To be honest I'm on Branson's side on this one. He generally seems a nice chap and to be honest why should they have to pay an extra 30% (IIRC earlier in this thread) when Sky get enough money from charging other channels to be on their platform anyway.
IF they get their way with Freeview the only one I would miss would be Sky Sports News the other two I very rarely watch
What's the message saying I wonder? Do miss Sky One being at 7, good old days and all that.
Me too - I had NTL analogue until November 2004 before finally deciding to switch to digital. I think it was the fact ITV3 was only on digital not analogue that made me switch.
Right, so heres what I'm wondering. Will a deal ever be and will these sky channels return to the virgin platform in the not to distance future??? my guess would be ....... 'no'
I have come up with a solution for myself, I am going to have sky installed and the most basic package of sky, (standard not sky+) and have that AND V+ togther until my virgin pacakge runs out in 10 months time and at which point I ditch it and switch over to sky+....
Yes am willing to pay, I had telewest primarly FOR! sky one in the first place and I will do this because I want it... and will get it back.
Right, so heres what I'm wondering. Will a deal ever be and will these sky channels return to the virgin platform in the not to distance future??? my guess would be ....... 'no'
TBH I'm not so sure, I think it will go one way or another, either Virgin will never carry the channels ever again and the content of Virgin Central will increase.
Or one or the other will come begging, for Virgin the content of Sky One is a rather Unique Selling Point, but on Sky's hand a £60Million (or so) loss in advertising revenue, isn't such a good thing considering the fact the channel's audience figures have been going down year on year and the supposed investment of Sky One, and as they're losing this figure, the money invested won't be returned as easily as they'd have hoped.
Or either subscriptions to Virgin Media will decrease and then realise they need the channels.
Give these things time really, but I wouldn't expect a mass increase of subscriptions to Sky for the loss of three channels.
There were mutterings on Mediaguardian yesterday that the basic Sky channels may re-appear as paid-for channels - it's possible that they're not gone for good.
Yes, I was wondering why they could not be made available as paid channels - surely its possible that those VM customers who want the Sky channels have the option of paying a bit extra and receiving them?
There were mutterings on Mediaguardian yesterday that the basic Sky channels may re-appear as paid-for channels - it's possible that they're not gone for good.
You mean where the not included on virgin packages if you want them you have to pay for them seperately? ... Well I'd be very happy with that. I would happily pay £5-7 a month for sky one as a stand-alone channel yes I would argee to that terms if offered the otpion.
Still would ditch V+ and move to sky+ when my contacts up but would cough up the dough 'in the meantime' I think others would too
There were mutterings on Mediaguardian yesterday that the basic Sky channels may re-appear as paid-for channels - it's possible that they're not gone for good.
Doubt it, Sky seem to think that they can operate channels on a cable network seperately from the owners of the cable network.... and they can't due to the closed nature of cable.
If they did appear with Virgin's blessing as channels you have to pay extra for it would give both parties an indication of how popular the Sky channels are.... and Sky would probably be disappointed
I would happily pay £5-7 a month for sky one as a stand-alone channel yes I would agree to that terms if offered the option.
For two fairly average (and a bit repetitive) programmes, you'd pay £5-7 a month? Fair enough, though if I were you I'd pay the £50 disconnection fee to VM and have done with it.
Sorry, the more I think about this the more it seems a bloody shambles.
They're both behaving like children, but Sky are the ones with the content. They're the ones with the better channels (Sky One versus anything the former Flextech had to offer - no question). It's their channels, and they can charge what the hell they want.
Virgin can moan all they want about having the amount of money they are paid by Sky cut dramatically, but that's down to their crappy negotiating. It's called business. So far broadcasting ain't communist.
At the end of the day Virgin are there to protect the interests of their customers. They have failed badly. And beyond that, they've acted like complete children over the situation. Instead of apologising profusely for the problems, they've created childish fake names for the channels and made a joke out of it. It ain't a joke for me thanks, I'm missing my favourite channels you morons. And they're refusing to cut their prices on the basis that we've got Virgin Central (which a - crashes my cable box every time I tune into it, and b - is crap, and full of five year old at least repeats).
Therefore they've got until the end of the month (because I think there is still a possibility one side or the other will come back begging) and then we switch.
And if they try to introduce Sky channels as some extra that costs a fortune, they can still shove it. Again, it's down to their poor negotiating.
Virgin are all hype, all David v Goliath, no substance. And in recent years they've been a failure in every single business they've moved into. This is not going to help their brand one bit, and it'll probably kill their cable business before it even gets going.