Freeview to lose Sky Sports News Channel

vodkacokebloke · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:23

As title hints at - SSN is being dropped from Freeview later this year.

Im not too chuffed about this tbh, its one thing to be forced to pay to see the football matches on TV (live ones anyway), but being pushed into doing the same just for the news and gossip seems like a step too far.

Source... http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/digitaltv/news/a228789/freeview-losing-sky-sports-news-channel.html

mike62 · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:28

vodkacokebloke said:
As title hints at - SSN is being dropped from Freeview later this year.

Im not too chuffed about this tbh, its one thing to be forced to pay to see the football matches on TV (live ones anyway), but being pushed into doing the same just for the news and gossip seems like a step too far.

Source... http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/digitaltv/news/a228789/freeview-losing-sky-sports-news-channel.html

**** the money grabbing sods :mad:

Shamikebab · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:29

Can't say I've ever watched it. The internet is always easier.

Cosimo · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:31

Shamikebab said:
Can't say I've ever watched it. The internet is always easier.

I've only occasionally used it to check scores.

Greenlizard0 · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:37

Another stingy move by MurdochCorp, The Times online went earlier today as well.

Pigeon_Killer · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:49

*****

daz · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:58

Chilling with friends and some beers watching soccer saturday on a saturday afternoon before getting ready to go out was what I did most saturdays as a student

cymatty · 17 Jun 2010 at 19:58

Aww no more Soccer Saturday, what the hell. :mad:

Rich_L · 17 Jun 2010 at 20:04

Pretty unpopular no doubt - is it a sign though that the advertising revenue these days is so bad that they'd rather aim for the subscription revenue from potential extra subscribers over the advertising revenue from a portion of the ~8 million Freeview watchers (about the same as there are Sky subscribers)

Tombstone · 17 Jun 2010 at 20:12

Understandable from a business standpoint. Doesn't affect me as I have sky anyway, but feel for those who won't get to see it now.

Loki · 17 Jun 2010 at 20:31

vodkacokebloke said:
As title hints at - SSN is being dropped from Freeview later this year.

Im not too chuffed about this tbh, its one thing to be forced to pay to see the football matches on TV (live ones anyway), but being pushed into doing the same just for the news and gossip seems like a step too far.

Source... http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/digitaltv/news/a228789/freeview-losing-sky-sports-news-channel.html

To be fair though, even though it's live, they break the news no quicker or slower than anyone else. Plus every hour is the same old same old rehashed.

If it's a slow news day then they dramatise the latest dramatic events at some crown green bowling event or the grand opening of a paper bag

Cob · 17 Jun 2010 at 20:38

Sky Sports 1 and 2 are coming to Freeview, so Sky need to free up some channels. The switch to Sky3+1 may be very short, with it probably being superseded by one of the 2 sports channels.

Burned_Alive · 17 Jun 2010 at 21:10

Cob said:
Sky Sports 1 and 2 are coming to Freeview, so Sky need to free up some channels. The switch to Sky3+1 may be very short, with it probably being superseded by one of the 2 sports channels.

Is this definite? If so, when? Seems daft to drop SSN if SS1+2 will be there, maybe it'll be included as part of a package.

Cob · 17 Jun 2010 at 21:26

Burned_Alive said:
Is this definite? If so, when? Seems daft to drop SSN if SS1+2 will be there, maybe it'll be included as part of a package.

Email received by Top-Up TV customers yesterday (ESPN subscriber in my case) -

It’s an exciting time to be a Top Up TV customer! You may have heard on the grapevine that we’re hoping to launch Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports 2 very soon. We’re still ironing out the details but we’re working hard to offer our customers both channels on Freeview for the first time, to bring you all of the great coverage for which Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports 2 are renowned at great value prices.

https://www.topuptv.com/sky

physichull · 18 Jun 2010 at 13:38

I've never been an avid watcher, but I often tuned into Soccor Saturday so will be disappointed when this happens. Seems like a very futile money maker from Sky.

vodkacokebloke · 7 Aug 2010 at 00:33

Just thought id update the thread a bit... August 23rd is the day the channel leaves Freeview im told

pooley · 7 Aug 2010 at 01:28

this doesn't surprise me at all.

manic111 · 7 Aug 2010 at 14:10

Fair enough to be honest - they've been forced to drop the price of SkySports 1 and 2 to BT and the like, into which they have ploughed billions of pounds by way of research etc. Perfectly justified in asking people to pay for SSN.

mike62 · 7 Aug 2010 at 17:32

manic111 said:
Fair enough to be honest - they've been forced to drop the price of SkySports 1 and 2 to BT and the like, into which they have ploughed billions of pounds by way of research etc. Perfectly justified in asking people to pay for SSN.

Always assuming you can actually get it to pay for.

lokiss · 7 Aug 2010 at 18:58

Like with the football, on sky sports 3 last night, fairly predictable.

I was wondering about the freeview ssn when i saw they were droping sky saturday from sp1, two days later answers why.

Predictable, sky saturday is one of there premium popular watches, im sure they'd like to convince those tempted to get on bt's sky sports packages in to thinking bad idea, we're missing out not lumping with sky instead.

Pretty much the bottom line, you can't tell sky where to dump their premium programing, bt/virgin anyone else would do the same.

Spose you could also point out there's no competition, wasn't the case when setanta were doing a news channel, if espn were doing a channel i doubt they would have done it.

For me it means no more ssn down the gym, thats who watches, every pub/gym, and cafe in the land, spose sky are hoping to get more traffic out of that