Never heard such crap!

[BarMoo]

In the Guardian, on the nonsense that ITV "may" go the BBC's way ...........

At stake is whether ITV continues to pay for the place on BSkyB's satellite and its encryption service, which stops viewers outside the UK picking up ITV channels, or joins the BBC by broadcasting "in the clear" on a separate satellite.

Separate Satellite? News to me I hope SKY know this?

Have Fun,

Mark.

P.S. On a weekend rant ..................

Even Freeview now has 30+ channels - when it only ever wanted upto 30. It wanted to be free, but in the end it probably won't be. Nonsense! Its ITV digidroll all over again.

I'm so angry with this w/s digital nonsense. Cue symbol )(-red

Ideal World the other day was selling a "plasma" for the "first time". The plasma demo picture was a feed of another Ideal channel squashed into a GBP 2,000 product. Great.

What is it with you guys? Not only are plasma screens expensive and nasty - Ideal World is a 4:3 broadcaster ????

Yet, it got even worse. The numb-nut doing the demo later showed "Idependance Day" on the same screen.

Most DVD bods might note that most FOX films are usually authored in 16:9 (probably thanks to the UK's obsession with 16:9) and not in the original format. Anyway, this demo-person didn't at all notice that everyone on the film seemed a little fat: yep, the guy had letterboxed a 16:9 feature on a plasma?

I have a friend with a w/s set and he thinks that watching Moira Stewart reading the news at the weekend "in fat mode" is quite normal? Yeh, for him maybe. I would rather speculate that that is why the UK has an obesity problem? Too many numb-nuts not knowing how to use their w/s sets; coz, for them, everyone looks normal; i.e., fat. You can thank the BBC for this.

I only hope that OFCOM legislate for HDTV the inclusion of PUO's - to stop anyone, who will probably be by that time extremely fat, from fooking around with the aspect ratios of any television service and/or DVD.

Erggghhh!

 

[Lancelot]

LOL.....O-Ha O-Ha O-Ha O-Ha



Absolutely brilliant Mark Tnx for brightening up a crap morning @ wk.

Cheers

 

[gameboy]

Separate Satellite? I hope SKY know this?

They are on a new satellite, just in the same position as the other Astra satellites that Sky use. Sky don't own any satellites, they only lease transponders like all the other broadcasters.

BBC not don't have to deal with Sky they deal direct with Astra and can determine the footprint they cover.

I for one hope ITV go the same way. Can't see Sky wanting them doing that as this may stop a lot of users needing a Sky receiver.

 

[BGonaSTICK]

I for one hope ITV go the same way. Can't see Sky wanting them doing that as this may stop a lot of users needing a Sky receiver.

Agree 100%. It must be good for competition. Sly are too powerfull as it is, without any new deals.

 

[BarMoo]

I was just amused by the way the Guardian wrote this story. It made it sound like an "us and them" thing. We all know that the BBC & ITV still benefit from the warmth of being under SKY's soft and fluffy duvet.

And, we all know that ITV and Channel 4 both recently hired extra capacity on 2D directly from Astra; which might explain why ITV3 is in the clear.

Yet, it has been bounced around that if ITV can negotiate a single digit GBP-Million figure that guarantees them decent EPG numbers, that still allows for the regionalisation benefits of the card and, of course, that encryption - then ITV will stick with SKY. I believe that ITV currently fork-out GBP17million.

Beyond that, I would love know if retailer's have started rolling out slot-free satellite STB's in anticipation of this supposed FreeSat thing? somehow, I very much doubt it.

Have Fun,

Mark.