Did RTE ever have discussions with Freesat?

lawred2

As per title..

Did RTE ever consider or were they ever approached about being part of Freesat offering?

Seems like something that should have possibly happened.

Phileas Frog

Why? They're already on Saorsat

The high horse brigade

I don't think it's possible for them, when they pay for movies and shows they pay for an audience of 4-6m on this island. If they were to increase viewership to cover the UK the prices they pay would go up

lawred2

Phileas Frog wrote: »

Why? They're already on Saorsat

Don't you need two different lnbs to get saorsat and Freesat/freeview?

Kinda defeats the purpose.

lawred2

The high horse brigade wrote: »

I don't think it's possible for them, when they pay for movies and shows they pay for an audience of 4-6m on this island. If they were to increase viewership to cover the UK the prices they pay would go up

Ah that's a fair point.. although one might argue that RTE should be focusing on their own content but that's a whole other ball of wax.

Charles Babbage

lawred2 wrote: »

Don't you need two different lnbs to get saorsat and Freesat/freeview?

Kinda defeats the purpose.

the purpose is a satellite whose footprint corresponds to Ireland.

Freesat does not meet this purpose.

lawred2

Charles Babbage wrote: »

the purpose is a satellite whose footprint corresponds to Ireland.

Freesat does not meet this purpose.

What do you mean? Far as I was aware Freesat/Freeview was available all over Ireland.

28.2e more than covers Ireland

Sure it's the same platform as delivers sky over Ireland.

Either way doesn't matter - it's a commercial licensing decision.

lbc2019

It covers more than Ireland so they would need to pay for UK rights also to be on Freesat

lertsnim

lawred2 wrote: »

As per title..

Did RTE ever consider or were they ever approached about being part of Freesat offering?

Seems like something that should have possibly happened.

I'm sure there must have been contact to get RTÉ radio on the platform. Television never for the reasons outlined in previous posts.

lawred2

Charles Babbage wrote: »

the purpose is a satellite whose footprint corresponds to Ireland.

Freesat does not meet this purpose.

Actually I get you now.. you meant an Ireland only footprint not a footprint that includes all of Ireland.

I picked you up wrong

The Cush

This from an Oireachtas committee discussion back in 2010 with RTÉ

The BBC, ITV and a number of other companies have put their services on one of the wideband Astra satellites. The services are broadcast unencrypted, or "in the clear" as we call it. The trouble with those wideband satellites is that they have a very big footprint. If RTE were to be put up on a wideband satellite, its services would be in the clear to the UK, France, Holland and many other countries. One might ask why that should not be done, to which I would respond that we do not have the resources to purchase the rights to enable us to broadcast into those countries. We buy programming that allows us to broadcast to 4.5 million people. We do not have the money to broadcast to 100 million people. Therefore, the option taken by the BBC when Freesat was launched is not available to us.

Harry Palmr

It would only work if, and this is a big if, Freesat boxes were armed with a CAM slot for Irish channels all of which would have to be on a single transponder I think (not a techie but that sounds right!)

kooga

But why then on sky is rte on the European beam rather than the uk beam

lbc2019

kooga wrote: »

But why then on sky is rte on the European beam rather than the uk beam

Its encrypted

Johnboy1951

The Cush wrote: »

This from an Oireachtas committee discussion back in 2010 with RTÉ

The BBC, ITV and a number of other companies have put their services on one of the wideband Astra satellites. The services are broadcast unencrypted, or "in the clear" as we call it. The trouble with those wideband satellites is that they have a very big footprint. If RTE were to be put up on a wideband satellite, its services would be in the clear to the UK, France, Holland and many other countries. One might ask why that should not be done, to which I would respond that we do not have the resources to purchase the rights to enable us to broadcast into those countries. We buy programming that allows us to broadcast to 4.5 million people. We do not have the money to broadcast to 100 million people. Therefore, the option taken by the BBC when Freesat was launched is not available to us.

That means that all channels on Astra 28.2E have rights to broadcast into the island of Ireland?
I was never sure of that.

Charles Babbage

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

That means that all channels on Astra 28.2E have rights to broadcast into the island of Ireland?
I was never sure of that.

I'm not sure that follows. If they pay for the UK rights then nobody might get too excited abou Ireland, this would not be true the other way around.

JDxtra

Never going to happen. Freesat will only ever be UK only. Just look at the recent Saorview Connect box - even though it's running Freesat software, Saorview weren't allowed to use Freesat EPG data on it.

Johnboy1951

Charles Babbage wrote: »

I'm not sure that follows. If they pay for the UK rights then nobody might get too excited abou Ireland, this would not be true the other way around.

But as pointed out in the quote it is not only Ireland but other countries also.
That could amount to a fairly sizeable number of people which I would think someone would have looked at and wanted payment for.

Vic_08

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

But as pointed out in the quote it is not only Ireland but other countries also.
That could amount to a fairly sizeable number of people which I would think someone would have looked at and wanted payment for.

Other countries, none of which are English speaking. There will be some demand for English language programming across Europe but nothing compared to the market for primary language content for the various countries.

icdg

My understanding is that in many cases (BBC, Channel 4, and others) rights are cleared here.

In other cases (eg Channel 5) they are not but there is an understanding from rights holders that Freesat is not marketed or promoted here, and the broadcaster does not market or promote themselves here, and they are not on the Sky EPG here then the reception and actual viewing of the channel is likely to be relatively limited enough for the rights holders to “look the other way” or at least treat it as being akin to “overspill”.

loyatemu

RTE were looking for money for an international channel a few years back. This would have broadcast exclusively home-produced content (and possibly some archive material) for a UK audience, though I don't know if they planned to put it on Freeview/Freesat or just on Sky.

I haven't read anything about it recently. I wouldn't have thought it would be massively expensive to do, when you look at some of the shoestring operations that have channels on Sky currently.

Is the RTE Player available outside Ireland? Many programs would have no rights issues (e.g. the news, LLS, Operation Transformation) - I don't see why they can't be made available outside Ireland.

lertsnim

There is an international version of the RTÉ Player yes.

s8n

No. It was on Andy Riely’s To do list but didn’t get to it

Capt'n Midnight

Tivusat is the Italian version of Freesat. Same people doing the backend.

To cover the overspill problem it's encrypted.

And while it's Free To View you can't buy the card on it's own, you have to buy it with bundled hardware.

Not a technical issue, just a paywall and you need an Italian PRSI number. I can imagine any proposed solution here being even more costly for "reasons".




Or look at the Saorview Connect. Freesat don't allow it to use the Freesat EPG even though it's programmed by the same people who've had a twin tuner HD recorder for Freesat ten years ago.

It's not a technical issue. It's a rights issue. BBC and ITN won't share their EPG.



One way to put RTE on Freesat would be to encrypt it. And provide cards. And the UK with ten times the population abandoned that years ago as too expensive. The funny thing about that is the BAI via SKY used to send you a card for the Sound And Vision scheme.



Again it's not a technical issue.

FRIENDO

icdg wrote: »

My understanding is that in many cases (BBC, Channel 4, and others) rights are cleared here.

In other cases (eg Channel 5) they are not but there is an understanding from rights holders that Freesat is not marketed or promoted here, and the broadcaster does not market or promote themselves here, and they are not on the Sky EPG here then the reception and actual viewing of the channel is likely to be relatively limited enough for the rights holders to “look the other way” or at least treat it as being akin to “overspill”.

Unfortunately this is not the attitude with Champions league on RTÉ Saorsat.

I suppose its just lucky nothing else was blocked on Saorsat over rights.

Gerry Wicklow

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

.....

Not a technical issue, just a paywall and you need an Italian PRSI number. I can imagine any proposed solution here being even more costly for "reasons".
......

Can you imagine the uproar here if they wanted your PPS number just to watch TV? :eek:

Johnboy1951

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

One way to put RTE on Freesat would be to encrypt it. And provide cards. And the UK with ten times the population abandoned that years ago as too expensive. The funny thing about that is the BAI via SKY used to send you a card for the Sound And Vision scheme.

Again it's not a technical issue.

Is that still the situation?
I believe I saw a programme mentioned as FTA on the eir sports EPG ....... would that have been broadcast in the clear or requiring a card?

lertsnim

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Is that still the situation?
I believe I saw a programme mentioned as FTA on the eir sports EPG ....... would that have been broadcast in the clear or requiring a card?

Always requires a card with Eir.

Johnboy1951

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Is that still the situation?
I believe I saw a programme mentioned as FTA on the eir sports EPG ....... would that have been broadcast in the clear or requiring a card?

lertsnim wrote: »

Always requires a card with Eir.

So a FTA card is issued on request to eir? or BAI? or who?

lertsnim

Eir though some people say they are given the runaround when trying to get one off them. Of course any old Irish subscription card will work for that "FTA" content too.

Gerry Wicklow

Also assuming you have an old Sky box to put it into or would it work in any box cam slot?

bassy

could,nt the do a freesat card for republic of ireland that would allow viewing of rte and the irish channels only to residents of the republic,just like the freesat card the have in the uk for ch5 etc.

icdg

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

So a FTA card is issued on request to eir? or BAI? or who?

It’s not really free to air at all, no matter how many times eir say it is. It’s free to view - ie still encrypted, but will clear with any active Sky viewing card with an ROI postcode.

In the days of Setanta, the viewer would call the Setanta call centre (in Kirkcaldy, Fife)and ask for a viewing card to view FTV programming and they would order one to be sent to the viewer. Although described as a “Setanta card” or “FTV Card” what was actually issued was a Sky viewing card with a Sky logo on it.

Johnboy1951

icdg wrote: »

It’s not really free to air at all, no matter how many times eir say it is. It’s free to view - ie still encrypted, but will clear with any active Sky viewing card with an ROI postcode.

In the days of Setanta, the viewer would call the Setanta call centre (in Kirkcaldy, Fife)and ask for a viewing card to view FTV programming and they would order one to be sent to the viewer. Although described as a “Setanta card” or “FTV Card” what was actually issued was a Sky viewing card with a Sky logo on it.

Yes, and that card would work in any receiver, not just the SKy boc of the time.
I had one for a considerable time working in a Ferguson Ariva 120.

Things have changed unfortunately ..... what Setanta had was awkward as you needed a box with a card slot.
Now you must have a Skybox I suspect, as the Sky cards must pair with a Skybox in order to function.
(I do not have any definite info on that so hope someone who has one can try.)

Johnboy1951

sugarman wrote: »

It was still working into the Eir takeover, it might still even now. I last signed up with Setanta but the year long sub spilled into the first year Eir took over.

You had to pop the card back into the Sky box every odd week to keep it activated or else it would unpair and not work on either receiver. If it did unpair you just had to call customer care to have it repaired in minutes.

So it did require a Skybox to pair to. Thanks.

I think it was about Oct after the eir takeover that mine stopped working in the Ariva .... not sure now ..... and I did not have a Skybox so it was useless to me from then onwards even if I knew about the SKybox 'trick'.

Johnboy1951

sugarman wrote: »

Yeah it was a bit of a pain the arse having to hold onto the Sky Box and swapping it around. Id sometimes forget and go to watch a match to find it had unpaired on me and id have call them up. Still, it was less hassle than using the Sky Box as a FTA receiver ...and while they were still Setanta, you could get through to customer care almost instantly and have it sorted.

With Eir it became a joke of waiting 30mins or more to speak to someone and not know what to do. They'd always tell you to contact Sky, which was no use as you were'nt their customer! Now I hear youre on hold for an hour or more and still not getting hold of someone. Just look at their forum on here with the complaints!

So I wouldnt waste your time, even if it still works.

I got a pressie of an out of contract Skybox last year, and used my old 'Setanta' card to pair to it so that sorted that end.
I then got a HDMI>DVB-T converter and fed that on the aerial coax as another channel for the tuners to find along with the Saorview channels.

So all good ..... only hassle is changing the eirsports channels from different locations in the house.

I eventually found a means of doing that through the LAN, so fairly well sorted for now. Still not anywhere near ideal, but I can live with it.

L1011

Harry Palmr wrote: »

It would only work if, and this is a big if, Freesat boxes were armed with a CAM slot for Irish channels all of which would have to be on a single transponder I think (not a techie but that sounds right!)

There'd be no requirement to all be on a single transponder

Also, NDS do not all simulcrypting nor Videoguard CAMs for consumers so they'd need second feeds

lalababa

lawred2 wrote: »

Don't you need two different lnbs to get saorsat and Freesat/freeview?

Kinda defeats the purpose.

Don't think so...I got a freesat box that had saor in it, cheapest was bout 60euros, 20 more than cheapest freesat reciever on its own. Only had one lnb.

Gerry Wicklow

lalababa wrote: »

Don't think so...I got a freesat box that had saor in it, cheapest was bout 60euros, 20 more than cheapest freesat reciever on its own. Only had one lnb.

SaorSAT needs a different type of LNB as it is on a different frequency band to conventional satellites.