the discussion has turned into one on the licence fee, which we might take to a more appropriate thread

political analyst

RT? would be shooting itself in the foot if it withdrew its channels from the Virgin Ireland EPG - it would lose viewers and, in turn, revenue from advertisers, and so would not save money.

Elmo

political analyst wrote: »

RT? would be shooting itself in the foot if it withdrew its channels from the Virgin Ireland EPG - it would lose viewers and, in turn, revenue from advertisers, and so would not save money.

No money to be saved as RTÉ, TV3 and TG4 never paid to be on the platform. RTÉ is suggesting (as have the BBC, ITV, C4 and C5) in the UK that they ad to Sky and Virgin's packages.

Sky did seek to get RTÉ on its platform after its launch and I think TV3 came after that.

Now that TV3 are owned by Virgin Media its harder for RTÉ to progress the argument.

I think it is a non-runner and deflects the attention away from the licence fee.

Also on that if you do add it to the Electricity bill you'll have people posting on boards, what has electricity got to do with broadcasting?!

STB.

political analyst wrote: »

RT? would be shooting itself in the foot if it withdrew its channels from the Virgin Ireland EPG - it would lose viewers and, in turn, revenue from advertisers, and so would not save money.

What you actually meant to say is Virgin/Sky would be shooting itself in the foot if it withdrew the RTE channels from their EPG - it would lose subscribers and, in turn, revenue from advertisers, and so would lose money.


These "subscription" companies have been getting free content for all too long under the must offer rule. The must offer rule must be one of the most abused requests by large multinational subscription companies ala Sky/Virgin etc of state broadcasters services, both here and in the UK, which only exist in the supposed interests of "platform neutrality".

Like it or not. RTE 1 and 2 have filled the top 2 slots in market share for the last 20 years. The market share for RTE1 is 20%+ alone across all platforms.

The value of PSB content was put in perspective a few years ago when Sky were forced to drop the immense satellite charges it wanted the BBC and ITV to pay in the UK. The threatened withdrawal of those services from Sky's subscription service soon changed their tune.

As ICDG said, Virgin would want to very careful here as they might get what they deserve. If the EPG positioning is the only thing Virgin can value from a position of bargaining, they're fcuked from the off.

Virgin and Sky are profiteering from the content that is provided to it free of charge. They should be paying for it.

Saying that you are paying for it twice by having to pay Virgin is absolute rubbish. You do not have to subscribe to third party multinational to watch these channels.

Dave..M

They may find out they are both loosers; Virgins customers will have one less reason to pay money for old rope in the face of subscription onslaught and RTE may find their content not so highly sought after as they may imagine vs alternatives in the FTA & subscription space. In any event I fear the rapidly approaching future will likekly not be too kind to either RTE or Virgins TV offering in their current forms. Assuming we don't all decide that Super Garden and The late late show are in fact the best use of our couch time....

Elmo

STB. wrote: »

RTE 1 and 2 have filled the top 2 slots in market share for the last 20 years. The market share for RTE1 is 20%+ alone across all platforms.

RTÉ 1 is around the 18% mark and has been the last 3 years, while without sport RTÉ2 IS around the 5% mark.

Antenna

Sam Russell wrote: »

If RTE were to disappear from payTV, then there would be panic from the 'default' subscribers to get RTE back, and then the push would be on from suppliers (like those 'digital' aerial sellers at analogue switch off) to fill the gap. Once it became obvious that paying for TV was a mugs game, there would be mass migration to FTA.

A sizable number might migrate to just using online services for TV ??? (and a consequent significant decrease in TV licence income under the present system).

If Sky/VM have to pay, might it also be argued that Internet Service Providers ought to pay something as well, or else access to RTE Player be blocked on the ISPs concerned ??

Regarding a "mass migration to FTA" (of both Sat and Terrestrial), it hasn't been helped by various issues with the functionality of combo boxes/TVs for sale on the Irish market over the past number of years, as just one example this:
https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056168690

Johnboy1951

The "must offer rule" should be changed to specify that those who benefit from it, must also transmit FTA (NOT FTV), else pay for the use.
The payment could probably be structured relative to customer base.

How VM or Sky might manage that I have no idea but that would be their problem.

lertsnim

VM could certainly do it as most televisions bought in the last 10 years or so have a digital cable tuner on them. I'm surprised they don't do it already like UPC do in some other countries and do away with the analogue channels completely.

Sky have no way of doing it.

Elmo

lertsnim wrote: »

VM could certainly do it as most televisions bought in the last 10 years or so have a digital cable tuner on them. I'm surprised they don't do it already like UPC do in some other countries and do away with the analogue channels completely.

Sky have no way of doing it.

I'd be happy if Virgin/Sky allowed viewers to retain the Saorview channels should they fall out of payment or if they happen to have a Virgin/Sky STB. Does Sky allow access to Saorview channels with a Sky Card out of subscription?

But yes Virgin could simply provide the 7 channels for free, even ad TV3+1 and a preview Virgin On Demand channel. Same goes for eir and other companies.

lertsnim

Elmo wrote: »

Does Sky allow access to Saorview channels with a Sky Card out of subscription?

No. Pay a sub or get a blank screen on any channels available on Saorview.

STB.

Chopper Dave wrote: »

Does this work though? Personally I'd be annoyed to have to BOTH pay a licence fee to RTE and then an increased fee to Virgin or Sky to watch RTE. At the very least I'd like a choice from Virgin and I suspect many would pick a cheaper package with no RTE.

You dont have to pay Virgin or Sky to watch RTE.

Its free to air by connecting an aerial.

The same old arguments are hashed out here time and time again whereby people confuse their own private agreements with foreign pay tv companies with their necessity to have a TV licence.

political analyst wrote: »

RT? would be shooting itself in the foot if it withdrew its channels from the Virgin Ireland EPG - it would lose viewers and, in turn, revenue from advertisers, and so would not save money.

RTE's viewing figures are miles ahead of any other TV station in Ireland accross ALL platforms.

Virgin and Sky not having the Irish stations would be difficult for them to sell the otherwise overpriced and mainly FTA packaged products. They expect their content for free. The truth in the matter is they have been getting away with for far too long. These are very profitable companies.

Elmo wrote: »

RTÉ 1 is around the 18% mark and has been the last 3 years, while without sport RTÉ2 IS around the 5% mark.

Around ? Market share is not calculated on that basis. Where did you get 5% from.

Elmo

STB. wrote: »

You dont have to pay Virgin or Sky to watch RTE.

Its free to air by connecting an aerial.

The same old arguments are hashed out here time and time again whereby people confuse their own private agreements with foreign pay tv companies with their necessity to have a TV licence.

RTE's viewing figures are miles ahead of any other TV station in Ireland accross ALL platforms.

Virgin and Sky not having the Irish stations would be difficult for them to sell the otherwise overpriced and mainly FTA packaged products. They expect their content for free. The truth in the matter is they have been getting away with for far too long. These are very profitable companies.



Around ? Market share is not calculated on that basis. Where did you get 5% from.

Very many people do not know they can connect to an aerial nor want to spend the time or money, no reason why Sky cannot allow those subscribers that have left their service retain Saorview channels. TBH you may as well say that Saorsat is available.

RTÉ ONE has had its worst autumn in years and when you include all channels RTÉ has 24 - 26% v TV3's 15% - 17%.

Take a look a the TV ratings thread.

Also while both RTÉ and TV3 are higher market share than their audience shares Irish TV only averages 45% of the audience the other 55% are watching other TV, of which only 25% sell advertising into the Irish market.

Market share really only exists for Advertisers, majority of audience are not watching Irish TV channels.

Market share estimate
RTÉ 45%
TV3 25%
TG4 3%
Others 27% (Channel 4, UKTV, Sky, Discovery, Viacom)
Audience for Market share 70%
Audience for non market channels 30% (ITV, BBC and Non-opt out channels/FTA satellite channels)

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=105255014&postcount=1156

STB.

Elmo wrote: »

Very many people do not know they can connect to an aerial nor want to spend the time or money, no reason why Sky cannot allow those subscribers that have left their service retain Saorview channels. TBH you may as well say that Saorsat is available.

In the context of this discussion allowing people have the Irish Channels without active subscription (a FTV card system) does not address that Sky have been getting free content for far too long and use this free content to sell TV packages. When you look at the repackaged content much of it is available free to air. Sky will never agree to such agreement anyway. In any event Sky are changing the way they do business. They dont want out of contract subscribers retaining their equipment for FTA purposes.

Many people have aerials in Ireland. Do as many use them here as in the UK ? No. The reasons for this vary.

The small number of channels on the Saorview platform does not make it an attractive proposition. Hence why RTE should have developed a hybrid box that integrates both sets of FTA channels from satellite and saorview.

Elmo wrote: »

RTÉ ONE has had its worst autumn in years and when you include all channels RTÉ has 24 - 26% v TV3's 15% - 17%.

Take a look a the TV ratings thread.

Thanks Elmo, but I have a long standing Medialive Account and have access to Nielsen/TAM data.

Elmo wrote: »

Also while both RTÉ and TV3 are higher market share than their audience shares Irish TV only averages 45% of the audience the other 55% are watching other TV, of which only 25% sell advertising into the Irish market.

Market share really only exists for Advertisers, majority of audience are not watching Irish TV channels.

Market Share is all that counts. Advertising is all that counts. Its all about survival.

Your claim that 55% are not watching Irish TV is flawed! To reach the other 55% you would have to advertise with 30+ other stations the vast majority of which have individual viewing shares of less than 1%.

You need to look at the share of viewing. You cannot just look at it from the percentage they do not have. Advertisers wouldnt and three of the top 10 advertisers in Ireland are the USCs in Eir Sky & Virgin!

Advertising monies leaving the market ie UK is still less than 20%.

The biggest shifting trend in the market is those not watching live TV.

lawred2

Elmo wrote: »

Simple solution to that is to add the licence fee on to all telecommunications bills, worked it out that it would cost the average mobile phone bill an extra 18c (this includes landline, broadband and payTV bills) 0.06% on top of your current bill/top up.

BAI have the power regulate the EPGs of all Irish based operators, Sky have always said the go by the local regs where possible.

Ah yeah..

Nice and convoluted. Easy to ratchet it up piecemeal from them on. Not so easy with one single charge. Myriad of small levies on multiple sources - easy winnings.

Johnboy1951

Elmo wrote: »

Very many people do not know they can connect to an aerial nor want to spend the time or money, no reason why Sky cannot allow those subscribers that have left their service retain Saorview channels. TBH you may as well say that Saorsat is available.

That should not be acceptable under the "must offer rule".
It should be FTA or pay with no fudging.

I don't see how Sky could do it .... but as I posted earlier, that is their concern.

Virgin could do it - in similar manner to their present analogue channels being available.
I would guess that it might do Virgin a lot of good if they did, as it could attract customers to their pay TV offerings.

STB.

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

That should not be acceptable under the "must offer rule".
It should be FTA or pay with no fudging.

And in that sentence lies the very root of what subscription companies dont tell you. They are not allowed charge anymore for the stations they request under the must offer rule. It becomes must carry. Must carry without charging any extra.

And now for the biggest lie.

Ask them to prove they don't charge for them and they'll go running.

The basic Tv package contains this content they have obtained under the must offer/carry rules. But there is a charge for the basic content package, isnt there

Elmo

STB. wrote: »

Market Share is all that counts. Advertising is all that counts. Its all about survival.

Your claim that 55% are not watching Irish TV is flawed! To reach the other 55% you would have to advertise with 30+ other stations the vast majority of which have individual viewing shares of less than 1%.

You need to look at the share of viewing. You cannot just look at it from the percentage they do not have. Advertisers wouldnt and three of the top 10 advertisers in Ireland are the USCs in Eir Sky & Virgin!

Advertising monies leaving the market ie UK is still less than 20%.

The biggest shifting trend in the market is those not watching live TV.

audiences don't care about advertising market share, Sky don't care if about RTÉ's advertising market share when 55%+ of their audience not watching Irish TV channels. If RTÉ where to leave Sky it's a risk that Sky can make. Sky only care about subscriptions, the risk is losing subs, the only UPS for RTÉ is Live Sport, most of which can be played via their player (especially if they really plan to improve it).

Johnboy1951

STB. wrote: »

And in that sentence lies the very root of what subscription companies dont tell you. They are not allowed charge anymore for the stations they request under the must offer rule. It becomes must carry. Must carry without charging any extra.

And now for the biggest lie.

Ask them to prove they don't charge for them and they'll go running.

The basic Tv package contains this content they have obtained under the must offer/carry rules. But there is a charge for the basic content package, isnt there

The only way Sky could counteract that 'accusation' they are charging for the channels covered by the 'must offer/must carry' scheme is to offer the channels on a FTV basis.
That idea should be prevented if at all possible.
Over time it will die anyway, as the older Sky boxes get replaced by Sky Q hardware which remains the property of Sky.

Unless Sky can find a means to provide those channels on a FTA basis they should be forced to pay for the privilege of having them behind a paywall.

STB.

Elmo wrote: »

audiences don't care about advertising market share, Sky don't care if about RTÉ's advertising market share when 55%+ of their audience not watching Irish TV channels. If RTÉ where to leave Sky it's a risk that Sky can make. Sky only care about subscriptions, the risk is losing subs, the only UPS for RTÉ is Live Sport, most of which can be played via their player (especially if they really plan to improve it).

Elmo with all due respect you are not grasping how viewing share works.

Viewing audiences drive advertising. As I explained earlier saying 55% are not watching Irish stations is a complete nonsensical argument. This is a whole market viewing figure of 50+ stations whereby the No 1 viewed station has a market share of 19% and the lowest is 0.1%. In the context of television viewing RTE1 is the most viewed station in Ireland by miles.

TV Viewing has fallen for all stations (including Sky) in the past few years with competition from the non linear market.

Sky do care. Not alone are they a subscription Tv company, they are also one of the biggest advertisers on Irish TV. It just doesnt suit them when they are asked to pay for content they have been getting for free. They will have less subscribers if they drop the most viewed station. RTE have a legitimate argument. It is not their job to fill the content of private subscription companies.

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

The only way Sky could counteract that 'accusation' they are charging for the channels covered by the 'must offer/must carry' scheme is to offer the channels on a FTV basis.
That idea should be prevented if at all possible.
Over time it will die anyway, as the older Sky boxes get replaced by Sky Q hardware which remains the property of Sky.

Unless Sky can find a means to provide those channels on a FTA basis they should be forced to pay for the privilege of having them behind a paywall.

We are way beyond the must offer/carry rule. This was introduced to pacify pay TV companies who used platform neutrality as a means to get content for nothing. Convenient. RTE finding itself in a market that is now competing with non linear way of watching content, coupled with broadcast commercial partners who have no commitment to the FTA platform (as they are owned by a pay tv company) and with mounting bills has every right to demand payment for their content that pay TV companies repackage for personal profit.

As I said earlier Sky have shown their hand. They have decided to move away from having a situation whereby the out of contract customers can continue to use their equipment, so even FTV is not an option.

The tail attempting to wag the dog needs to stop.

Elmo

STB. wrote: »

Elmo with all due respect you are not grasping how viewing share works.

Viewing audiences drive advertising. As I explained earlier saying 55% are not watching Irish stations is a complete nonsensical argument. This is a whole market viewing figure of 50+ stations whereby the No 1 viewed station has a market share of 19% and the lowest is 0.1%. In the context of television viewing RTE1 is the most viewed station in Ireland by miles.

TV Viewing has fallen for all stations (including Sky) in the past few years with competition from the non linear market.

STB. lets be realistic while I agree the advertising market is important, Irish TV has stagnated over the last 3 years, with RTÉ ONE seeing its audience share deplete. This is due to programming decision by the channel, in particular the number of re-runs. I do not feel at the moment that the audience would miss RTÉ and this is partly down to RTÉ's continued reduction in original first run programming across their channels.

RTÉ ONE's audience share has ranged from a high of 20.26% to a low of 16.24% or over the course of this year an average of 18.3%, meanwhile RTÉ2 has seen a high of just 7.66% and a low of 5.5% and an average of 6.13%, over all RTÉ TV has seen a share of 26%.

These shares only include broadcasters own non-linear services, and I am not sure if Sky or Vigin's own on-demand services are included, rather just live/programmes this week from Sky's suite of Broadcast channels.

So while TV has seen drops in audience numbers due to onDemand services such as Netflix, Irish TV channels have also seen significant drops in Audience share.

And while it is true that the 55% market is fragmented and advertisers like to see big audience shares, I honestly don't see why Sky couldn't use TV3 which had a high of 12.24%, a low of 9.27% and an average of 10.63%. With their suite of channels having an average of 16.42%.

As I say 55% of viewers don't watch Irish TV. More and more are moving from Live TV to on Demand, much of the on Demand content being viewed via non-traditional platforms that are not part of the TV audience shares.

You are also suggesting that Sky and Virgin want to allow RTE retain advert revenues.