Something weird with BBC World's dog

CD

cdd 25 April 2004 7:58pm

He's just told me that he is watching BBC World via satellite.

EDIT: just added this convo log--

Quote:

[07:57:51 PM] Chris: how do you receive BBC World?
[07:58:19 PM] Mike: I have a minidish which has service through ExpressVu in Canada
[07:58:47 PM] Mike: I use a broker, you see, to maintain an address in Canada so that I can receive BBC World, as well as other BBC programs such as BBC Canada and BBC Kids.
[07:58:58 PM] Chris: ah - why you have to pay for the service?
[07:59:23 PM] Mike: Here in the US, I get BBC America by both digital cable and my satellite service with DirecTV
[08:00:05 PM] Mike: Because BBC World is not transmitted FTA in North America. It is FTA in Europe afaik
[08:00:54 PM] Mike: In order to watch it, you have to find a provider that has it (only Canada and Latin/South America and Caribbean; no US), and pay for service. But since the coverage area is pretty much all of the US, you're set.
[08:01:12 PM] Mike: As well as BBC 1/2, can you get BBC World over in the UK?
[08:01:37 PM] Chris: ...nope!

MH

mhking 26 April 2004 8:02pm

cdd posted:

My mate just sent me this capture from the North America feed: http://chris.snowby.biz/na_world_dog.mov

Apparently the normal tower dog rotated in behind this red thing, and apparently it's still there. Weird! Perhaps some kind of maintenance?

I noticed this on the 7A Eastern BBC America feed. I just assumed that it was some sort of maintenance issue. I generally miss the evening BBC America newscasts though. I'll take a look in the morning to see if there's any sort of change.

I do know there has been much discussion of the notion of offering BBC World in the US, especially now that NewsCorp has controlling interest in DirecTV, the larger of the three home satellite systems. Nothing has come of that yet, though.

MH

mhking 26 April 2004 8:11pm

cdd posted:

He's just told me that he is watching BBC World via satellite.

It is possible to go through a "grey market" distributor (one which does not actively market directly to the US market) - technically, the only companies authorized to sell satellite service in the US are DirecTV, Dish Network (also known by their parent company name, Echostar), and VOOM.

There are some who get services (surreptiously) through the Canadian DBS firms (Star Choice & ExpressVu). If you do go that route, you would have the channels that available solely to Canadian viewers (ostensibly), which is how US viewers can watch BBC World directly.

There is an active grey market providing Canadian programming to people in the US and a much larger grey market going the other way, providing US programming and services to Candians. Canada has actually physically outlawed this mode of television reception.

However, Americans receiving Canadian programming is not prohibited by law. It is frowned upon, as distributors and programmers in the US have "exclusive rights" to provide programming to American viewers. By watching Canadian satellite systems, these "exclusive rights" are circumvented.

Pain in the tail if you ask me. Personally, i'm planning on getting a Canadian dish and programming sometime between now and the end of the year. I'll still keep my DirecTV system, but the Canadian system will give me access to a number of things that are not available here (such as BBC World).

(April 2004)