"Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will disappear from digital terrestrial"
 

"Mizter T" wrote in message
oups.com...
On 10 Feb, 11:43, Ian wrote:
In message om, Mizter
T writes

snip

Perhaps they'll nick Top-Up TV's idea of utilising a DVR/PVR/ hard
disk recorder (whatever you want to call it) to automaically catch
programs broadcast overnight.

Even if they don't perhaps part of ther plan would be to push the
service by selling all the set-top boxes with integrated DVRs so
they're a DTT version of the successful Sky Plus product.

AIUI, Top-Up send a selection ( theirs ) of programmes to the box,
rather than the box records OTA broadcasts.
--
Ian


Of course, though the principle behind it could be utilsed so that a
Sky DTT subscriber had a number of programmes pushed onto their box
overnight, even if that merely involved automatically recording
several of the programmes broadcast overnight on one of the channels.
It would be one way of ensuring that Sky DTT subscribers had more
choice, given the fact that Sky's planned DTT subsciption offering
will only amount to four channels.

I still don't get how this works (for the customer). Everybody
has to receive the same programs. If the programmes Sky
schedule overnight are ones that I want to watch, I can set my
box to record them. And if they aren't, I can use the space on
my disk to record something else from, um a non-sky channel.

I can see how it works for Sky, and they expect me to pay
*them* for something that benefits only them?

Incidentally how does the Top-Up TV service work - I had presumed that
the "pushed" programmes are broadcast on the special private TUTV
channel(s) at normal speed and the box picks them up as they are
broadcast overnight.

You're going to have to rethink this.

There is only enough bandwidth to send e.g. 4 programs in a
given time. It doesn't matter if you send 4 programs at the
same time at watchable speeed, or one after the other at 'high'
speed, there is still only going to be enough band-width to
send 4 programs in the given time.

Presumably they could be compressed further though and brodcast to the
TUTV DVR box as if they were a file, or at double-speed if you see
what I mean. This would of course mean the TUTV DVR box would have to
be a bit cleaverer than your average DVR box, so for this reason I
would be inclined to think that the pushed programs are just broadcast
as normal on the special TUTV channels.

I am sure the newer clever boxes could work in real time. The
reason that they don't is because the system is required to be
backwards compatible.

If everyone was prepared to throw away their box every few years
we could all have more channels in the same space as technology
improves.

tim

"Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will disappear from digital terrestrial"
 

On 10 Feb, 16:10, "tim....." wrote:
"Mizter T" wrote in message

oups.com...



On 10 Feb, 11:43, Ian wrote:
In message om, Mizter
T writes

snip

Perhaps they'll nick Top-Up TV's idea of utilising a DVR/PVR/ hard
disk recorder (whatever you want to call it) to automaically catch
programs broadcast overnight.

Even if they don't perhaps part of ther plan would be to push the
service by selling all the set-top boxes with integrated DVRs so
they're a DTT version of the successful Sky Plus product.

AIUI, Top-Up send a selection ( theirs ) of programmes to the box,
rather than the box records OTA broadcasts.
--
Ian

Of course, though the principle behind it could be utilsed so that a
Sky DTT subscriber had a number of programmes pushed onto their box
overnight, even if that merely involved automatically recording
several of the programmes broadcast overnight on one of the channels.
It would be one way of ensuring that Sky DTT subscribers had more
choice, given the fact that Sky's planned DTT subsciption offering
will only amount to four channels.

I still don't get how this works (for the customer). Everybody
has to receive the same programs. If the programmes Sky
schedule overnight are ones that I want to watch, I can set my
box to record them. And if they aren't, I can use the space on
my disk to record something else from, um a non-sky channel.

I guess the point is that most people don't scour the overnight
television schedules for programmes they might like to watch. It would
just ensure that when the Sky DTT viewer switched on their box there
was a selection of "high quality" Sky programming for them to choose
from without them having had to set up any recordings themselves. It's
purely conjecture, based on a few idle thoughts on how Sky could make
their proposed DTT subscription service a more attractive proposition.

Of course they might not want to make it that attractive a proposition
for fear of harming their conventional satellite offerings.


I can see how it works for Sky, and they expect me to pay
*them* for something that benefits only them?

This ain't part of Sky's plan - at least not AFAIAA, the details of
their plan haven't been disclosed. It's just me idly speculating.


Incidentally how does the Top-Up TV service work - I had presumed that
the "pushed" programmes are broadcast on the special private TUTV
channel(s) at normal speed and the box picks them up as they are
broadcast overnight.

You're going to have to rethink this.

There is only enough bandwidth to send e.g. 4 programs in a
given time. It doesn't matter if you send 4 programs at the
same time at watchable speeed, or one after the other at 'high'
speed, there is still only going to be enough band-width to
send 4 programs in the given time.

I did have similar thoughts, I just thought there might be a
possibility it could be more complex than that. But I'd wager that the
TUTV "pushed" programmes are broadcast akin to a normal channel, only
one that is invisible to normal viewers.


Presumably they could be compressed further though and brodcast to the
TUTV DVR box as if they were a file, or at double-speed if you see
what I mean. This would of course mean the TUTV DVR box would have to
be a bit cleaverer than your average DVR box, so for this reason I
would be inclined to think that the pushed programs are just broadcast
as normal on the special TUTV channels.

I am sure the newer clever boxes could work in real time. The
reason that they don't is because the system is required to be
backwards compatible.

Well, if TUTV is broadcasting it's 'Anytime' programming via special
channels solely to their new TUTV DVRs then there's no need for
backwards compatibility - TUTV could have specified all sorts of weird
and proprietary protocols for use with their TUTV Anytime service.


If everyone was prepared to throw away their box every few years
we could all have more channels in the same space as technology
improves.

I assure you I wasn't proposing a perpetual revolution in DTT
standards whatsoever!

Sky may use MPEG4 encoding for their proposed DTT subscription service
if it gets off the ground, but no-one's suggesting that MPEG4 will
supplant MPEG2 as used by all the Freeview channels - apart from a bit
of tweaking (16 or 64 QAM) that's set in stone for the next 30 years
at least with a massive installed user base.

"Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will disappear from digital terrestrial"
 

On 10 Feb, 15:53, "Mizter T" wrote:
Incidentally how does the Top-Up TV service work - I had presumed that
the "pushed" programmes are broadcast on the special private TUTV
channel(s) at normal speed and the box picks them up as they are
broadcast overnight.

The programmes are played out as normal broadcasts using the SECA2
encryption; they can be viewed by any equipment with a suitable CAM
and an authorised smartcard. For example, if you had an IDTV with a
TopUpTV CAM and put the card from an Anytime box in it, you would see
the broadcasts, just like any other TV programme.

The sole clever bits of the system are that a data file is transmitted
(actually, there's more than one, I gather) each day, which tells the
box which programmes are being transmitted at which time, and under
which channel to file them in the library, and the fact that the box
is able to save material from three streams simultaneously.

If you had a CAM and activated smartcard, and didn't want to record
three things at once, you could just as easily record the material
using a Humax or Topfield PVR.

All the talk of 'overnight downloads' and 'push VOD' is really just
marketing smoke and mirrors. It's just standard pay TV broadcasting,
with some meta-data used for automatic recording and filing.

(Much of this, in case anyone's curious, comes from the press briefing
I had with the TUTV guys before the service launched).

Nigel.

"Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will disappear from digital terrestrial"
 

Adrian C wrote in
:


Complaints to Ofcom please.

This digital 'bandwidth' should be released and given to make
improvements to the existing freeview services. Sky only had their
dross on freeview as a carrot to induce the persuaded to move to
subscription services. If Sky are allowed to get away with this, the
chances of decent HD coming to freeview for other broadcasters post
digital switchover will be even lower. MPEG4 on DTT may as well wait
until then.
Wish I could, I looked all over the site and I could not find any way to
complain about this particular issue. I also tried phoning but after 15
minutes worth of recorded messages and phone ringing and then back to
recorded messages I gave up.

"Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will disappear from digital terrestrial"
 

"Stone Free"
spam_KillKillKillstone_freeNoSpamPleaseWereBritis wrote in
message . 1...
Adrian C wrote in
:


Complaints to Ofcom please.

This digital 'bandwidth' should be released and given to make
improvements to the existing freeview services. Sky only had their
dross on freeview as a carrot to induce the persuaded to move to
subscription services. If Sky are allowed to get away with this, the
chances of decent HD coming to freeview for other broadcasters post
digital switchover will be even lower. MPEG4 on DTT may as well wait
until then.
Wish I could, I looked all over the site and I could not find any way to
complain about this particular issue. I also tried phoning but after 15
minutes worth of recorded messages and phone ringing and then back to
recorded messages I gave up.



ofcom put a release out today on it stating they would consult before going
forward.


--
Gareth.
A french man who wanted a castle threw his cat into a pond.
http://www.audioscrobbler.com/user/dsbmusic/

"Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will disappear from digital terrestrial"
 

"Chris Vowles" LEASE
wrote in message ...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6343715.stm

from this summer .... Sky Three, Sky News and Sky Sports News will
disappear from digital terrestrial ....


Just how many people have bought a freeview box mainly for Sky Sports News
/ Sky News / Sky Three, well they will be annoyed .....




Not nearly as many as who bought them for Film4, BBC4 and the small few
other good channels that FV offers.....but I bet a good few still did. What
can you do though?