[QUOTE=Digital Fanatic;35171170]but we don't know how much Sky are asking. Much better that VM get it at the fair price, afterall it's a niche channel as I've said all along and the viewing figures are embarrassing for Sky.
VM did the right thing
[/QUOTE
In your opinion.
I still cannot see any viewing figures for Sky Atlantic on the Barb website although I too fully expect them to be low when they appear.
But do Sky launch these channels to obtain massive audiences? Reading Jeremy Darroch's comments they seem to do it to differentiate themselves from their competition and it seems to work. Nevertheless it's available in 10m homes. It's part of a wider package of PAY channels. Sky's ad income makes up only about 6% of their total income. However their targetted audience for Atlantic is not that of say Sky Living or Sky 1, they are aiming at a far higher demographic and advertisers will pay accordingly even for relatively low audiences. That's why UKTV's Good Food is so successful, the audience are a far higher demographic than say ITV1, Nigella followers if you like, the sort who shop at Waitrose rather than Tesco! Not huge but lucrative all the same.
Sky know full well if they show a list of channels and point out they have Channel X and competitor Y dosen't most Joe Bloggs subscribers will go with them. It's human nature.
Take a look at their latest subscriber numbers, they simply do not lie. All Sky care about is how many people subscribe to a particular PACK. Have you seen Sky Arts ratings?, very low but Sky know that's another group of customers they can hook into a PACK of channels, do the ratings really justify 2 HD versions? Sky clearly think so. Why do the operate Sky News which loses money hand over fist? Maybe because it's part of the overall package.
But that's all just my opinion.