THE CONCRETE ROUNDABOUT (TCR)

There are loads of TV and streaming companies now. A number cover sports.

None can compete with Sky.

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Disclaimer: All my comments are my opinions unless stated otherwise. I'm just a fan following my club.

Amazon's coverage is actually very good and financially, if they really wanted to they could knock Sky out the park.

But I've never understood how having lots of different sports broadcasters makes things cheaper for us

E.g. if SKY and TNT bid each other up for a Premier league football contract then the only winner is the Premier league ..,the loser will be the subscriber who will have to pay more and have to havr two playforms

Another example is that used to like the club rugby union in SKY but now it's on TNT so I can't watch it unless I pay a lot more for TNT

Surely the answer is some kind of intervention on how much the broadcasters can pay for any sport and how.much they can charge....otherwise the 'competition' aspect works against the consumer in this case ?

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Rebuild, repair recharge ....COYD

I'm sure there are lots of people who want to watch sport generally (I've heard that Sky Sports is brilliant for that) but that's no use to people who want to watch MK Dons specifically and nothing else and don't need to move to the Sky platform. I'm hoping that it'll just be that you pay your £12.99 (or whatever) for a day pass or some new PPV or maybe just a contract-free monthly pass for the season - they probably calculate that a percentage of people who do this will cave in and upgrade. Good for them (and Sky) but not so good for casual viewers. Still no clarity on audio streaming for listeners outside the 3CR area. We'll see how it pans out in practice.

Just to watch games shown live in the UK you need multiple subscriptions -

Sky Sports
BT Sport (TNT)
Amazon Prime
ViaPlay
Premier Sports
iFollow

It's absolutely ridiculous and probably only going to get worse, as you just know Disney+ and Netflix are going to want a slice of the pie soon as well.

I honestly do not blame people at all for going down the IPTV route. I am one of the idiots that subscribers to most (but not all) of the channels listed but I also have an IPTV subscription too, as its costs me £65 a year. I use it mainly for iFollow games of other teams where I have a mid-level interest due to their results impacting us. I also use it occasionally for Prem 3pm kick offs.

I read audio won't change. I think there will still be the I follow passes for audio. When Now TV started it was brilliant and even the last play off campaign I would be able to buy a weekly pass to watch both play off games and I think it was £20. That's gone. If I want to watch the play off I will have to pay £25.98 to buy two single passes or £30 for a month which can be cancelled at any time. I don't watch Premier League or any other football for that matter. The only other sport I watch is pro-wrestling and that is on TNT so I don't get to watch that much. It is the way of the world I am afraid. Wait till it happens to music (and it will) Spotify is lucrative and of course greedy bosses will gate off their artists so you have to pay money to each record company to listen to different types of music. Video games have also tried (and so far failed) to bring in their own services that in itself has its own set of issues, especially one of ownership as if it is streamed and the companies take their products "off the shelf" do you really own it?

I am not happy about it. I am not interested in Sky. They have ruined football for the most part. Sure, the clubs get a little bit more money, but at what cost? And just wait till you have your fixtures moved at a whim. We saw 2 seasons ago how Wednesday fans were screwed cause our game with them was moved to 7:45. Imagine that most weeks.

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It's the hope that kills you

Interesting post and I mostly agree but I don't share the concern about music. The financial model in music has already fundamentally shifted. In Ye Olde Days, record sales (albums mainly) was the cash cow. Live gigs were reasonably priced and quite easy to buy (you saw an advert in the back of the NME that Thin Lizzy were playing Wembley Arena. You sent off a cheque or postal order to the Wembley box office and they posted back your tickets). Live gigs were almost treated as adverts for records, as the record sales was what counted. Now, that's totally inverted. Few artists make money off of recorded music and the streaming of their music now generates demand for their live gigs. One night on the main stage at Glasto now is like having a hit album. A successful tour can make you a millionaire. Crack the sales AND gigs AND merch thing and you become a billionaire, like Taylor Swift. The middlemen now suck blood out of gig tickets (hello Ticketmaster!) rather than record sales (hello HMV!).

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I don't need your ill-informed, half-baked, idiotic opinions. I have plenty of those myself.

Not if the broadcaster was made o make the ames available to others at a reasonable price. For example, I get Sky Sports through TNT , (was BT).

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Disclaimer: All my comments are my opinions unless stated otherwise. I'm just a fan following my club.

Yes but I assume it's an add on to have SKY on TNT? (Same way as I can add TNT or other sports channels to my SKY box)

It's not the 'accessibility' I'm saying is an issue it's the total cost of needing more than one sport provider

Like I say for my old SKY I would watch football, club rugby league and club rugby union ...now if I want the club union I need to play the extra £30 or so a month for TNT

This is all because of 'competition' between companies and this doesn't benefit us

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Rebuild, repair recharge ....COYD