Dodgy Channels On Sky

[bhowells]

There have been a lot of very dodgy channels on Sky, I have been a subscriber since 1999 and there have been some right humdingers.

Anyone recall Life a channel that was a ragbag of ancient us cookery programmes, over the top envanelists and endless showings of old Hollywood films with very poor prints.

The people who brought us Life created a sister channel called "Bonanza consisting of episodes of Bonanza and Beverly Hillbillies, two great shows marred by having their famous themes removed for copyright reasons.

Inbetween an absolutely awful man used to show off his vegetable chopper.

Then theer is Open Access 1,2 and 3, nothing on half the time but at invervals they show classic Amrican sitcoms like The Burns and Allen Show but its usually the same show week after week.

Any members of the forum have any comments abou the plethora of garbage on the Sky platform.

BARRIE

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by bhowells There have been a lot of very dodgy channels on Sky, I have been a subscriber since 1999 and there have been some right humdingers. Anyone recall Life a channel that was a ragbag of ancient us cookery programmes, over the top envanelists and endless showings of old Hollywood films with very poor prints. The people who brought us Life created a sister channel called "Bonanza consisting of episodes of Bonanza and Beverly Hillbillies, two great shows marred by having their famous themes removed for copyright reasons. Inbetween an absolutely awful man used to show off his vegetable chopper. Then theer is Open Access 1,2 and 3, nothing on half the time but at invervals they show classic Amrican sitcoms like The Burns and Allen Show but its usually the same show week after week. Any members of the forum have any comments abou the plethora of garbage on the Sky platform. BARRIE

I don't pay Murdoch, I pay Branston instead
I have cable (fibre optic) rather that satellite, and I use it for the phone and the broadband connection as well as the TV & radio. Virgin took over most of the cable companies (Telewest & NTL) a while back. Virgin offer a good enough service, but their help desk isn't as good as the Telewest one was.

Cable TV always has offered most of what's on the Sky platform. Some channels are only available on satellite and some are only available on cable. It depends on who signs a deal with whom.

And with cable we get more local programming. That can be amateurish, but fun

Steve

[Dave B]

"Life" (and, before it, "Liberty") did bring us "Four Star Playhouse", "Captain Gallant", "Long John Silver" and "Serie Noire".

All with mediocre picture it's true. But when I subsequently bought "Long John Silver" on DVD, the picture was no better.

Bonanza gave us Ronald Howard's "Sherlock Holmes" and several episodes from the "Flash Gordon" TV series. (Plus "Lone Ranger" and "Dragnet" - though these are easily available on public domain DVD sets.)

My highlight from these channels, though, was the 18 month run of Four Star programmes on Performance. A different episode every day - with excellent picture quality. These programmes were shown three times on the one day, and have not been repeated since.

[bhowells]

I agree with you about the Four Stary seasons, there were some gems amongst the differennt series, "June Alyson SHOW" "Tom Ewell." "Peter Love Mary." and my peronal favourite, "Mrs G Goes to College."

A lot of these shows only run to one season and my understanding is that us shows that only run for one season are probably rarely shown because a show has to x amount of episodes before it goes into syndiacation

It was as privelege to watch these shows, I dont know how many were ogrinally aired on uk tv at the time. Burkes Law and Big Valley were definitely on.

There isnt enough classic us tv available on the sky channels, I wonder if this has anything to do with distribtuion rights. I have said elsehwere on this forum that the rights for the Bonanza seired are farcical with some seasons being public domain some not.

I would love to see the entire run being show.

At one point I was frustrated when the BBC only used to show the last four seasons and not the earlier ones. These days its the other way around its only possible to view shows from the early days.

It is possible to view clips on youtube , I have to say.

[DB7]

Originally Posted by Steve Crook I don't pay Murdoch, I pay Branston instead Steve

But Murdoch is buying Virgin Media.

*one of us, one of us"

[rskershaw]

"Inbetween an absolutely awful man used to show off his vegetable chopper."

Oh err!

[rskershaw]

Originally Posted by Steve Crook I don't pay Murdoch, I pay Branston instead Steve

Does he throw a free jar of pickle into the deal?

[Steve Crook]

Originally Posted by DB7 But Murdoch is buying Virgin Media. *one of us, one of us"

Given the dodgy state of Branston's finances (as documented in Private Eye) one does wonder how long he can keep the juggling act going and when all the balls do fall down (as opposed to the "balls up" state he's in at the moment) then the Murdoch empire probably will be the only one that can take it over

Steve

[Carmel]

Sky has been going down the pan for years as the keep repeating things and swapping them onto other channels hoping you wont notice and they charge me £49 a month for the privlage i suppose im the fool for paying it i have free view attached in my bedroom and watch the channels on it far more. I see there is a paranormal channel starting on the 6th June it will more than likely be repeats of most haunted, and crossing over and such like i cant see them filling a whole day with new programes God forbid they should do that now.

[Briant]

I too give Mr Murdoch as little support as possible. There is intelligent life outside of watching and paying for Sky TV! I prefer a good film on DVD or reading a good book.