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March 28, 2024, 04:37:12 PM

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Sky Arts going free-to-air

Started by Sebastian Cobb, July 28, 2020, 01:00:22 PM

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Sebastian Cobb

https://deadline.com/2020/07/sky-arts-free-to-air-channel-in-uk-1202995645/

I've actually got this channel but keep forgetting about it. It also looks like it's probably going to be free-to-aired in order to push Now Tv.

What's interesting is that Sky reckon their audiences to this channel have increased by 50% during lockdown.

Can't help thinking this might be related to the gutting of BBC4, or possibly that it highlights what a shit decision that is.

Sebastian Cobb

also lol at choosing Danny Dyer as a banner image.

Norton Canes


buttgammon

Those André Rieu repeats won't watch themselves!

steveh

Noticed a load of Sky Arts programmes have been moved to Sky Documentaries...

JaDanketies

good channel for seeing what's airing and then recording a bunch of things

kaprisky

Do they still show feature films on this channel?

I remember when they made the transition from the old Artsworld channel to Sky Arts, they ran no adverts at all, something which obviously they couldn't sustain. From memory they screened some Eisenstein, like Ivan The Terrible, as well as a couple of Tarkovskys such as Mirror and I think Stalker too. I recorded a few films off there like The Terence Davies Trilogy, The Bill Douglas Trilogy, A Woman Under The Influence, Radio On, the documentary Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession and a few others (possibly some Greenaway). And some Quay Brothers shorts!

Actually I probably watched stuff like T-Rex: Born to Boogie, The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, L'Enfer d'Henri-Georges Clouzot (Inferno), Mon Oncle d'Amerique and probably some Buster Keaton too and Shadows, another Cassavetes film.

buttgammon

They don't show too many films these days but I've noticed 8 1/2 in the schedules a few times, so there's still at least some commitment to showing 'arty' films on there.

thr0b

If you like a handful of Queen concerts being shown weekly, it's a great channel. I do.

The schedule is hardly varied though, and I think a lot of people getting excited over it being an "Arts" channel are in for a bit of a shock.

I'd also suspect its remit will be substantially widened by going FTA, given that it's entirely possible that a lot of the content they have is given to them on the basis of it being an encrypted broadcast. It'll probably have a lot more of Sky's own drama and comedy added. Possibly then rebranded a year or so down the line.

Still, good to see a decent addition to Freeview.

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: thr0b on July 30, 2020, 10:43:31 AM
I'd also suspect its remit will be substantially widened by going FTA, given that it's entirely possible that a lot of the content they have is given to them on the basis of it being an encrypted broadcast. It'll probably have a lot more of Sky's own drama and comedy added. Possibly then rebranded a year or so down the line.


It wouldn't surprise me, but it also wouldn't surprise me if it's just being done as a loss-leader for Now TV given that's the only way to get catch-up. There's a lot of talk of DVR's in here, which I suppose most people have with cable/sky as part of the service. I had a Freeview DVR but it died and I've never really felt the need to replace it because I can get most of the stuff I watched on Freeview on catch-up these days and not have to look at the schedules. In fact I later got cable and can go months without turning the box on, looking through the schedules is a chore.

I've been meaning to cut the cable off, but I'm a bit worried with lockdown if I threaten to leave I might balls it up and be stuck without internet.

steveh

I get the impression the traditional satellite / cable bundle with a DVR is tanking faster than anticipated and the current economic depression will only accelerate that. Now TV are currently doing customer surveys with questions about new pricing tiers and UHD so it looks like they're investing more in that. In the States Sky owners Comcast recently launched their NBC Peacock service using the same architecture as Now TV with ad-supported and ad-free tiers so they may be about to do the same here. Putting Sky Arts on Freeview gives them a more upmarket entry point alongside Pick TV.

Sebastian Cobb

Quote from: steveh on July 30, 2020, 12:41:02 PM
I get the impression the traditional satellite / cable bundle with a DVR is tanking faster than anticipated and the current economic depression will only accelerate that. Now TV are currently doing customer surveys with questions about new pricing tiers and UHD so it looks like they're investing more in that. In the States Sky owners Comcast recently launched their NBC Peacock service using the same architecture as Now TV with ad-supported and ad-free tiers so they may be about to do the same here. Putting Sky Arts on Freeview gives them a more upmarket entry point alongside Pick TV.

I actually sat in a meeting with some lads from Sky about getting our vod stuff onto the Sky platform, which by the way is a massive ballache because they need to ingest individual programmes into their convoluted Cablelabs ADI system. There was a massive internal political struggle with their VOD stuff. In Germany they deliver the whole SkyQ system over IP there because cable/internet take-up ended up way more popular than Satellite. In the UK they've started doing this in special cases for listed buildings, the thing stopping them from doing it elsewhere is they don't want it to compete with the 'premium' satellite system and the 'budget' Now TV system.

Ads is probably why they run the ingest the way they do. The dynamic advert insertion on these systems uses an ad-server called Freewheel, you can link into Sky's own one and have an ad-revenue share where they take a decent cut or you can try your own. It took Channel 4 years to integrate theirs properly. On other systems (Virgin, Freeview Play, Youview etc) the streaming app is a html5 website optimised for televisions and you manage the ad-insertion yourself and therefore have more control over where the cash goes.

dissolute ocelot

As a channel it makes no sense, it's a mix of ancient documentaries (mainly on film or rock), mostly ancient concert footage, the occasional cheaply made reality tv show (like Portrait Painter Of The Year), a few random fiction shows (Tales of the Unexpected), and the odd gem.  Surely the audience for a Gerge Ezra concert has little in common with the audience for a documentary on Telly Savalas, Michael Ball live, or the Erotic Adventures of Anais Nin. I guess TV channels mostly exist to provide background noise these days, stick it on and forget about it, but maybe this really is what one 55 year old (bald) man in Surrey wants to watch all day.

Mr Banlon

Quote from: Sebastian Cobb on July 28, 2020, 01:11:53 PM
also lol at choosing Danny Dyer as a banner image.
'Danny Dyer on Pinter'  Fucking hell.

the science eel

Quote from: buttgammon on July 28, 2020, 03:11:03 PM
Those André Rieu repeats won't watch themselves!

That, and those film docs with exactly the same format and the same people every time (Derek Malcolm, Ian Nathan).

One of the chaps does the music docs too but for those, he takes off his tie and dons a leather jacket with the collar up. Absolute nonsense.

Quote from: Mr Banlon on August 06, 2020, 02:44:19 PM
'Danny Dyer on Pinter'  Fucking hell.

Not the worst choice, since the two of them were friends and Pinter saw a lot of promise in him. Cast him in three of his plays.

Sebastian Cobb


Shit Good Nose

Quote from: the science eel on August 06, 2020, 02:48:17 PM
Ian Nathan

For reasons I won't go into here (because they're pretty boring) I was once (got to be getting on for 15 years ago now) "interviewed" by Ian Nathan, and one of the questions was "what's your desert island film?"  I couldn't decide between Blade Runner, Fitzcarraldo and Sorcerer, so I said as much.  And he was absolutely incredulous at the mere mention of Sorcerer, stopping short of calling me a stupid fucking cunt (though he did laugh AT me when I said it - "what, that terrible remake of Wages of Fear!?!?!?!").  Cut to however many years later when it gets released over here on blu-ray and the cunt gives it 4 out of 5.  Been wanting to push a fresh tod through his letterbox ever since.

the science eel

Quote from: Shit Good Nose on August 06, 2020, 04:13:46 PM
For reasons I won't go into here (because they're pretty boring) I was once (got to be getting on for 15 years ago now) "interviewed" by Ian Nathan, and one of the questions was "what's your desert island film?"  I couldn't decide between Blade Runner, Fitzcarraldo and Sorcerer, so I said as much.  And he was absolutely incredulous at the mere mention of Sorcerer, stopping short of calling me a stupid fucking cunt (though he did laugh AT me when I said it - "what, that terrible remake of Wages of Fear!?!?!?!").  Cut to however many years later when it gets released over here on blu-ray and the cunt gives it 4 out of 5.  Been wanting to push a fresh tod through his letterbox ever since.

I quite liked him from watching those shows, but after following him on Twitter for a while realised he's kind of a humourless, ego-centric smart-arse - so your story doesn't surprise me too much.

Derek Malcolm would have just nodded and mumbled something about Scheider being 'quite extraordinary', I bet.

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: the science eel on August 06, 2020, 05:03:40 PM
Derek Malcolm would have just nodded and mumbled something about Scheider being 'quite extraordinary', I bet.

Whilst I wonder whether or not to call 999 cos he might be having a stroke.

the science eel

Ah, I hope not for a while yet. He's a gem.

SteveDave

My dad gave me his Sky Go log-in the other day so I got to have a flick through Sky Arts. I've seen the R. Stevie Moore and Apple Records documentaries (the latter featuring some actually quite good animated bits as well as an Brute Force interview) but I made the mistake of watching one of those "Discovering..." 30 minute documentaries. It featured two people from Radio X or Absolute Radio who were about 25 obviously regurgitating facts that would've been OK had they just been a voice-over but having them as talking heads just seemed wrong.

Shit Good Nose

Quote from: SteveDave on August 12, 2020, 02:40:40 PM
I made the mistake of watching one of those "Discovering..." 30 minute documentaries. It featured two people from Radio X or Absolute Radio who were about 25 obviously regurgitating facts that would've been OK had they just been a voice-over but having them as talking heads just seemed wrong.

Some of those were/are better than others - the full hour long ones involving biographers of the subject and/or genuine fans are a half decent watch, but they were always few and far between and most of them were just DJs and ex Q/Mojo writers speaking bland generics.  Despite being an hour, I remember the Genesis one in particular being a painful watch, completely glossing over important periods from both Gabriel and Collins eras and it was riddled with very basic factual errors.


Having said that, the channel as a whole isn't bad.  When we were with TalkTalk we got it "free" (in quotes cos they actually charged £4 for it, along with a couple of other Sky channels, but it was rolled in with the package and it wasn't an optional extra so you couldn't take it out) and I watched quite a lot on there.  But, as others have pointed out, if they're just offloading the decent stuff onto a different subscription channel and all that's left is the half-hour Discovering... shows, then that is going to be hella lame.

Johnboy