DTT: Freeview and Top Up TV

I'd like to think that it wasn't, and despite my support for Top Up TV I am not remotely excited about the prospect of paying for TV channels, I am however excited about the prospect of seeing some decent channels on there again, which as a necessary evil I will have to pay for.


Well I'm afraid I believe that Freeview has allready peaked; this is it. Any improvements to it or indeed free DTT as a whole would require years and years of patience - maybe 5 years or more, before the number of DTT viewers increased and channel providers were interested in a free platform. I believe the important thing is to get some decent channels on there now, and at present the only way to do that is by having pay channels there, and the only way to do that is by having a pay TV service.


Why has it turned them into waste? The BBC do still provide 8 free channels. And your 'eventually there is likely to be...' line is just another conspiracy theory.

When ITV Digital was going, I accept that there was no easy way of getting free DTT; until 2001 the only consumer level DTT equipment here (except iDTVs) were ITV Digital boxes, and getting them except through ITV Digital with a subscription would set you back nearly £300, and even then you'd need a specialist retailer who stocked them to get it - the boxes in Dixons and Currys weren't actually their property to sell.

Things are different now, there will never be a time again when FTA DTT equipment is so hard to come by. Apart from anything else, Top Up TV just don't have the resources to get involved with equipment supply; buying the box will always be down to you, which means that there will always be the option to get free DTT by not subscribing.

I agree - Freeview does appear to have peaked, but if TUTV is taking channels away from Freeview- even if most just pass them off as shopping channels, it is 3 less channels to boast about in their line-ups.

I implore you again; read the thread. Those 3 channels are not on Freeview, they are on DTT. It just so happens that as free channels Freeview have decided to associate them with their service - but they had no right to and no right to claim that channels are being 'taken away from Freeview' when they aren't.

And as I have said to you last night, at least one of those channels would have gone with or without Top Up TV appearing, and in all likelihood, so would a second one. And as I also said last night, I do believe that Bid Up will manage to survive anyway.

Barney is not the only one, my Parents watch bid-up because its funny not for whats on it, mum sings the auction music its quite amusing, ok so its not life or death if ti goes but if its going (on FREEview) and nothing replaces it that means that PAYtv is taking channles from FREEview which I think is totally wrong.

... and not forgetting that it's extremely likely that Top Up Tv pursuaded Boomerang and TCM to join them, and not Freeview.

We can't do anything about it now. Top Up is coming. All we have to remember is that it's expansion is limited, unlike Freeview who can switch back to 64QAM after analogue switch off and free up lots more space.

Honestly, how many more times are we going to go round in the same circle here? To Barney, Bail, and whoever else, READ THE F**KING THREAD!!! None of the channels affected are on Freeview. Just because you type 'FREEview' and 'PAYtv' it doesn't magically mean that they are.


As I've said before, despite a broadcast licence existing, they've recently encrypted transmission of both channels on Sky. It would seem their priorities have changed. And in any case, even if you are right, Boomerang and TCM, whilst better than nothing, are still only two channels, and are only a classic cartoons channel and a classic film channel. Adding them only to DTT would still leave it without a proper general entertainment channel, without a mainstream kids channel (I will accept however that Cbeebies has been popular with it's target audience - but that's a very young audience), and without a proper documentary channel. Top Up is still better than the possibility of just TCM and Boomerang appearing.


Ooh so in ten years time Freeview might have been able to deliver something then? That's an awfully long time to wait. And in any case, what will they do with this free space? As you and everyone else refuses to acknowledge, Freeview *ALLREADY HAS* free space, and they can't fill it. To repeat something I said only yesterday, I find the assertion that Top Up are stealing valuable space which Freeview might have their eyes on almost as laughable as the number of channels which have been touted and then failed to launch on Freeview's remaining slot. If not even Disney can get a channel off the ground, then who else will.

What? are you sure? I have always thought Disney signed to SDN, Not Freeview. Take a look:

http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0%2C7493%2C1059797%2C00.html


http://www.tvtoday.co.uk/article.php?p=103&more=1


Before Top-up TV Came the SDN MUX was going to be:
Five
Bid-up.tv
TV Travel Shop
Daytime
QVC
(space)

And for Wales as above with QVC and (Space) being S4C and S4C2 instead.

But now it looks like it could be:
Five
Top-upTV
Top-upTV
Top-upTV
QVC - (S4C Digidol in Wales)
Then either Daytime/Bid-up (with S4C2 in Wales)

To repeat myself again, it is likely that Top Up Tv is the reason Freeview has not yet filled the one space on the Crown Castle multiplex - the one remaining Freeview space (not counting SDN, Digital3/4) was originally meant for TCM/Boomerang which is now part of Top Up Tv.



EMAP, Viacom, Flextech and UKTV have all managed it quite well...

This is so true. Freeview have free space and yet had the inability to fill it with interesting channels that would appeal to the vast majority. If DTT is to survive, then Top Up TV is the only way to ensure that it can. I have Freeview because I had ITVDigital. If I didn't have Freeview, then I wouldn't bother getting it because the channels on offer are crap. Paying £7.99 for 10 additional channels when you are unable to get Sky for various reasons is far more appealing. Frankly, I find the shopping channels that are being refferred to as appallingly bad and full of tack. True they are marginally entertaining for a brief period but then you lose the will to live. So losing them from the DTT platform is no hardship, especially when a new bargain pay-tv option is paving the way for a better channel line up (which will be available to all in due course) is a much better idea.

Freeview could not deliver a decent package, someone else then has to. How else can DTT survive otherwise?

Unfortunately, Top Up TV doesn't exactly offer much that I would actually ever bother to watch.

E4.... well, with no new Friends/Sex & The City/etc I wouldn't really bother (and I did when it was on OnDigital and it had that)

UK Gold...was fun for a while, but there aren't that many episodes of Dads Army/Vicar of Dibley/The Good Life in existence and they're always being repeated on BBC1 anyway (plus the only thing I ever remember bothering to watch on UKG on OnDigital was Dr Who on weekend mornings which isn't exactly possible on the timings being offered)

The 'daytime channels'.... ok, i know this doesn't apply to everyone, but I hae a job so wouldn't be watching them (which is why I never chose 'lifestyle' channels from OnDigital)

TCM.... its a possibility, but hardly as good as Sky Premier (which I did subscribe to during the OnDigital days)

Bloomberg... yeah, actually I'd rather stick with the free news channels thanks

Which leaves.... Discovery! Which I might bother to watch, occasionally! But would I for £7.99 a month????

I'm talking about launching a genuine, decent, general entertainment channel. EMAP and Viacom have launched music channels, of the type which are ten a penny on Sky. Even attempts to make TMF a little bit more distinctive have now largely disappeared.

Flextech have launched FTN - a channel which has turned over the first two hours of it's time to relaying a shopping channel and whose schedule speaks more volumes about what a waste of space it is than anything I could write.

UKTV have launched UK Bright Ideas - a dull lifestyle channel which until recently ran on a 2 hour loop, and now runs only on a 4 hour loop, and aswell as that they've launched UK History - a channel which sounds promising and indeed looks quite good; until that is you realise that after about 2 weeks you'll have seen almost every programme they have to show - after that it's just repeat on repeat of Gladiators of WWII, Cold War, et al. Indeed, they show almost nothing which doesn't relate to wars, and there's a lot more to history than that.

I don't see any of them as filling the gap of getting a decent general entertainment channel on DTT.

[B] It's OK for all you dudes that have cable or satelite TV and can get upteen channels. But what about those of us who can't ?????
I do not have cable and because of surrounding structures and the low location of the satelite, I cannot get a satelite picture.
Freeview was originaly part pay-per-veiw and was one of the main reasons I bought a set top box.
Having payed regular premiums to watch football and films etc; they suddenly decided to pull the plug and leave us in the dark.
So to all those who think freeview should not turn around, please spare a thought for people like me. After all You still get your freebie channels and no-one is making you pay for extra ones.