The Late Late Gay Byrne Irish Television Thread

It was Teledu Cymru from the Preseli transmitter that was receivable in SE Ireland, and that didn't start until Sept 1962, however, yes you're right, there were so many UK TV viewers in Eastern Ireland, obviously using 405 line sets, that RTE were forced to launch on 405 lines in those areas, (rather than exclusively on 625 lines)

I see that VM1 was the proposed new name for TV3.

Bit *too* similar a name to that of a certain Viacom-owned channel whose current programmes include America's Next Top Model and RuPaul's Drag Race, is it not?

I can’t believe they’d have actually gone for those names. Using abbreviations when the parent company doesn’t would have destroyed the only point there was in the rebrand (to create a branding connection between the cable company and the broadcaster). Maybe that’s what happened - the rebrand progressed to this point and the powers that be realised that the execution wouldn’t achieve the goals they were looking for.

There appears to be increased use of the Virgin Media brand of late on TV3 - the so called “sponsorship” of the studios meaning the brand is appearing on endcaps, use on promos etc. It wouldn’t surprise me if, eventually, we did get a rebrand that kept the TV3, 3e, and Be3 names but turned the corporate colour red and added (small) Virgin Media logos to the idents.

They could use a backronym on TV3 and claim it has always stood for Television Virgin. Really glad though they've finally seen sense - and most large corporations now own other brands anyway.

Virgin Media Ireland have announced that their analogue cable service will be fully switched off by the end of 2019.

https://www.virginmedia.ie/switchoff

https://www.virginmedia.ie/business/switchover/

The latest area that I heard analogue cable being switched off from VM is Mullingar. VM Ireland said that the service in Mullingar will switch off by Monday the 23rd of April 2018; which is roughly 3 weeks away. Customers are given six weeks notice to change to Virgin's digital TV service in Ireland or to other providers wherever possible. It appears that this operation is going to be a phased rollout of switchoff. For TV presentation purposes; a notice will appear on RTÉ One, RTÉ2 & BBC One NI to advise viewers that their analogue service will be switched off in their area with the final date being decided at the discretion of VM.

Down over the Years, Cablelink had a terrible name for customer service, as did NTL, NTL Chorus and then UPC. The Virgin Name was going to be a new beginning. But when this service is cut off I wouldn't want to be working for Customer Service in Virgin dealing with Dublin Callers. It's going to look like a money grab to get more money out of extra connections in each house.

That link above calls their technicians ‘Red House Ninjas’. I love the idea of a tubby, balding fortysomething called Derek knocking on the door of an analogue cable subscriber and announcing “Hello, I’m a Red House Ninja,” the elderly woman who answers being baffled and terrified.

To be fair, Cablelink didn’t need to do anything customer service wise through most of their existance. Either you took the service or you didn’t (and in Dublin, practically everyone took the service, they had a riddiculously high take up from homes passed). Premium channels only arrived in the 1990s and, beyond small trials, they never publically offered phone or internet (because they were a subsidiary of what is now Eir, who wouldn’t let them). Chorus and it’s predeccesors had by far the worse rep for CS.

Dublin will almost certainly be the last to go. It’s a service that’s been around since the 1960s and there will be resistance to its closure.

Eir Takeover completed

French consortium completes Eir takeover: https://t.co/2IcOJHfx6E #sportsbiz

— SportBusiness Media (@TVSportsMarkets) April 10, 2018

It’s their ninth change of ownership since their privatisation nearly twenty years ago. A number of executives have left one of which is Glen Killane who was their head of TV. Wonder if the price is right the new owners might be all too willing to sell eir Sport back to Setanta who are still running much of its day to day operations.

RTÉ has sought regulatory approval from the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland for RTÉ2+1. A decision is still undecided though.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/media-and-marketing/rt%C3%A9-plans-plus-one-channel-for-rt%C3%A92-1.3485996?mode=amp

Considering the mess that RTE 1+1 is, I can't see RTE 2+1 being any better.