F1 owners say UK paywall TV deal they have inherited is detr
Discussion
I concur with the above with regards to the CH4 coverage. Only thing I was nervous about was Steve Jones but now he's settled in and brings his own style. Only downside is that they still have Eddie Jordan now and again to play the jester.
Lee McKenzie is in a different league when it comes to driver interviews.
Lee McKenzie is in a different league when it comes to driver interviews.
cuprabob said:
I concur with the above with regards to the CH4 coverage. Only thing I was nervous about was Steve Jones but now he's settled in and brings his own style. Only downside is that they still have Eddie Jordan now and again to play the jester.
Lee McKenzie is in a different league when it comes to driver interviews.
Lee McKenzie is in a different league when it comes to driver interviews.
Agree with all of this. I actually think Steve Jones is a great addition now that he seems less excitable (or maybe I'm just more used to him), his interview with Lewis Hamilton was great and I can't think of anyone on Sky pulling it off. Ditch Jordan for a rotating guest or another ex-driver and it could be pretty much flawless.TheAngryDog said:
I manage just fine...
I do, most of the time. But one has to be careful and it does make the day awkward - turning down radios at just the right time - making sure you don't read any news headlines on the internet etc.To be honest, I'm getting that I don't care that much anymore so if I do accidentally hear the result, I'm not that upset.
Crafty_ said:
I think its quite funny that we're still trotting out the "blame Bernie" line.
If you want to blame someone, blame the BBC.
When ITV pulled out the BBC were the only bidders, their bid was sufficiently high enough for Bernie to accept.
They then decided they didn't want to pay, so approached Sky and worked out the "share" plan, which then they dumped shortly after.
All of this was done on the basis of cost cutting. At best its poor planning, but I'd go for incompetency - after all this is the organisation that spent £100m on digitising their catalog of media and ended up with nothing to show for it.
When the BBC decided to pull out, had Bernie rejected the Sky deal we could have ended up with no coverage at all.
Yes it is expensive, but the sky coverage is the best we've ever had by some way. BBC coverage turned in to a farce with Humphrey gurning at the camera, Coulthard being just plain rude to Jordan and Jordan, well, being Jordan.
The Channel 4 coverage is just lacklustre, I'm not sure they really want to be there half the time.
As an aside, its interesting to note that Liberty say its a bad deal for the sport, but clearly not bad enough to ditch the contract and offer it to FTA TV for a budget price.... clearly it can't be that bad then ?
They could quite easily bin the contract, set up a pay access web streaming serice, hire whoever they want and get on with it for the 2019 season, but they don't want to take the risk.
You remember the economic crisis?If you want to blame someone, blame the BBC.
When ITV pulled out the BBC were the only bidders, their bid was sufficiently high enough for Bernie to accept.
They then decided they didn't want to pay, so approached Sky and worked out the "share" plan, which then they dumped shortly after.
All of this was done on the basis of cost cutting. At best its poor planning, but I'd go for incompetency - after all this is the organisation that spent £100m on digitising their catalog of media and ended up with nothing to show for it.
When the BBC decided to pull out, had Bernie rejected the Sky deal we could have ended up with no coverage at all.
Yes it is expensive, but the sky coverage is the best we've ever had by some way. BBC coverage turned in to a farce with Humphrey gurning at the camera, Coulthard being just plain rude to Jordan and Jordan, well, being Jordan.
The Channel 4 coverage is just lacklustre, I'm not sure they really want to be there half the time.
As an aside, its interesting to note that Liberty say its a bad deal for the sport, but clearly not bad enough to ditch the contract and offer it to FTA TV for a budget price.... clearly it can't be that bad then ?
They could quite easily bin the contract, set up a pay access web streaming serice, hire whoever they want and get on with it for the 2019 season, but they don't want to take the risk.
The BBC wanted to keep F1. It was one of the two major sports it covered. However, it was told to drop one of them and F1 made the most economic sense. To blame the BBC for dropping it is silly in the extreme. The funds were pulled and something had to go. It was a political decision to reduce the funding. It was either F1 or Wimbledon.
I like Ch4's coverage. The only poor bit of it is Jordan. Or rather the dreadfully inept bit. I use Now! TV for some, but by no means all, of those races not covered by Ch4 and whilst it is very good, I still prefer Ch4.
There is a limit to how much TV channels can afford and the commercial channels obviously didn't want to abandon F1 but the economic situation meant that Ecclestone's demand could not be met.
That Liberty will change the source of TV coverage is almost a given. It is probable it will either demand a drop in the cost of subscribing to Sky for F1, or it will choose a form of online streaming at a cheaper rate.
To blame the BBC for funding being pulled to suck up to Murdoch is nonsensical.
I thought Jake Humphrey was one of the best presenters F1 has had.
alock said:
Once you get out of the habit of watching every race live, it's very easy to lose interest in the season and hence have no motivation to devote 3 hours of a Sunday afternoon to the occasional race that someone has decided you are allowed to watch.
This basically. I find F1 impossible to watch in highlights or delayed. You need to watch the whole race to really follow it even if on the face of it not much is happening, highlights simply don't work.In terms of the C4 vs Sky nonsense, I don't really care as I would just want to watch the race, the fluff around it doesn't bother me in the slightest. As long as there is half decent commentary I'm happy. That said, from what I've seen the C4 team is exactly what F1 needs if it's to remain relevant.
I imagine if Liberty can engineer a direct stream in future they would pick up the Sky commentary (used for the world feed anyway, I think?) which is fine by me for Brundle alone.
Edited by ukaskew on Friday 23 June 09:14
hairyben said:
jsf said:
Channel 4 coverage is free, why don't you watch the live TV and delayed coverage on there? It really cant be used as an excuse for not watching yet, because at the moment we still have free to air coverage in the UK.
As has been said you "follow" a sport, or you can just catch up with it, we generally base our sundays around F1 and motoGP action; other motorsports may be watched if they fit around the main events or at other odd times, but are not followed religiously, not because WSB or BTCC or BSB or blancpain or many others can't offer excitement and engagement, but because we have a certain capacity for full engagement and those 2 series is enough.But the more difficult/expensive F1 becomes to watch, the more enticing other series will become, we have the sky F1 "HD legacy" deal and don't subscribe to any movie or sports channels, and even though I could easily afford it I would deeply resent paying sky £400/year or whatever for a load of billion £ greenfield cr@p I have no interest in just to get my once-a-fortnight F1 fix. Sadly I fear this will be skys intention when they have exclusive rights.
I've watched the sport for 25 years or so, but my interest did wane once during the schumacher/fez dominance and while I love it and I'm absorbed by it and have paid to go to races and this year I'm even basing a holiday to italy around monza, it's simply not irreplaceable.
It doesn't seem to detract their experience when mixing and matching approaches. Is it unique to F1 fans?
London424 said:
I don't really get that logic. I know plenty of fans of Football/Rugby/Cricket etc who will watch live when they can, go to the match when possible or watch highlights if that's the option.
It doesn't seem to detract their experience when mixing and matching approaches. Is it unique to F1 fans?
Completely different sports, for a start. Whilst all sports have a wider narrative and politics etc I think it's integral to F1. I can occasionally watch a football match with my Dad and enjoy it for what it is in isolation despite not following the sport at all. F1 rarely works like that and is rarely exciting as a one-off unless you're invested in the wider picture.It doesn't seem to detract their experience when mixing and matching approaches. Is it unique to F1 fans?
It also simply doesn't work as well as a highlights package for many reasons.
London424 said:
I don't really get that logic. I know plenty of fans of Football/Rugby/Cricket etc who will watch live when they can, go to the match when possible or watch highlights if that's the option.
It doesn't seem to detract their experience when mixing and matching approaches. Is it unique to F1 fans?
The problem for me is the number of races. When there were a dozen or so I could, to an extent, put the weekend away. It was a bit of a struggle at times but this was a bit of the fun. 20 races, 21 next season makes it impossible. My social life isn't particularly fraught but even so . . .It doesn't seem to detract their experience when mixing and matching approaches. Is it unique to F1 fans?
The present arrangement, with live FTA races at half the calendar, makes things easy. However, for the first time in my many years watching F1 I now find myself getting confused as to what the next race is. It might be old age, but it might be the sheer number of races make them fade into one-another.
I will only 'buy in' four or five Now! races this year.
Derek Smith said:
The problem for me is the number of races. When there were a dozen or so I could, to an extent, put the weekend away. It was a bit of a struggle at times but this was a bit of the fun. 20 races, 21 next season makes it impossible. My social life isn't particularly fraught but even so . . .
Indeed. The ones I do watch are normally the really early ones or the evening (US) ones. 1pm on a Sunday just isn't happening with a young family.Crafty_ said:
As an aside, its interesting to note that Liberty say its a bad deal for the sport, but clearly not bad enough to ditch the contract and offer it to FTA TV for a budget price.... clearly it can't be that bad then ?
They could quite easily bin the contract, set up a pay access web streaming serice, hire whoever they want and get on with it for the 2019 season, but they don't want to take the risk.
You say "they could quite easily bin the contract" - that could be a very expensive thing to do : do you know what the contract's early cancellation clause is?They could quite easily bin the contract, set up a pay access web streaming serice, hire whoever they want and get on with it for the 2019 season, but they don't want to take the risk.
I personally like the Channel 4 coverage. I rarely watch the race live these days, not however for a lack of interest in the sport but just generally spending time with family at the weekend. I tend to record race/highlights and watch on Sunday evening.
My mates and I who follow the F1 tend to go into internet/radio lockdown after qualifying if not watching live and the same for the race so rarely I find out result before I have watched it and we then catch up after we have all established we have watched it.
When F1 first switched to Sky I did take out the subscription as didnt need to take sports package out, and was part of a sky friends and family deal, when that ended at the time sky wearn't willing to do a deal to renew so cancelled. Now when you have to have sports it is far too expensive as wouldnt really use the subscription for anything else.
My mates and I who follow the F1 tend to go into internet/radio lockdown after qualifying if not watching live and the same for the race so rarely I find out result before I have watched it and we then catch up after we have all established we have watched it.
When F1 first switched to Sky I did take out the subscription as didnt need to take sports package out, and was part of a sky friends and family deal, when that ended at the time sky wearn't willing to do a deal to renew so cancelled. Now when you have to have sports it is far too expensive as wouldnt really use the subscription for anything else.
bobbo89 said:
I've been saying this on every one of these threads but If you really want to watch a race live and you've got an old redundant Sky dish, point it at Astra 1 with a cheap sat box and away you go watching it on RTL!
I live in Germany, and RTL is the reason I've changed to Sky for this season, it's s
te, believe me. At least if you can speak German, and understand everything they're saying. The guy that does the pit interviews, Kai Ebel, is so bad it's embarrasing. He asks the same stupid questions every week, the man is an idiot. And the guy that does the commentary with Christian Danner in the cabin, Heiko Wasser, is a weapons-grade bellend.But the worst bit is, you miss about a third of the race due to commercial breaks, with no roll-back if something has happened in the break.
They get the pictures from the F1 world feed, and have no control over the pictures, and sometimes I think they're more concerned about
commenting on whatever "celebritys" they can see on the screen, as they are about the race itsself.
While it's true that Sky has no control either, at least they show the race without any adverts at all.
If Skys business model wasn't so greed-driven, they could clean up in Europe. Say €10 a month, just for F1: at the moment, you have to pay a lot of money to watch F1 because it's packaged with a lot of other crap that nobody wants to watch.
AW111 said:
Crafty_ said:
As an aside, its interesting to note that Liberty say its a bad deal for the sport, but clearly not bad enough to ditch the contract and offer it to FTA TV for a budget price.... clearly it can't be that bad then ?
They could quite easily bin the contract, set up a pay access web streaming serice, hire whoever they want and get on with it for the 2019 season, but they don't want to take the risk.
You say "they could quite easily bin the contract" - that could be a very expensive thing to do : do you know what the contract's early cancellation clause is?They could quite easily bin the contract, set up a pay access web streaming serice, hire whoever they want and get on with it for the 2019 season, but they don't want to take the risk.
Despite everything that LM say and people rejoicing because Bernie has gone little has changed - its still all about the money.
They say the TV contracts are bad, but haven't made any effort to dump them.
They let Malaysia walk away instead of doing a deal.
LM want more races - and they'll get them.
LM have been on a charm offensive, saying straight that the previous administration was bad and that they want to do all this good stuff instead of going for short term gain. In reality they've made no changes and are still chasing every penny.
Crafty_ said:
This is all a battle between "interest" in the sport and money.
Despite everything that LM say and people rejoicing because Bernie has gone little has changed - its still all about the money.
They say the TV contracts are bad, but haven't made any effort to dump them.
They let Malaysia walk away instead of doing a deal.
LM want more races - and they'll get them.
LM have been on a charm offensive, saying straight that the previous administration was bad and that they want to do all this good stuff instead of going for short term gain. In reality they've made no changes and are still chasing every penny.
The charm offensive is a major improvement. Despite everything that LM say and people rejoicing because Bernie has gone little has changed - its still all about the money.
They say the TV contracts are bad, but haven't made any effort to dump them.
They let Malaysia walk away instead of doing a deal.
LM want more races - and they'll get them.
LM have been on a charm offensive, saying straight that the previous administration was bad and that they want to do all this good stuff instead of going for short term gain. In reality they've made no changes and are still chasing every penny.
I'm not sure why you say that LM are after the money. That's surely a given. One could say the same about Starbucks and Slack Alice's truck stop. The difference is how they go about attracting clientele.
Whilst there are differences showing already, for a business restricted by contracts and agreements, it would be silly to expect any fundamental change this early.
You say 'they let Malaysia walk away instead of doing a deal' without knowing the details. There could be any number of reasons from them demanding too low a fee to the location not having enough advertising potential.
Ecclestone's plans were all short term. There was no succession planning. LM will probably want to sell the sport on within a few seasons and for that they will need a worthwhile product. I would assume that this will include a plan for the future.
It seems that LM have a plan. That's an improvement.
Derek Smith said:
The charm offensive is a major improvement.
I'm not sure why you say that LM are after the money. That's surely a given. One could say the same about Starbucks and Slack Alice's truck stop. The difference is how they go about attracting clientele.
Whilst there are differences showing already, for a business restricted by contracts and agreements, it would be silly to expect any fundamental change this early.
You say 'they let Malaysia walk away instead of doing a deal' without knowing the details. There could be any number of reasons from them demanding too low a fee to the location not having enough advertising potential.
It seems that LM have a plan. That's an improvement.
So as long as they say nice things and take the money you're happy then ?I'm not sure why you say that LM are after the money. That's surely a given. One could say the same about Starbucks and Slack Alice's truck stop. The difference is how they go about attracting clientele.
Whilst there are differences showing already, for a business restricted by contracts and agreements, it would be silly to expect any fundamental change this early.
You say 'they let Malaysia walk away instead of doing a deal' without knowing the details. There could be any number of reasons from them demanding too low a fee to the location not having enough advertising potential.
It seems that LM have a plan. That's an improvement.
They let Malaysia walk - the race organisers there said that an offer was made to try and keep the race, but it wasn't enough and LM were not open to negotiation past that offer. LM pretty much shrugged their shoulders and said Malaysia didn't want to pay any more and thats fine.
Their plan is for 25 races a year - they've mentioned and its been unpopular so they will get there by stealth. 21 next year, then it'll be 22 and so on..
You're just blinded by your hate for Eccelstone to look at it objectively.
poosemon said:
I personally like the Channel 4 coverage. I rarely watch the race live these days, not however for a lack of interest in the sport but just generally spending time with family at the weekend. I tend to record race/highlights and watch on Sunday evening.
My mates and I who follow the F1 tend to go into internet/radio lockdown after qualifying if not watching live and the same for the race so rarely I find out result before I have watched it and we then catch up after we have all established we have watched it.
Sounds just like me. I've got used to watching the highlights on Sunday evening and even not watching the full races live. It is just too much of a commitment these days to watch the whole thing! I'm still a bit sad at the prospect at not having any live races though as I am not paying for Sky - but I'll live.My mates and I who follow the F1 tend to go into internet/radio lockdown after qualifying if not watching live and the same for the race so rarely I find out result before I have watched it and we then catch up after we have all established we have watched it.
C4 coverage has improved this year. I still think the peak was the BBC coverage with Jake Humphrey as they worked well as a team and had some great pre race coverage and articles.
Crafty_ said:
So as long as they say nice things and take the money you're happy then ?
They let Malaysia walk - the race organisers there said that an offer was made to try and keep the race, but it wasn't enough and LM were not open to negotiation past that offer. LM pretty much shrugged their shoulders and said Malaysia didn't want to pay any more and thats fine.
Their plan is for 25 races a year - they've mentioned and its been unpopular so they will get there by stealth. 21 next year, then it'll be 22 and so on..
You're just blinded by your hate for Eccelstone to look at it objectively.
I think I see clearly enough. Ecclestone's gone. He's yesterday's man. You brought him up. They let Malaysia walk - the race organisers there said that an offer was made to try and keep the race, but it wasn't enough and LM were not open to negotiation past that offer. LM pretty much shrugged their shoulders and said Malaysia didn't want to pay any more and thats fine.
Their plan is for 25 races a year - they've mentioned and its been unpopular so they will get there by stealth. 21 next year, then it'll be 22 and so on..
You're just blinded by your hate for Eccelstone to look at it objectively.
You suggest that I'm happy for LM to say nice things and take the money. I'm not sure which post of mine that was on. It's a silly and pointless misinterpretation of what I wrote.
LM have plans. I would assume the increase in the number of races is a way of maintaining income. They will have to drop the circuit fees, certainly in the medium term. It is rather obvious. I reckon that the Malay organisers might well have worked this out and gone for a lower charge than LM are willing to accept. They drew a line in the sand, perhaps as a warning to other circuits, that they won't be bullied. Who knows? Not me, and not you either, so it is silly to criticise them.
To put it simply, I have no problem with LM getting a return on their investment. That's business. I'm happy that they have a PR system that includes talking to people in a friendly manner. We will not know whether LM with be a positive influence on F1 for some time. It needs lots of work and hopefully they will provide it.
However, contracts are enforceable. They can't go free to air in this country whilst the Sky agreement is in place. They are stuck with the agreement. So criticising them for not breaking a contract is nonsensical. They are making the right moves online though.
I don't hate Ecclestone. I'm damn glad he's gone from F1 though.
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