Sky, TVNZ to launch new pay TV service

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22 posts

Geek

#550018 25-Nov-2011 14:45

Linuxluver: The government has just privatised TVNZ7 and handed 51% to Sky.

Isn't Sky 44% owned by Fox News founder and owner, Rupert Murdoch, through News Corp?

Thanks, John Key.
Thanks, Steven Joyce.

Thanks for running down the public broadcasting assets we entrusted to you and handing them to your corporate buddies.

Your cronies win again...and the people of NZ get the shaft.

Now we know why the energy assets are up for sale....and what to expect.

I'm sorry Linuxluver, but your statements are a nonsense...

" The government has just privatised TVNZ7 and handed 51% to Sky"

Untrue, it was announced back in April that funding for TVNZ7 would cease effective July 2012. TVNZ will be winding up TVNZ7 at the end of June 2012.

"Thanks for running down the public broadcasting assets we entrusted to you and handing them to your corporate buddies."

TVNZ is NOT a public broadcaster. They do NOT have a mandate to act or behave as a public broadcaster. People need get their heads around this idea. NZ still does have a public broadcaster, it's called Maori TV. The previous Labour govt thought they could own a TV company that was a commercial broadcaster turning a profit and could at the same time meet a public broadcast charter, goals which are diametrically opposed.

TVNZ does not receive any government funding excepting for targeted funding for TVNZ7 and Maori/Pacific Island functions. Other than that all of their income is from commercial sources including advertising, licensing and pay TV revenue, or from contestable funding available to all broadcasters through NZ On-Air. Thus the idea that the tax payer somehow pays for TVNZ is a nonsense, in fact TVNZ returns a significant dividend to the government on an annual basis.

The bottom line is that TVNZ have realised that they cannot continue to rely on advertising revenue from conventional broadcast TV as this is a business model that is under serious challenge. Thus they need to diversify their revenue streams which includes pay TV revenue.

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crackrdbycracku

1168 posts

Uber Geek

#550044 25-Nov-2011 16:00

old3eyes:
crackrdbycracku:
sleemanj: Clearly this is TVNZ largely driving here, SKY only days ago said they didn't see a business case for it -?http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/5976762/Sky-still-mulling-pared-down-TV-service?

Clearly it has been TVNZ that has waved considerable money and content under Sky's nose to do this or they wouldn't be doing it, either way, I think TVNZ has really lost their way lately, somebody needs to step in and remind them who exactly owns them - you, me, and every other tax payer in the country. ?

Progressively moving more content to pay tv, to the great detriment of Freeview in my opinion, is not a very good thing for a Government owned Television network IMHO.

Are they moving the content to pay TV or duplicating it on pay TV? My understanding is the stuff from Freeview will still be broadcast on Freeview, and therefore free. ?

Why would you want to duplicate free stuff on pay TV// No one would buy it. I suspect that the only stuff on TVNZ Freeview channels will be the stuff that the new PayTV network doesn't want.

Yeah, I agree with your point. But the press release reprinted on Stuff says:

Customers will get paid-for content, as well as free-to-air channels

If the channels are free to air then, eh, they are free right?

That isn't the same as content which used to be on free to air TV but is now only on pay TV, like All Black games used to be live on free to air TV once upon a time but now they are only live on pay TV.

I can't see TVNZ restricting programs that would generate significant ratings (stuff people want to see) and ad revenue to this offering from Sky. What would that leave on free to air TV?

I think it is more like Basic Sky, oh yeah and the Freeview stuff you could watch on normal TV will also work through the box. Maybe some people will think this is a good idea, never know.

Didn't anybody tell you I was a hacker?

mattwnz

20035 posts

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#550089 25-Nov-2011 18:42

crackrdbycracku:I think it is more like Basic Sky, oh yeah and the Freeview stuff you could watch on normal TV will also work through the box. Maybe some people will think this is a good idea, never know.?

Someone else also mentioned earlier that it could be to do with protecting the UHF frequency, so it isn't lost to competition, which is a possibility.

benneg

47 posts

Geek

#551165 28-Nov-2011 19:30

I predicted that sky would offer such a service a while ago on this site. What I can't figure is why aren't they just using their existing service and equipment? In this way they could entice people who choose this package the add on services as well like pay per view movies to generate extra revenue? I have been lead to believe they could then return their unused frequencies to the government for a tidy little profit. They must be so paranoid that someone else will come along and spend millions of dollars to set up a competing company in a small market which they have already tied up most of the most lucrative programming that they are willing to spend so much money and make sure it is used; that pretty well sums this company up doesn't it?

On the other hand Freeview is looking pretty sick isn't it? I will stick with the free to air channels only because I get extra services currently from several Australian channels and a few international news channels; if it wasn't for them than I would consider the new package. This brings about the question; why can't Freeview try to get some of these channels officially to join their network? They are already paying the broadcast costs to transmit here; and as long as they don't contain too much material that would infringe rights of current NZ channels (eg SBS), then wouldn't this be a cheap alternative to help them save there customers deserting them? Maybe SBS would also allow a few other channels to use the spare capacity on the transponder as a trade off to help pay the bills, giving benefits to all?

old3eyes

9110 posts

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#551281 29-Nov-2011 08:45

Allot of the content on SBS is also on Sky and later Prime so I wouldn't hold out any hope of SBS on FV here..

Regards,

Old3eyes

benneg

47 posts

Geek

#551387 29-Nov-2011 12:00

old3eyes: Allot of the content on SBS is also on Sky and later Prime so I wouldn't hold out any hope of SBS on FV here..

There are a handful of programs yes; but I would not say a lot. Just look at the content right throughout the day, it is all foreign news broadcasts. However I do not know what Sky's position on some of the foreign content is as far as rights to those items go, I guess some films would be part of the Rialto channels deals they have?

I would assume that Sky knows about these signals broadcast here for quite sometime now; but I have never heard about any challenges to it?

I do know you are right; but Freeview seems to have everything stacked against it, so what else do they do? They have announced several more channels will join next year; but if they don't get some quality programming onboard and just offer specialist or limited appeal channels as they have been doing; there ability to compete will not be enhanced.

Jaxson

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#551405 29-Nov-2011 12:29

benneg: if they don't get some quality programming onboard and just offer specialist or limited appeal channels as they have been doing; there ability to compete will not be enhanced.

I really don't know that freeview needs to compete with anything. It should have just been the future of free to air TV in NZ. It's just a platform really. To my mind it doesn't compete at all with Sky TV as the content each provides is totally different.

Freeview doesn't offer current movies, live sports, or niche market channels etc, it's just free to air TV. In a few years, once analogue is switched off, it's not going to be freeview, it's just going to be normal TV. The only time it competes is where remote people couldn't receive terrestrial analogue transmissions and had to go to Sky to get TV via satellite.

dolsen

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#551437 29-Nov-2011 13:17

On buzzthepeople (survey site) they are talking about a "New Home Entertainment product" that is almost certainly the new sky product (there's a picture with tape over the logos).

Some features mentioned
All free to air and freeview channels (not sure why they are separating them).
Big sports events live... biggest matches only sky viewers see..
Extra tv channels
On demand availability
two hour pause function.

Jaxson

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#551444 29-Nov-2011 13:36

If it's got sport, (as in Rugby, League and Formula One), then I'm probably in.

benneg

47 posts

Geek

#551475 29-Nov-2011 14:42

Jaxson:
benneg: if they don't get some quality programming onboard and just offer specialist or limited appeal channels as they have been doing; there ability to compete will not be enhanced.

I really don't know that freeview needs to compete with anything. It should have just been the future of free to air TV in NZ. It's just a platform really. To my mind it doesn't compete at all with Sky TV as the content each provides is totally different.

Freeview doesn't offer current movies, live sports, or niche market channels etc, it's just free to air TV. In a few years, once analogue is switched off, it's not going to be freeview, it's just going to be normal TV. The only time it competes is where remote people couldn't receive terrestrial analogue transmissions and had to go to Sky to get TV via satellite.

May be competes is the wrong word; what I was trying to say was, I think the threat to the future of Freeview from Sky is that it has such a big share of the market that the cost of joining (or staying part of) Freeview cannot be justified by many providers because its market share is so small that it is not cost effective for them. That is why I believe Freeview needs to grow and cement its position with new more attractive options for viewers.Isn't that what a lot of media insiders are saying as well?

JimmyH

2886 posts

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#551555 29-Nov-2011 18:49

May be competes is the wrong word; what I was trying to say was, I think the threat to the future of Freeview from Sky is that it has such a big share of the market that the cost of joining (or staying part of) Freeview cannot be justified by many providers because its market share is so small that it is not cost effective for them. That is why I believe Freeview needs to grow and cement its position with new more attractive options for viewers.Isn't that what a lot of media insiders are saying as well?

I think the competition angle is bang on. Freeview, or rather the providers on it, does compete head on with other options for your eyeball time (which is what the FTA channels sell to advertisers to stay in business). At the moment the main competitor (but not the only one - think consoles, torrents, or conceivably *chortle* CASPA) is Sky. The space is moving fast and in a few years I can see other entrants - conceivably say a Netflix equivalent, IPTV from offshore, the Sky/TVNZ joint venture and/or Telstra in some areas. As things current stand, as more entrants come in and the market fragments Freeview will likely see its audience base and the revenues of its providers dwindle, ad rates and demand will come under pressure. Ultimately the viability of TV3 and TVNZ, as well as the Freeview transmission platform could come into question.

To respond to this competitive challenge and survive, Freeview and its channel partners need to offer a compelling proposition in terms of viewing experience. Otherwise the ultimate result is kind of inevitable. To my mind they aren't doing this now, and don't seem to know how to do it. What they seem to have is:

only a small number of channels
not much compelling content Vs other options
branded/certified equipment on the market that is in many cases buggy for customers to beta test
a poor viewing experience - saturation bombing of ads that are louder than programmes etc
inexplicably poor advertising/promotion of any benefits of Freeview
Pointless DRM/crippling that makes Freeview product less attractive than non-branded (ad skip, encryption etc)
an EPG that seems to be absurdly slooooow to load/respond on most kit

Not, I would venture to suggest, likely to be a long-term winning proposition.

icogill

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#551775 30-Nov-2011 12:42

For those interested, Nine to Noon from 25 November has an interview about this
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/20111125

tstone

381 posts

Ultimate Geek

#554821 7-Dec-2011 08:40

Some details of Igloo are at stuff.co.nz on the main page currently (sorry having difficulty trying to post the link).

GeoffisPure

459 posts

Ultimate Geek

#554836 7-Dec-2011 09:14

>Igloos' 11 pay-TV channels are:

UKTV,
Vibe,
Heartland,

BBC News,

BBC Knowledge,
National Geographic,
Animal Planet,
Food Television,

Kidzone24,

MTV Hits

Comedy Central.

>Pricing for the set-top boxes and the 30-day channel packs have not yet been disclosed. Igloo will hold a conference in Auckland today at which more details are expected to be released.

Hmmm... So a little bit of everything eh...
I dunno... I might be willing to pay about $15/month for this. No more.

Boeingflyer

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#554839 7-Dec-2011 09:20

I reckon it will be at least $20 (money is on $25) with a $99 install price.
I hope the decoder has 4 tuners

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