Virgin & Sky

Nice! They aren't the best channels in the world but it's good to have them back. It's a pain to have to switch to freeview to watch sky news/sports news.
I'd really love the HD versions but I doubt they are included in this deal, given that it's current one of sky's biggest USP's and virgin don't seem to care about HD

It actually means that we get more channels than we did before - I don't remember Sky 2,3 or Arts being there before (maybe on NTL but not on Telewest)

Also those of us on XL TV get all the Sky channels and Setanta.... that's quite a good deal

It must be a factor, according to Media Guardian Sky were losing 8% of their ad revenue - £25 million a year.

The added viewers to Sky News is a boom too, especially if they take it off Freeview (can't keep track of what's happening to Picnic)

Picnic is suspended indefinately AFAIK

Fairly good news to see this resolved, as I imagine many have missed them. It'll be nice to watch another alternative news channel but I won't notice much of a difference apart from that myself as I never used them much before and I don't see any reason why that would change.

NTL had Two, yes. Three & Arts, no.

So, what's going to happen to Setanta News then? Surely there's no need for it now.

No, we musn't have any competition.

I await comments on how Setanta is not competition.

Channel numbers: http://www.virginmedia.com/customers/skychannels/

Virgin1's shifting down a few numbers so as to be ahead of the Sky channels.

£38 Million a year according to Broadcast

Is that all? I can't claim to know the value of such things, but that seems like a low price for a handful of channels to me.