General : ESPN, BT, Euro, Premier and Sky Sports news

[denphone]

Originally Posted by colin25

Nice guys finish last.

Unless it is santa, who is checking all who are naughty and nice.

Maybe virgin are going to allow you BT sport for xmas?

By heck you are blowing a lot of hot air this morning my old marra.

[Gavin-D]

BSkyB is to announce significant price cuts to its broadband packages in direct response to competition from BT Sport.

A statement will be issued early this week, according to sources, and will concern the company’s internet and television bundles. The announcement is said to be a “market changer” and in retaliation to BT’s new free-to-view sports TV. BT Sport, considered to be Sky’s first credible rival, is due to launch its three sports channels at the beginning of August in time for the first game of the Barclays Premier League. It will be available to all BT broadband customers and is the first time football fans have been able to watch the premiership free in more than 20 years. Peter Oliver, commercial director for BT Consumer, welcomed the cuts from its rival. “We think Sky customers are grossly overcharged and welcome any cuts they make to their package,” he said.

“Many sports fans have broadband through us and their TV through Sky. Our channels will be free for those households, so we’d be happy seeing their monthly bills reduced by Sky.” Currently Sky charges customers £617.50 a year for access to the full suite of sports channels. That price includes line rental and 2GB of broadband data downloads per month. The equivalent deal from BT is £261 a year to watch the sports channels via a laptop, or a further £110 a year for a set-top box. This includes a download allowance of 10GB a month. The price war has been predicted by analysts. At the time of BT Sport’s launch in May, Fitch Ratings said: “BT’s decision to give away its football content free to broadband subscribers changes the pricing dynamics of the industry and could force BSkyB to cut prices at a time when content costs are rising.”

Sky declined to comment on the pending announcement, but sought to stress that it would show three times as many Premier League games as BT Sport next season. A source said that Sky did not consider BT Sport a threat any more than it did failed offerings from Setanta Sports or ESPN. BT Sport has bought the rights to ESPN in the UK and will broadcast games from the FA Cup and the Europa League.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...rts-offer.html

Rumors suggest Sky's new prices will be as follows

Fibre Pro £22.50
Fibre Unlimited £12.50
ADSL Unlimited £0

[Chad]

Originally Posted by Gavin-D

BSkyB is to announce significant price cuts to its broadband packages in direct response to competition from BT Sport.

A statement will be issued early this week, according to sources, and will concern the company’s internet and television bundles. The announcement is said to be a “market changer” and in retaliation to BT’s new free-to-view sports TV. BT Sport, considered to be Sky’s first credible rival, is due to launch its three sports channels at the beginning of August in time for the first game of the Barclays Premier League. It will be available to all BT broadband customers and is the first time football fans have been able to watch the premiership free in more than 20 years. Peter Oliver, commercial director for BT Consumer, welcomed the cuts from its rival. “We think Sky customers are grossly overcharged and welcome any cuts they make to their package,” he said.

“Many sports fans have broadband through us and their TV through Sky. Our channels will be free for those households, so we’d be happy seeing their monthly bills reduced by Sky.” Currently Sky charges customers £617.50 a year for access to the full suite of sports channels. That price includes line rental and 2GB of broadband data downloads per month. The equivalent deal from BT is £261 a year to watch the sports channels via a laptop, or a further £110 a year for a set-top box. This includes a download allowance of 10GB a month. The price war has been predicted by analysts. At the time of BT Sport’s launch in May, Fitch Ratings said: “BT’s decision to give away its football content free to broadband subscribers changes the pricing dynamics of the industry and could force BSkyB to cut prices at a time when content costs are rising.”

Sky declined to comment on the pending announcement, but sought to stress that it would show three times as many Premier League games as BT Sport next season. A source said that Sky did not consider BT Sport a threat any more than it did failed offerings from Setanta Sports or ESPN. BT Sport has bought the rights to ESPN in the UK and will broadcast games from the FA Cup and the Europa League.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...rts-offer.html

Rumors suggest Sky's new prices will be as follows

Fibre Pro £22.50
Fibre Unlimited £12.50
ADSL Unlimited £0

Must admit I'll be very happy indeed if my current SKY broadband becomes free.



I get this speed 24/7, totally unlimited, no traffic management and all peer to peer software unaffected. Admittedly it's not the fastest connection available on the market, but if it becomes free with SKY Sports I'll be delighted.

So you'll have BT giving away BT sports with their broadband.
SKY giving away totally unlimited broadband with SKY Sports.
It'll be interesting to see what Virgin come out and offer. There is no way Virgin can stay quiet whilst BT and SKY are coming out with "game changing" deals for their customers.

[BexTech]

Originally Posted by Chad

Must admit I'll be very happy indeed if my current SKY broadband becomes free.



I get this speed 24/7, totally unlimited, no traffic management and all peer to peer software unaffected. Admittedly it's not the fastest connection available on the market, but if it becomes free with SKY Sports I'll be delighted.

So you'll have BT giving away BT sports with their broadband.
SKY giving away totally unlimited broadband with SKY Sports.
It'll be interesting to see what Virgin come out and offer. There is no way Virgin can stay quiet whilst BT and SKY are coming out with "game changing" deals for their customers.

It's difficult for Virgin Media, they have to 'buy in' content. Their phone service is extremely overpriced.

What could they offer?

Originally Posted by BexTech

It's difficult for Virgin Media, they have to 'buy in' content. Their phone service is extremely overpriced.

What could they offer?

Broadband without line rental?

[Chad]

Originally Posted by BexTech

It's difficult for Virgin Media, they have to 'buy in' content. Their phone service is extremely overpriced.

What could they offer?

It's difficult to say really. Virgin had their game changer being ESPN for free to XL and VIP customers. This however comes to an end next month with no reduction in the price of XL and VIP expected.

Virgins lowest broadband speed is 30mb. Virgin charge £22.50 per month for this without a phone line or £14.50 with a phone line. The big problem is the 30mb connection has really tight usage restrictions. Would Virgin consider giving their 30mb broadband free to customers? Virgin could lower their broadband prices, or introduce a totally free lower speed service. For example give L, XL and VIP customers 10mb broadband totally free.

The broadband scene in the UK seems to be going through some major changes. Whilst Virgin are pushing high speed connections they come at a fairly high price with heavy restrictions. Other ISP's are offering incredibly cheap broadband or in the case of BT premium TV free with their internet packages.

[colin25]

Originally Posted by Top banana

Broadband without line rental?

They have that already...just that it is almost as expensive with a phone

Originally Posted by colin25

They have that already...just that it is almost as expensive with a phone

Yes but that is stand alone. I mean offer the triple play package but remove or reduce the line rental cost or move to a package like tv, broadband and 2 mobile phones for x per month with out a land line.

Should be interesting over the next few months. In years gone by, the investor view was that content is king which put Sky in a strong position. The view is that the world is changing and that infrastructure is king, which weakens Sky's position as they hardly have any. BT seem to be getting themselves into a good position as they are getting into the content business and also own their infrastructure.

So the new guy at VM has his work cut out in deciding where VM heading I reckon.

Originally Posted by Chad

Must admit I'll be very happy indeed if my current SKY broadband becomes free.



I get this speed 24/7, totally unlimited, no traffic management and all peer to peer software unaffected. Admittedly it's not the fastest connection available on the market, but if it becomes free with SKY Sports I'll be delighted.

So you'll have BT giving away BT sports with their broadband.
SKY giving away totally unlimited broadband with SKY Sports.
It'll be interesting to see what Virgin come out and offer. There is no way Virgin can stay quiet whilst BT and SKY are coming out with "game changing" deals for their customers.

Just seen a report which says the Telegraph article is pure speculation and that its business as usual for BSKYB with some tactical promotional activity but no major revisions.

Could be a red herring though

[Chad]

Originally Posted by Top banana

Just seen a report which says the Telegraph article is pure speculation and that its business as usual for BSKYB with some tactical promotional activity but no major revisions.

Could be a red herring though

Very interesting. The Telegraph could end up with egg on their face. The story is being run by the likes of Reuters and Yahoo. Everyone running the story are quoting Telegraph as the source.

[denphone]

Originally Posted by Top banana

Just seen a report which says the Telegraph article is pure speculation and that its business as usual for BSKYB with some tactical promotional activity but no major revisions.

Could be a red herring though

Oh dear that will deflate a few forum members who thought they were onto a real bargain deal.

[BexTech]

Originally Posted by Top banana

Broadband without line rental?

It would need to be cheaper than it currently is, as combined broadband phone is virtually same price as broadband only.


Years back for about 3 years I used to have just broadband and TV from then Telewest, that was when not having the phone didn't bump the price of the other two services up. Was only when I moved I was then more or less forced to have a landline as couldn't keep my old package, had to take new one and was only a couple of quid difference whether had phone or not.

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by BexTech

Years back for about 3 years I used to have just broadband and TV from then Telewest, that was when not having the phone didn't bump the price of the other two services up. Was only when I moved I was then more or less forced to have a landline as couldn't keep my old package, had to take new one and was only a couple of quid difference whether had phone or not.

Years ago, the cost of the line rental was included in the TV cost, so you paid it whether you wanted it or not i.e. the days of the 'free' phoneline.

The cost of the broadband was then an add on to the TV(+Phone) cost - so was the same whether you had the other two services or not.

[BexTech]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

Years ago, the cost of the line rental was included in the TV cost, so you paid it whether you wanted it or not i.e. the days of the 'free' phoneline.

The cost of the broadband was then an add on to the TV(+Phone) cost - so was the same whether you had the other two services or not.

I was only paying £19 for the broadband and TV, was 12 month offer that they extended twice for me. If I wanted the phone line it was another £11 on top of that.

I was using VoIP via a Linksys PAP2 ATA, didn't want to pay an extra £11 when I could pay nothing per month for my Sipgate line and also at the time using Vyke, which back then was 2p per call again no monthly charge.

It was only later on in the Telewest area they altered it so there was very little in it if you had phone line or not. A few of us in the family went TV & broadband and then used VoIP.

[passingbat]

Originally Posted by Chad

The big problem is the 30mb connection has really tight usage restrictions. .

It has zero usage restrictions; you can download as much as you want.


After a certain amount of download, the speed you can download at is reduced, but you can still download as much as you want.

And even when speed caped, a VM 30meg meg connection is still faster than most Sky BB connections.