On Sun, Jun 24, 2012 at 10:16 PM, Joe Hass <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Sun, Jun 24, 2012 at 3:33 PM, Adam Bowie <[email protected]> wrote: > > A couple of things worth adding to this: > > > > - BT will almost certainly make their games available to other platforms > > since doing otherwise won't make the numbers work. Nobody really expects > the > > die-hard football fan to have two different boxes under their TV. That > said, > > they've not formally announced how they'll be marketing them (currently > they > > retail some, but not all of BSkyB's sports, so expect getting full > access to > > those channels to be part of the discussion). BT Vision is very much the > > fourth most popular platform in the UK, but the AT&T comparison is a good > > one for telecoms and broadband. > > Help me understand this: according to the BT Vision site, you can get > Sky Sports 1 and 2 on their service. Are you saying that a user > wouldn't get a box that runs both if they subscribed to BT Vision? > BT Vision subscribers do indeed get Sky Sports 1 and 2. Sky was forced by law to retail those channels to competitors. But they don't get Sky Sports 3, 4 or F1 (they're new F1 only dedicated channel). Nor do they get Sky Sports News which used to be free-to-air on Freeview, but isn't any longer. Nor do they get any of those channels in HD. While SS1 and 2 show most of the premium fixtures, sometimes there are games that drop down to 3 and 4. And if, for some reason, you're a WWE fan, then you'll pretty much get no coverage on SS1 or 2. Similarly for things like golf and tennis. Finally, Sky's own platform is the only one that offers interactivity with alternative fixtures or commentaries and so on. Things like their F1 "Race Control" are remarkably good with a choice of three on-board cameras, pit-lane coverage, timings (beyond the on-screen ones) and so on. We get Redzone as an alternative to the live Sunday NFL games on Sky via interactive too. I think lack of HD is a real killer if you've invested in a 40"+ TV set as so many have over the last few years. I would expect that Sky will offer those services to BT's service in return for retailing a BT football channel from August 2013. > > - The comparison with the NFL is interesting. Considering the UK is > roughly > > a fifth the size of the US marketplace, that makes this an excellent deal > > for the Premier League. The difference is that UK viewers have to pay > > premium subscriptions to get that football. Sky Sports is not a basic > cable > > service as ESPN essentially is. Sky Sports costs an additional £20 a > month > > ($31). And there's no free-to-air Premier League coverage aside from the > > highlights that run on the BBC. Although I know some NFL coverage is run > at > > a loss, the scale of the US market means that Fox, CBS and NBC certainly > go > > a long way to mitigate their costs with advertising. ITV, Channel 4 and > > Channel 5 looked at the rights for some live games, but at over £6m a > match > > under this new deal, there's no way they could earn back that in > advertising > > in the much smaller UK market. > > I'd add that the EPL is effectively further along than the US when it > comes to pro sports moving completely to pay TV (with a couple > exceptions: Detroit, for example, is in year eight of a 10-year deal > that puts *every* non-national-TV Red Wings, Tigers, and Pistons game > on Fox Sports Detroit). But the unique nature of the EPL (with the > awesomeness that is no postseason) means it's hard to try to get a > real similar format (maybe college football as it stands now), because > the cheapening of the regular season puts the premium in getting those > rights. I'd say MLB is closer to going full-pay than the other leagues > (I believe the next TV contract will see an NHL-style World Series > format, where two of the first four games are on cable only), because > they really are all about the broadcast dollars, more so than the > other two. > > But can you really envisage the end of free-to-air NFL coverage? It seems like even NFL Network hasn't done that well. And ESPN gets very wide coverage compared to Sky Sports. For example, Sky is in about 10m UK homes, but only just over half of them pay extra for Sky Sports. Whereas if you get cable, you probably get ESPN and don't get to choose whether a portion of your monthly bill gets forwarded to them irrespective of your interest in sport. Ironically much of this whole thing is due to the European Commission dictating that the Premier League should not be allowed to sell all its rights to one customer. Ironically, despite hating this decision from around 2004 initially, this has played right into the Premier League's hands since there are always new players trying to come into the market. Al Jazeera was a rumoured bidder this time - they're about to enter the French market. And there was even talk of Apple and Google. Although I don't believe the UK's broadband backbone would stand up to an internet-only delivery of live sport. What's more, I think both those companies would want to do regional, or even global deals rather than country by country ones. The broadband issue could also mean that BT will struggle to deliver HD games via its network aside from those consumers with "fibre to cabinet" packages. Currently that's a small number since it involves a lot digging up roads to lay the fibre. > > Adam (who is writing this to take his mind off a tense European > Championship > > England v Italy quarter-final that's taking place right now. It's just > going > > into extra time...) > > And with the match now going into penalties, be brave. > > And it's all over for another two/four years... Roll on the Olympics! Adam -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
