Well, not quite. Open, transparent discussions with other providers probably would have saved it on free-to-air. It's all moot now anyway but I hope you don't think that I "jumped on a bandwagon" to tell you you shouldn't watch Sky. I made my decision but I'm not quite arrogant enough to want to make yours too or to criticise you for whatever you decide. I should be free to criticise Sky, though, and the BBC for that matter.
Of course you're free to criticise who you like and put your opinion up. That's why there are forums so you can discuss it all.
It'd be interesting to see how the poll would go if this question were put retrospectively. Wouldn't want to risk a second Sky thread, though. Can you vote on a poll if its thread's locked?
Won't let me vote. I guess you could put in big letters "DO NOT REPLY," link back to this thread and threaten to delete any replies. Also, maybe make it clear that "Yes" only applies to subscriptions and does not include live internet streams?
indeedy, what to try and stop people feeling pressured to vote one way or another, even if they're not.
For those with freeview TV and not Sky, the Sky preview show is now on Pick TV. I'm hoping they'll have a lot of material on there throughout the season, I doubt it though.
before the F1 show preview on pick they had a program called 'time of our lives' or something like that. very interesting chat between the interviewer, Nigel Mansel, Damon Hill and Murray walker!! I learnt that our Nigel completed and won the 92 world championship with a broken left foot and also found out Damon was glad he didnt win the 94 WDC because of the stigma of what went on that year. good show
Yeah I caught the last 30 minutes of it, was ok. But at the end I was biting my knuckle as it's a channel I would most likely watch every day, all day... But that Fenners needs to **** off. He just sounds like a bloody football hooligan or a rip off from Delboy, all he needs next time round is a can of beer and a flipping kebab and that would fit his character. [video=youtube;J2rve2W4BuU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2rve2W4BuU[/video] Sky trying to make F1 into the next football....great! *Sarcasm*
You know, I actually found his section quite amusing. That's more a comment of how incomprehensibly dry, bland and unexciting they made the rest of the show but there were a couple of quips in there I smiled at, such as expecting Alonso to come out on time. I think he'd probably grate after about two shows but I would like to see a Dennis Pennis or Sacha Baron Cohen type character interviewing F1 personalities in the paddock.
Surely if people are watching the shows on Pick TV/Sky One (where it was shown on sat morning), that's just as bad as watching it on their actual F1 channel? You're still watching it on a sky backed channel, improving Sky's ratings etc etc. What I'd like to know is the real reason for people being so anti-sky and not wanting to watch the F1 channel. Is it - a) the hate for Murdoch/his business empire and the illegal phone tapping done by his papers? b) Having to pay for a dedicated channel to watch F1, for those who don't have sky sports or a HD subscription already? I am sensing some confusion on why some are decding not to watch it.
Agreed. It was only part of a show and was a humourous peice of journalism by a person with little knowledge of F1. If you take it how it was supposed to be, it was a bit of fun and never made itself out to be serious or how F1 articles were going to happen all the time, then it worked quite well amongst the rest of the show which was more serious and techy. Maybe they should get Louis Theroux to do an F1 special!
For me it's definitely a). Of course, it's regrettable that a sport we've had access to 'for free' is now subscription based. I like a lot of what I saw, however, and it's not as if the BBC has always got it right *cough* Legard *cough*. If this Ofcom investigation screws the Murdochs and they end up having to sell their stake in Sky then I'd be more than likely to pick up the F1 channel on Virgin Media. It's not the money, it's whose pockets the money's filling. It's not just the phone tapping either. I've been dismayed for a long time by what the ethos Murdoch encourages in his businesses feeds in our society - the whole prurient, sensationalist, voyeuristic, scandal-mongering, lowest common denominator attitude and appealing to and exploiting society's basest instincts sickens me. Not that I think Sky would transform into a model of propriety and decency overnight. It's a commercial enterprise and it has to appeal to the biggest number of people. For me though, if the Murdoch shadow was removed then I'd be more inclined to accept it for what it is. In my opinion Sky itself is not the problem (although I'm utterly bemused that we accept a model that demands that we pay them to advertise at us, whether it's Virgin, Sky, BT or whoever) but I'm still going to take the piss out of them. They've posted an interview with their main presenters. It's a cracking vocabulary they have. You can read it here or go there. <- hyperlink
I think for most people on here who are anti Sky the reason is B, however, reason A is what they are claiming. Using the morality of a media company due to phone hacking and so on is a little hypocritical when you're supporting a sport that generates money and prestige for various countries around the world who have oppressive regimes and questionable human rights records, countries such as Bahrain and China for instance. It seems we can overlook the murder of protestors and human rights atrocities in these countries because we want to watch the sport they host, however as soon as we're asked to pay a little extra to watch that sport we suddenly get very critical about the moral ongoings of the company asking us to do so. I'm not a particular fan of Sky, and if I had of had to pay another £20 per month more to watch F1 on it then I'd be upset about it. As it happens I don't need to as I already have Sky HD so I get the channel. However, had it been otherwise I'd have stated cost as the reason and not hidden behind some flawed moral reasoning to disguise the fact I just don't want to pay extra for watching sport. As far as the preview show went I thought it was OK, haven't made my mind up on the Fenners bit yet but I kind of agree it was a little "footballish" for me, maybe in a social environment with a few mates round it may go down better. Loved the technical stuff, not sure Georgie Thompson is right for it, I'd much rather see Lee McKenzie on there.
For me personally it's mostly A and partly B. The hacking scandals were just coming in, we found out Murdoch was influencing the governments and the public far more than we thought. And then out of the blue BBC sell out to Sky and they thought it was a good idea to do this behind our backs and then have Sky rub it in our face telling us this was great news and both sides silencing the uproar was disgraceful. I think this was about the time Murdoch got egged when he was getting interviewed about the credibility of his companies. The Murdochs should of kept their noses out of the political aspect as we have no idea now if Murdoch had this deal in the works as he had Cameron by the balls. This BBC/Sky deal just put the hate in meltdown as it just seemed Murdoch was pissing on everybody's party and just looked to have FAR too much influence in the UK and because of this should be kicked back to the 1960's.
