Sky to charge BBC more for EPG positioning

[net1]

Just days before a showdown meeting between the two broadcasting giants-BSkyB and BBC, it has emerged the corporation will have to pay considerably more to list its channels as a result of its decision to go it alone. While the BBC is hoping to save £17m a year in BSkyB fees, the satellite network is planning to hike up other charges to give it a place in the TV listings. The BBC will be told the charge to list each of its channels on Sky's electronic equivalent of the Radio Times will almost treble from £28,000 a year to £75,000. The corporation plans to include 31 channels on the guide, which means the charges amount to a massive £2.3m a year - a sum that would wipe out a proportion of the savings the BBC hoped to make by withdrawing the service in the first place. To rub salt into the wound, BSkyB will effectively discount the charges to any channels that remain and opt to take Sky's encryption and conditional access service. BSkyB amended the amount it charges broadcasters to be listed on the programme guide at the beginning of this year but the new tariff only takes effect when a new contract is negotiated. For the first time those channels that use Sky's encryption system, which the BBC is abandoning, will be asked to pay £35,000 while those that broadcast unencrypted will be asked to pay £75,000 a year.

 

[Genie]

I think sky have got a stranglehold on the market now,and the bbc will just have to go along with it.

Or come up with a competing product (ie. their own FTA box with good EPG and channel setup, not one of the off the shelf FTA receivers, cos people are dumb).

But that could prove very hard to take off for the bbc since sky already have the uk sat market in their hands.

 

[2old4this]

I've been screaming for years about the absurdity of not being able to re-sequence channels on the Sky Digibox. It is a customer-unfreindly restriction imposed with the specific purpose of artificially generating a market for EPG positioning. Here we have a clear illiustration of that. There is no reason at all that the EPG could not have a "default" order, but also be customisable (so viewers could place BBC at whatever position they wanted - just like one can with every other receiver on the market). Nor would it interfere with the automatic updating of EPG as new channels are brought in.

The BBC apparently has threatened to go to Oftel if Sky attempts to remove them from the EPG. But they should actually be lobbying Oftel to force Sky to allow the EPG to be user-customisable. That would solve all of these problems.

It would also have the stupendous benefit of allowing viewers to finally get rid of all those channels for which they have no subscription or in which they have no interest.

2old

 

[net1]

The BBC will hold peace talks with BSkyB today amid concerns that the corporation will have to pay the satellite broadcaster an increased fee to appear on its TV listings service.
The BBC will withdraw from the BSkyB service on May 30 and broadcast to Sky homes from a different satellite in a move it said would save the corporation £85m in fees over five years. However, the corporation still wants to appear on the pay-TV group's on-screen channel menu, which is used by 6.6m Sky subscribers to locate their favourite programmes. BSkyB is now planning to raise the separate fees charged to the BBC for a slot on its electronic programme guide.

Earlier this year BSkyB increased its tariff for channels that broadcast on its network without using its encryption system, which the BBC will quit on May 30. The cost of listing each BBC channel on BSkyB's electronic equivalent of the Radio Times will almost treble from £28,000 a year to £75,000.

Because the BBC plans to increase the number of services it lists on the guide, the annual charges to the corporation will soar to £2.3m - a sum that would wipe out a proportion of the savings the BBC hoped to make by withdrawing from the service in the first place. The BBC paid BSkyB around £4m a year to use its network before announcing last week that it was not renewing the broadcast contract.

The BBC is facing hefty Electronic Programming Guide charges because the services it wants listed include all 22 regional versions of BBC1 and BBC2 plus eight digital channels, including News 24, BBC3 and BBC4. At present it shows only national variations of its channels. The BBC will also have to pay BSkyB to develop software that will allow viewers to switch between different regional variations.

"Sky rather looks as though it is not legally obliged to change the software, which could leave the BBC channels scattered all over the EPG," said Anthony de Larrinaga, an analyst at SG Securities.