"Cost of watching live football to be slashed"

Carnwaj

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/7005966/Cost-of-watching-live-football-and-cricket-to-be-slashed-in-price-war.html

Tongue

Ah if you have a decent broadband connection its FREE and that includes ALL the footy matches and darts as well

SKY will self destruct soon, once the encryption is beaten it's goodbye to sky!

omen666

Tongue wrote: »

Ah if you have a decent broadband connection its FREE and that includes ALL the footy matches and darts as well

SKY will self destruct soon, once the encryption is beaten it's goodbye to sky!

Sky's encryption is second to none and has never been cracked totally so what makes you think it will be, stupid post really as you obviously know nothing about NDS Videoguard or any of the others

Inactive

omen666 wrote: »

Sky's encryption is second to none and has never been cracked totally so what makes you think it will be, stupid post really as you obviously know nothing about NDS Videoguard or any of the others

Indeed, it has been sound for about 10 years now.

omen666

Tongue wrote: »

Ah if you have a decent broadband connection its FREE and that includes ALL the footy matches and darts as well

SKY will self destruct soon, once the encryption is beaten it's goodbye to sky!

Sky's encryption is second to none and has never been cracked totally so what makes you think it will be, stupid post really as you obviously know nothing about NDS Videoguard or any of the others

whatmichaelsays

Personally, I'm in support of Sky on this one.

No private sector media company have innovated more in the past 15 years or so than BSkyB. Sky are the ones who have invested, innovated and created a product that is clearly desirable to both consumers and business.

If Virgin Media, BT or anybody else wants to reap the benefits of Sky’s investment, they should be expected to pay for it. The two have put nothing into the sports, have made minimal contribution to the production of sport and yet they still feel that they can demand it at a knock-down rate.

Whilst OFCOM say this investigation is in the interests of “fairness” to consumers, I rather they keep their noses out of this. Sky isn't cheap but at the end of the day, I'm a strong believer in people being paid for the work that they do. There are already restrictions on the way that Sky operate that considers the social and economic aspect of televised sport (they aren't allowed to hold exclusive rights to protected events for instance), do we really need OFCOM sticking their oar in here?

Forcing Sky to lower their wholesale cost will only force the cost of TV rights down. That will affect the clubs and the sports that rely so heavily on them. Those losses will invariably be recouped by higher ticket prices. What’s “fair” about those who actively support their chosen sport being forced to pay extra so that a few watching the game on cable can save a few quid?

ukcarper

whatmichaelsays wrote: »

Personally, I'm in support of Sky on this one.

No private sector media company have innovated more in the past 15 years or so than BSkyB. Sky are the ones who have invested, innovated and created a product that is clearly desirable to both consumers and business.

If Virgin Media, BT or anybody else wants to reap the benefits of Sky’s investment, they should be expected to pay for it. The two have put nothing into the sports, have made minimal contribution to the production of sport and yet they still feel that they can demand it at a knock-down rate.

Whilst OFCOM say this investigation is in the interests of “fairness” to consumers, I rather they keep their noses out of this. Sky isn't cheap but at the end of the day, I'm a strong believer in people being paid for the work that they do. There are already restrictions on the way that Sky operate that considers the social and economic aspect of televised sport (they aren't allowed to hold exclusive rights to protected events for instance), do we really need OFCOM sticking their oar in here?

Forcing Sky to lower their wholesale cost will only force the cost of TV rights down. That will affect the clubs and the sports that rely so heavily on them. Those losses will invariably be recouped by higher ticket prices. What’s “fair” about those who actively support their chosen sport being forced to pay extra so that a few watching the game on cable can save a few quid?

Aren’t BT told what they can charge for their wholesale products, they are even forced to let other suppliers have space in their exchanges so if it’s ok for them why not sky.

whatmichaelsays

ukcarper wrote: »

Aren’t BT told what they can charge for their wholesale products, they are even forced to let other suppliers have space in their exchanges so if it’s ok for them why not sky.

I suspect that's because BT are using infrastructure that was created under public ownership and so have to open up that infrastructure to the competition (after all, it was the public that paid for it), much in the same way that Royal Mail have to open their services up to TNT / UKMail.

BSkyB on the other hand have built up their entire product offering and infrastructure from their own investments. It's like arguing that Tesco should offer discounts on Tesco products to a local corner shop so that the corner shop can undercut them.

Sky have created something that people evidently want, are prepared to pay for and should be free to set their own price point. If BT was really interested in live football, where was it's bid when the TV rights tender was released? Presumably it got lost in the post because it was nowhere to be seen.

ukcarper

But BT was sold the price included the network so if it was originally built from public money it doesn’t matter and they have done a lot of work on the network since then.

whatmichaelsays

But it was sold on the condition of a USO (Universal Service Obligation). BSkyB was built from the ground up. BT (in its current guise) wasn't.

As I said earlier, if BT is so interested in live sport, they should be putting their money where their mouth is. There was a bundle of rights going cheap following the Setanta collapse - where were they then?

BT are effectively trying to start a war but wanting to use their opponents weapons. Murdoch has already made his stance clear on people who simply want to distribute his content for their own gain (see Google News, NewNow and the Virgin / Sky One saga). If BT and Virgin Media want to take him on, good luck to them but I suspect that they'll soon have to find their own content from somewhere in the long term (and as "media companies", shouldn't they be making their own content in the first place?).

I know some of this will come across as somebody who works in the Sky press office (I don't) but Sky has sunk its money into infrastructure, rights and production. It is a lifeline for the majority of professional sports and has been the key economic driver behind the huge improvements that we have seen in facilities for sportsmen, women and spectators. If somebody else wants a piece of the pie, fine. Just don't expect other people to do the work for you.

ukcarper

Could you not argue that if sky wants to offer broadband it should build it's own network and not use BTs digital network, which has been created since privatisation