ntl Ireland no longer exists....for over six weeks now.

a bientot

I believe there are only a limited number of channels that can be put over NTL's analogue system. I'm involved with Dublin Community Television and that's the excuse they gave us anyway. Once DCTV gets a license and goes live it will also be on NTL Digital... which is a shame as I have Sky...
from one of your esteemed contributors

---

This is wearisome prattle.........
Way back in the the mid eighties telecom eireann/rte (Cablelink under Mr Kevin Windle) were howling about the limited number of channels in analogue......
The same excuse for not providing a decent basic service is still with us in 2005: a basic service of say twenty international channels to be enjoyed by the majority of cable subscribers is all that is required by those of us who do NOT need help with our understanding of the English language.........so do NOT need 150 English language channels as most do not have 150 tv sets and can't watch them all anyway. But people are entitled to choice......

Where did the 90,000 digital homes (potential captives for one of the new Dublin channels) come from.......20,000 of that number are in Waterford and Galway (cable and mmds)...

And let's not mention n.....t......l again. This organisation no longer exists in Eire. The former bosses in London thanked all their staff in Dublin, Waterford and Galway, six weeks ago, for obeying all instructions given from the capital of the United Kingdom over the past three and a half years and wished them all 'success in their futures'. The cable tv and radio service in Dublin, Galway and Waterford is now owned by Morgan Stanley and staff in the cable company are very worried as they await news of their future........

Let us hope that UPC Ireland acts in the interest of the majority of their subscribers and brings in their normal European practice of a multi-lingual basic cable tv and radio service for all and an extra package of 250 English language channels for those who are interested at a reasonable price. The 20 channel basic service in the 14 countries where UGC operates under its name UPC costs from 5 euros to a maximum of 12 euros per month.
Consumer watchdog/rip off Ireland take note.
Check out upc.name of country on the web.......

zuma

Yeah I hope that UPC Ireland wont fúck around with their new Dublin operations as they have been doing so with Cork!!!

But I must say that I take exception to Ireland being called Éire when using the English language as I dont go around calling Germany "Deutschland" or Russia "Российская Федерация" when I speak English.

===================================================
Before someone decides to attack me on what I have said above please note that Ireland is a country comprising 5/6ths of the island of Ireland and N.Ireland is a province of the U.K.
The British are the only people who use Éire to discern between the two while the rest of the world use Ireland or varitaions of such in their own languages.

goldenbrown

zuma wrote:

Yeah I hope that UPC Ireland wont fúck around with their new Dublin operations as they have been doing so with Cork!!!

But I must say that I take exception to Ireland being called Éire when using the English language as I dont go around calling Germany "Deutschland" or Russia "Российская Федерация" when I speak English.

take a look at what is written on the stamps used by this state its...... eire...so what is your problem with eire, its offical baby :cool:

zuma

goldenbrown wrote:

take a look at what is written on the stamps used by this state its...... eire...so what is your problem with eire, its offical baby :cool:

When I speak to you in English I expect the reply in English and vice versa!

Stamps use Éire on its own and dont mix it with English!!!

zuma

Well "goldenbrown" before you go on a crusade take a look at what NTL had termed their Irish operations...NTL Ireland!!!
And not NTL Éire as you might prefer....why????

Marcopolo85

a bientot wrote:

IThis is wearisome prattle.........
And let's not mention n.....t......l again. This organisation no longer exists in Eire. The former bosses in London thanked all their staff in Dublin, Waterford and Galway, six weeks ago, for obeying all instructions given from the capital of the United Kingdom over the past three and a half years and wished them all 'success in their futures'. The cable tv and radio service in Dublin, Galway and Waterford is now owned by Morgan Stanley and staff in the cable company are very worried as they await news of their future........

Let us hope that UPC Ireland acts in the interest of the majority of their subscribers and brings in their normal European practice of a multi-lingual basic cable tv and radio service for all and an extra package of 250 English language channels for those who are interested at a reasonable price. The 20 channel basic service in the 14 countries where UGC operates under its name UPC costs from 5 euros to a maximum of 12 euros per month.
Consumer watchdog/rip off Ireland take note.
Check out upc.name of country on the web.......

Ah, Mr A Bientot.

At it again I see. You didn't seem too pushed a few weeks ago about the jobs of staff at ntl (see this post:http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=254102&page=2&pp=20) when you were practically wishing redundancy on their staff for capitulating with the Auld enemy.

Amazing one that - given your passion for the sixth (yes - sixth) most spoken language on the planet (even Bengali is more widely spoken). I wonder if ntl had been French - owned would you have had as many objections. Just as well they weren't - we would probably have been subjected to a plethora of obscure channels which no-one would understand, and thus not view.

I, for one, object to the racist tone of your comments and feel you are letting your 'passion' for a foreign language cloud your views on the bigger picture - people's livelihoods.

You have some neck to presume to represent the 'majority' of cable customers. You don't represent me. When I sit down tonight at the TV I want to be entertained.......not to be subjected to foreign language lessons against my will.

Give it a rest - you're flogging a dead horse. As I've said to you before - if you're so fond of France why don't you go and live there (and before you get on your high horse I've been to France on two occasions, both camping and caravanning - nicest people you could meet......can't remember meeting any French language zealots like yourself trying to ram it down my throat). :rolleyes:

Mossy Monk

zuma and goldenbrown, keep it on topic please

bk

a bientot wrote:

I believe there are only a limited number of channels that can be put over NTL's analogue system.

That is right, lets say NTL has about 550 MHz of radio spectrum to play with.

Each analogue TV channel uses 8MHz, therefore the 18 analogue channels use 144MHz of the radio spectrum.

Now with digital you can fit more channels in a smaller space, about 10 channels in each 8MHz band (this can differ depending on the encoding used). So the 150 NTL digital channels are using about 15 8MHz bands, so about another 120MHz.

Now don't forget that they also transmit 12 radio channels by analogue and broadband uses another two bands (and even more bands in the future for higher speeds, DOCSIS 3) and finally don't forget that their need to be separation between channels, to ensure there isn't interference.

As for multi-lingual channels on Analogue, I personally would be very annoyed if they wasted the precise analogue space on foreign language channels that no one wants to watch. The analogue channels should and are kept for the most popular channels (I'd be a very happy camper if they added LivingTV to analogue, Paramount Comedy was a very good move).

BTW I believe after the big UK and Irish channels, channels like Para, Setanta, etc. pay extra to get on analogue due to the higher potential viewer figures. Do you seriously think a French channel could afford to do this in Ireland or even care?

UGC only carry multi-lingual channels in Europe, because a significant number of their subscribers are multi-lingual (and it is required for their license), it is the same reason that NTL carries TG4. However they don't carry, Chinese, Islamic channels etc. because it isn't required by the government and for the same reason, NTL aren't going to carry a French channel, as it isn't required by their license.

I have no problem with and in fact I would be very supportive of a variety of foreign language channels (french, german, chinese, islamic, spanish, etc.) being carried on Digital, however I would object to it on analogue, their simply isn't any need. Every NTL customer can get digital and it is only an extra €10, so where is the problem?

cdc

Marcopolo85 wrote:

if you're so fond of France why don't you go and live there

And wouldn't it be lovely if everyone with a fondness for Britain and USA would move to those places too?

Marcopolo85

cdc wrote:

And wouldn't it be lovely if everyone with a fondness for Britain and USA would move to those places too?

Touché, mon chérie!!

Possibly another wannabe Francophile? Wishful thinking though - that would mean the other 99% of us moving to leave you lot in the 1% to play with the TV spectrum...... and, after all, the most popular programming (watched by the most viewers) is produced by those countries.......plain statistics.....live with it!!!:D

Marcopolo85

bk wrote:

I have no problem with and in fact I would be very supportive of a variety of foreign language channels (french, german, chinese, islamic, spanish, etc.) being carried on Digital, however I would object to it on analogue, their simply isn't any need. Every NTL customer can get digital and it is only an extra €10, so where is the problem?

I wholeheartedly agree. Excellent post in total.

The tax man

YAWN!!!!
...and you'll probably moaning about the channel line up when the new crowd gets the ball rolling.
BTW NTL still operates here and is still called NTL. The name is still active until the takeover is complete.

patrickmooney

The tax man wrote:

YAWN!!!!
...and you'll probably moaning about the channel line up when the new crowd gets the ball rolling.
BTW NTL still operates here and is still called NTL. The name is still active until the takeover is complete.

According to their website "NTL Communications (Ireland) Limited (registered in the Republic of Ireland under number 32156), a subsidiary of MS Irish Cable Holdings B.V." - "The "ntl" and "ntlworld" trade marks are used under licence from NTL Group Limited"

So from this I would gather that NTL Group no longer operate here, but licence their brand.

Marcopolo85

patrickmooney wrote:

According to their website "NTL Communications (Ireland) Limited (registered in the Republic of Ireland under number 32156), a subsidiary of MS Irish Cable Holdings B.V." - "The "ntl" and "ntlworld" trade marks are used under licence from NTL Group Limited"

So from this I would gather that NTL Group no longer operate here, but licence their brand.

I think that's called 'splitting hairs'!!

cdc

Marcopolo85 wrote:

Touché, mon chérie!!

Possibly another wannabe Francophile? Wishful thinking though - that would mean the other 99% of us moving to leave you lot in the 1% to play with the TV spectrum...... and, after all, the most popular programming (watched by the most viewers) is produced by those countries.......plain statistics.....live with it!!!:D

No. It was a continuation of your suggestion to see people who like a certain country to move to that country.
Every single non must-carry channel on ntl is British or American, packed with British and American shows. And not one of them has to move for an internal Irish city channel. Not one. Keeps the Anglophiles happy. :rolleyes:
And do you expect me to believe CNBC gets more viewers than the channel it replaced (Eurosport) did?

Amazing that someone in this country who would like a little more than British and American tv is called a Francophile.


Edit...

patrickmooney wrote:

So from this I would gather that NTL Group no longer operate here, but licence their brand.

Tell me Morgan Stanley do not pay to use the NTL name :eek:

icdg

Okay guys this topic is getting a little heated (and develling into pedantary in places)...

Morgan Stanley are using the NTL name, under licence from NTL Group Limited. This is because they are not going to rebrand NTL Ireland, this will be the job of the eventual purchaser (UPC or otherwise). Morgan Stanley's business is not cable TV, it is banking! They are merely holding the business in trust for the eventual purchaser, and are unlikely to go to the trouble of spending big money on a rebranding. Therefore licencing the NTL brand (which, depending on negotiations in the UK, may itself not even exist by the end of the year...) is the cheapest and easiest option.

Nonetheless, the company is a commercial business. The reality is that the amount of people here who can speak French fluently is a minority. The amount of people who can speak English is near 100%. The reality is that the company is catering for its market by providing English langauage channels. TV5 Europe is available via digital for those who want to watch it. (And for us digital viewers, it would be nice to add RAI, 3Sat, and TVE. That way most foriegn langauge entusiasts would be happy, not just French enthuaists).

Back to mod mode, and could people keep it civil for the rest of the topic please!!!

bk

cdc wrote:

And not one of them has to move for an internal Irish city channel. Not one. Keeps the Anglophiles happy. :rolleyes:

It keeps their customers happy. The customer is always right.

In fairness, how many of the past local channels been a success, they are usually useless.

cdc wrote:

And do you expect me to believe CNBC gets more viewers than the channel it replaced (Eurosport) did?

No, but Eurosport probably demanded more money then NTL was willing to pay. There is always tension between the content providers and carriers, this is nothing new and proves nothing.

SPDUB

bk wrote:

Every NTL customer can get digital and it is only an extra €10, so where is the problem?

That should be "most NTL customers can get digital...." as it's not available where I live

bk

SPDUB wrote:

That should be "most NTL customers can get digital...." as it's not available where I live

Yes, sorry about that, I should have said NTL cable customers. Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe all NTL cable customers can now get digital. It is the MMDS customers who might have problems?

Marcopolo85

icdg wrote:

Okay guys this topic is getting a little heated (and develling into pedantary in places)...

Morgan Stanley are using the NTL name, under licence from NTL Group Limited. This is because they are not going to rebrand NTL Ireland, this will be the job of the eventual purchaser (UPC or otherwise). Morgan Stanley's business is not cable TV, it is banking! They are merely holding the business in trust for the eventual purchaser, and are unlikely to go to the trouble of spending big money on a rebranding. Therefore licencing the NTL brand (which, depending on negotiations in the UK, may itself not even exist by the end of the year...) is the cheapest and easiest option.

Nonetheless, the company is a commercial business. The reality is that the amount of people here who can speak French fluently is a minority. The amount of people who can speak English is near 100%. The reality is that the company is catering for its market by providing English langauage channels. TV5 Europe is available via digital for those who want to watch it. (And for us digital viewers, it would be nice to add RAI, 3Sat, and TVE. That way most foriegn langauge entusiasts would be happy, not just French enthuaists).

Back to mod mode, and could people keep it civil for the rest of the topic please!!!

Very well put. I apologise if I did get a bit heated, but I think it's appaling to see someone in an open forum, wishing a company which employs a large number of Irish people into oblivion. I don't care whether it's cable TV, baked beans, or frozen foods - it's just not on. :mad:

JohnC.

bk wrote:

Yes, sorry about that, I should have said NTL cable customers. Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe all NTL cable customers can now get digital. It is the MMDS customers who might have problems?

AFAIK, the entire MMDS network is digital only. It is here anyway. I believe the analogue service has been switched off.

cdc

bk wrote:

It keeps their customers happy. The customer is always right.

In fairness, how many of the past local channels been a success, they are usually useless.



No, but Eurosport probably demanded more money then NTL was willing to pay. There is always tension between the content providers and carriers, this is nothing new and proves nothing.

So what's it to be ?
The customer is always right or NTL's penny pinching is always right?

chorus techy

Anyone notice the chorus site is now gone? Chorus' website, www.chorus.ie now says the website is undergoing maintenance and has the UPC logo on it. I wonder how long the NTL site will remain as it is now...

Marcopolo85

cdc wrote:

So what's it to be ?
The customer is always right or NTL's penny pinching is always right?

I would imagine that it is not penny piching. Like any business, they (NTL) surely must look closely at supplier's rates, etc (much as a sueprmarket does). If one supplier looks for above the odds (and gets it) There would be a knock on effect.

This would then filter down to the customer. Look at the petrol situation at present.

In the supermarket scenario the retailer would look elsewhere. Cable would be no different. :rolleyes:

bk

cdc wrote:

So what's it to be ?
The customer is always right or NTL's penny pinching is always right?

Why both of course. Nothing in life is ever black and white. When NTL are deciding to carry a channel (or dump a channel) they make the decision on many factors including:

1) How many customers will the channel bring to the service, would people leave NTL for Sky if they didn't have the channel, is the channel a big differentiator from Sky, is there an equivalent replacement, etc.

2) How much money is the channel looking for to be carried.

For instance the main Irish and UK channels are a must have, as they are the reason people get cable, in particular UTV and C4 are worth their weight in gold as Sky doesn't have them and therefore they are a big differentiator.

I'm sure dropping Eurosport was a hard decision for NTL and it probably did cost them customers, however Eurosport was probably just looking for too much money.

paulm17781

chorus techy wrote:

Anyone notice the chorus site is now gone? Chorus' website, www.chorus.ie now says the website is undergoing maintenance and has the UPC logo on it. I wonder how long the NTL site will remain as it is now...

The chorus site is back there now.

patrickmooney

paulm17781 wrote:

The chorus site is back there now.

Did anyone get a URL or screengrab of that message?

Mossy Monk

the Chorus website is looking very UPC now. see www.upc.nl for similarities

Marcopolo85

Mossy Monk wrote:

the Chorus website is looking very UPC now. see www.upc.nl for similarities

Yep - exactly the same - only in Dutch!! :eek:

chorus techy

patrickmooney wrote:

Did anyone get a URL or screengrab of that message?

Nope, unfortunately not. The URL was www.chorus.ie - it didn't re-direct anywhere or anything, it was basically like it is at the moment, only there was a UPC logo where the chorus logo is and then where all the links, text etc. is, there was just a message explaining the site was down for maintenance.

cdc

bk wrote:

Why both of course. Nothing in life is ever black and white. When NTL are deciding to carry a channel (or dump a channel) they make the decision on many factors including:

1) How many customers will the channel bring to the service, would people leave NTL for Sky if they didn't have the channel, is the channel a big differentiator from Sky, is there an equivalent replacement, etc.

2) How much money is the channel looking for to be carried.

For instance the main Irish and UK channels are a must have, as they are the reason people get cable, in particular UTV and C4 are worth their weight in gold as Sky doesn't have them and therefore they are a big differentiator.

I'm sure dropping Eurosport was a hard decision for NTL and it probably did cost them customers, however Eurosport was probably just looking for too much money.

All thoroghly reasonable but re. point 1 - relate that to CNBC. How many people watch that programme? Where did the demand come from? Do NTL release viewing figures for it?
No doubt it's cheaper, possibly CNBC even pay NTL to broadcast it, and NTL did not pass this saving on to it's subscribers.
All I can see is penny pinching here.

thund3rbird_

bk wrote:

No, but Eurosport probably demanded more money then NTL was willing to pay. There is always tension between the content providers and carriers, this is nothing new and proves nothing.

I don't know where this "ntl would not pay eurosport" theory comes from..

ntl Ireland, at the time eurosport was removed/replaced/dropped (read as you see fit), was, while being a separate operation, still part of the ntl group
eurosport is still carried by ntl in the uk, albeit the gb version. (http://www.home.ntl.com/icat/television&source=ntlcomtv_icon)
surely any negotiations at the time would have been conducted by those operating the purse strings & as the channel was carried to a much higher audience in the uk price would not have come into it?
part of the ntl digital service (ie the epg) is still fed from the uk therefore it would not have been much to include ES in a lineup.

my reading on the situ from ALL that I've read about this is that ES wanted to stay on the analog service & ntl wanted to put the channel on digital
ES then acted like a sulky child & "decided to take the ball home from the park so that no one could play"

as i said, my reading of the situ but if anyone wants to dispute this feel free

I had ES at the time it was taken off but NEVER watched it
when I wanted to watch popular sports like skiing I went to the pistes in the mcgillycuddy reeks / comeraghs / wicklow mts etc to catch it live :rolleyes:
the local monster truck arena has great action as well.

the site/campaign (http://www.bringbackeurosport.com/index.shtml) got about 2500 signatures (out of 375000 customers) which is 0.66 %. given that not everyone has internet access ntl probably got the same percentage (or little more than it) in calls / letters.
liberally it was prob about 1.5%. yes it was a really popular channel.;)
BTW check out that site to see what sports you are missing:

• [size=-1]Figure Skating World Championships[/size]
• [size=-1]Curling World Championships[/size]

at least we have setanta now (free by the way) which shows a good bit of Irish sports, especially good for the eircom league as attendances have declined.

eurosport - good riddance to it!!

Mossy Monk

Eurosport does throw up the odd good thing though, you may not like figure skating but i'm sure someone who has ntl does. what about some of the pre season football? the Peace cup was good. Moto GP, they give better coverage than anyone else imo. Athletics, they cover the majority of it. Cycling, Eurosport cover loads of it. you gave examples of 2 winter sports which is i think is limited

thund3rbird_

Mossy Monk wrote:

Moto GP, they give better coverage than anyone else imo.

moto gp is covered by RTE - admittedly you do have to listen to Peter Collins tho:eek:

Mossy Monk wrote:

Cycling, Eurosport cover loads of it. you gave examples of 2 winter sports which is i think is limited

tour de france was covered by tg4 recently & before you ask I do realise there's more to this sport than the TdeF.

examples were taken from the bringback... site
yes, they did mention others as well but to use the ones I mentioned as examples of "what you could be watching" is a bit much.

there are channels I rarely/never watch CNN / CNBC / Extreme Sports / EWTN:eek: and some I always do. Everyone has their faves/dislikes.

I think the old saying re not being able to please everyone all the time rings true here

SPDUB

bk wrote:

Yes, sorry about that, I should have said NTL cable customers. Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe all NTL cable customers can now get digital. It is the MMDS customers who might have problems?

No. They still haven't upgraded the cable network in the part of Dublin 12 where I live even though neighbouring areas have been upgraded

Rosser

Just on the CNBC topic...I watch Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and NBC Nightly News which is approximately three shows more than I watch on ITV...

By the way www.upc.ie hasn't been reserved so anyone who is feeling industrious should get in there!