F1 on Channel 4
Discussion
CraigyMc said:
And in the process, C4 will have made a tiny amount of money from advertising, while SkyF1 made a fortune from subscriptions.
Sky get fewer viewers and pay a lot mmore.£100 million / year ? That's £5 million per race. They allegedly get what 700,000 viewers? So that means they need to net £7 per viewer after VAT and administrative and production costs.
And it's a reasonable guess that not all those viewers are actually paying Sky anything extra on top pf their other packages or are multiple viewers sharing the same suibscription.
CraigyMc said:
It's why Sky will be the only broadcaster after this year for the next 10 or so years.
It's those numbers that probably mean Sky *has to be* the only broadcaster after next year to make *their* numbers work.They need to convert those C4 customers to Sky subscriptions or viewing passes. How many? Probably a minority. How many will they get? Probably a minority and probably enough. Enough for Sky. But will it be enough for F1?
Edited by Dryce on Wednesday 1st November 02:59
I posted some figures elsewhere in a thread as follows: -
"I struggled to find information on the deal but it appears https://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2016/03/analysis-th... Sky are paying £100m pa for the rights however have traditionally paid £45m. You need 120k new people to sign up to Sky to cover that increased cost. It appears that in 2016 Channel 4 had an average of 1.76 million for highlights, 1.96 million for live race coverage so Sky need 7% of viewers to move over. However with Skys coverage attracting 669k viewers thats a big average increase to them!
It will be interesting to see what happens. It may of course pay Sky to sell a decent highlights and race package to Channel 4. They currently pay £24m for the coverage they have, would they more? How profitable is Skys coverage to them?"
Sky carry advertising dont they? So there will be some income from that.
"I struggled to find information on the deal but it appears https://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2016/03/analysis-th... Sky are paying £100m pa for the rights however have traditionally paid £45m. You need 120k new people to sign up to Sky to cover that increased cost. It appears that in 2016 Channel 4 had an average of 1.76 million for highlights, 1.96 million for live race coverage so Sky need 7% of viewers to move over. However with Skys coverage attracting 669k viewers thats a big average increase to them!
It will be interesting to see what happens. It may of course pay Sky to sell a decent highlights and race package to Channel 4. They currently pay £24m for the coverage they have, would they more? How profitable is Skys coverage to them?"
Sky carry advertising dont they? So there will be some income from that.
cjm said:
I much prefer the C4 programme and presenters. Though Webber does seem very serious and sucks the fun out of the rest of the teams style and comments.
You are kidding? Edited by cjm on Wednesday 1st November 09:35
DC and Webber make a great double act. Their banter minkes the whole show work really well during live races.
EJ’s attempts to be controversial are now getting very tired, but I now like listening to the views of Susie Wolff and think that KC, Lee McKenzie, Steve Jones, Ben Edwards are all significantly better than their SKY counterparts.
I watched the live SKY show on Sunday and thought it was pretty poor. I get the impression that Croft and Brundle do zero research before they sit down in front of the mike before the race, Hill and De Resta are just weary to listen to.
SKY could do a lot worse than invite Whisper to produce an entertaining program.
Chrisgr31 said:
I posted some figures elsewhere in a thread as follows: -
"I struggled to find information on the deal but it appears https://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2016/03/analysis-th... Sky are paying £100m pa for the rights however have traditionally paid £45m. You need 120k new people to sign up to Sky to cover that increased cost. It appears that in 2016 Channel 4 had an average of 1.76 million for highlights, 1.96 million for live race coverage so Sky need 7% of viewers to move over. However with Skys coverage attracting 669k viewers thats a big average increase to them!
It will be interesting to see what happens. It may of course pay Sky to sell a decent highlights and race package to Channel 4. They currently pay £24m for the coverage they have, would they more? How profitable is Skys coverage to them?"
Sky carry advertising dont they? So there will be some income from that.
The number of Sky F1 subscribers was quoted as being around 220,000 real subscribers then you have day pass/month pass buyers on top and pub licences on top of that. So it is a tiny number of real paying customers that will be watching live races."I struggled to find information on the deal but it appears https://www.jamesallenonf1.com/2016/03/analysis-th... Sky are paying £100m pa for the rights however have traditionally paid £45m. You need 120k new people to sign up to Sky to cover that increased cost. It appears that in 2016 Channel 4 had an average of 1.76 million for highlights, 1.96 million for live race coverage so Sky need 7% of viewers to move over. However with Skys coverage attracting 669k viewers thats a big average increase to them!
It will be interesting to see what happens. It may of course pay Sky to sell a decent highlights and race package to Channel 4. They currently pay £24m for the coverage they have, would they more? How profitable is Skys coverage to them?"
Sky carry advertising dont they? So there will be some income from that.
It would be interesting to know what the contract between Sky & FOPA/Liberty says about geoblocking streaming services. I suspect Sky were much more on the ball & tied it down as tightly as possible while Bernie didn't have any interest/understanding & gave it away. Once Liberty start producing their own service (produced by Whisper Films?) it's could be very attractive if they don't cane the price they charge.
For those interested in Sky & C4 viewing figures this blog has some details & analysis:
https://f1broadcasting.co/
https://f1broadcasting.co/
t decision.
swisstoni said:
It depends what you want. I’d listen to a recent F1 Driver all day long as opposed to some TV trained rentamouth, no matter how bright and breezy they were.
I'd challenge you to listen to De Resta all day long and not want to jump off a bridge! 
It doesn't have to be one or the other, Karun adds far more to the show than Webber does, I still think C4 has a great mix and is much better than Sky. Hopefully a deal will be sorted for 2019 onwards.
Edited by cjm on Wednesday 1st November 15:41
The obvious problem Sky have (and all other cable/satellite providers) is that people don't want to pay for their type of service. People do not want to pay for channels they do not care about.
The trend is heavily going towards streaming providers (probably already there...). Sky will not survive if they continue the way they are.
Children are growing up in a world of on-demand streaming services. They won't pay for Sky.
I'm 30 and there's no way I'd pay for services like Sky. I stream everything. I subscribe to NFL GamePass and will subscribe to the F1 equivalent (I may need to use a VPN).
There isn't much hope of Sky keeping F1 for 10yrs+ as some imagine. Not unless they hugely change their business model.
The trend is heavily going towards streaming providers (probably already there...). Sky will not survive if they continue the way they are.
Children are growing up in a world of on-demand streaming services. They won't pay for Sky.
I'm 30 and there's no way I'd pay for services like Sky. I stream everything. I subscribe to NFL GamePass and will subscribe to the F1 equivalent (I may need to use a VPN).
There isn't much hope of Sky keeping F1 for 10yrs+ as some imagine. Not unless they hugely change their business model.
cjm said:
I'd challenge you to listen to De Resta all day long and not want to jump off a bridge!
It doesn't have to be one or the other, Karun adds far more to the show than Webber does, I still think C4 has a great mix and is much better than Sky. Hopefully a deal will be sorted for 2019 onwards.
I think Webber is great, understands TV enough to be a great middle man between F1 fundamentals and TV presenting.It doesn't have to be one or the other, Karun adds far more to the show than Webber does, I still think C4 has a great mix and is much better than Sky. Hopefully a deal will be sorted for 2019 onwards.
Edited by cjm on Wednesday 1st November 15:41
Its Steve Jones that really, *really* pisses me off. He has this constant braying nature like that dickwad down the pub always trying to get the banter going, speaking to Hamilton like he's his best mate. Its taken him almost a season to actually start treating DC (and his slightly autistic, racing driver's mentality) with some respect.
I can't put it into words just how much he pisses me off.
Shay HTFC said:
I think Webber is great, understands TV enough to be a great middle man between F1 fundamentals and TV presenting.
Its Steve Jones that really, *really* pisses me off. He has this constant braying nature like that dickwad down the pub always trying to get the banter going, speaking to Hamilton like he's his best mate. Its taken him almost a season to actually start treating DC (and his slightly autistic, racing driver's mentality) with some respect.
I can't put it into words just how much he pisses me off.
I know what you.mean about Steve Jones but it's just an act. There certainly was no disrespect to DC as if there was DC would fire him. I get the impression DC likes Steve Jones' style and enjoys playing along.Its Steve Jones that really, *really* pisses me off. He has this constant braying nature like that dickwad down the pub always trying to get the banter going, speaking to Hamilton like he's his best mate. Its taken him almost a season to actually start treating DC (and his slightly autistic, racing driver's mentality) with some respect.
I can't put it into words just how much he pisses me off.
cuprabob said:
I know what you.mean about Steve Jones but it's just an act. There certainly was no disrespect to DC as if there was DC would fire him. I get the impression DC likes Steve Jones' style and enjoys playing along.
Yeah I didn't like Steve for the first couple of races but would miss him if he left now. It's EJ that I generally can't handle.Gassing Station | Formula 1 | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff