YES YES YES YES YES!!!! THe UK can now watch "Bernie TV"!!!

[Stephen Green]

Interesting question Mr V. I suppose the answer to it is 'how much will it cost?'. Personally I am against PPV purely because I already pay £37 a onth to Sky and therefore don't see whay I should be expected to pay even more to watch something I believe should be covered by the existing subscription.

However, if the 'season ticket' were to prove attractive price wize, then I may swallow my pride and cough up.

Interesting thought though isn't it?

[SILVERS95]

Originally posted by Aussie 05
But no way in hell am i gona pay £14.99 per frickin race. I don't even wanna calculate how much that would be for a whole season. What a rip off. Why aren't they gona show it on Sky Sports Interactive, thats what the channels for, they're just trying to suck more money out of us.

how can they be trying to suck more money out of us when ITS STILL FREE ON ITV !!!....some people get so carried away....

look...if ITV lost the rights to F1 and SKY bought them and they put it straight on PPV , then your point would be totally valid ....but they havent.....

we are now all being given a option of how we would like to watch F1...the traditional way with ITV for free ( which is fine )........or pay for it with SKY , but with alot of added camera views , all sessions live....a permanant camera showing the whole pit lane continously , so you can see for your self the pit crews coming out or doing a pit stop that the ITV feed has totally missed...they have all live timing screens , they also have audio of car to pit communications , although this is not live ,it is on a delay basis , as no way would team managers want other people to know there statagies etc.....last year , i remeber Jos retiring around the back end of the circuit , and you heard the full conversation between him and the pit wall while he was sitting in his stranded car ! ......they have a general feed as well which is just like ITV get , so if you dont want to muck around with anything you can just watch that until something happens somewhere that you want to watch more closely ( ie Montoya chasing Micheal )then you can switch to Montoya's onboard if its available and watch the action from the cockpit !!!..if your worried about missing action from the directors feed , then i think you can go picture in picture so you get the best of both worlds.......

I have watched about 3 races on Bernievision last year from Italian TV and it was fantastic !..but at least now weve got the choice..... if you want a altogether bigger F1 experience , then pay for it with SKY.....if your happy with ITV , that is fine.....

but don't moan......just carry on watching ITV. !..

[Ian-S]

Having watched Bernievision for the last three years, I can tell you it's nothing special, the only good thing is Friday practice and in-car cameras.

Apart from that, most of the trackside cameras are next to the local feed ones.

You think you miss a lot on ITV? Berinevision totally missed Burti's crash in Germany last year, the best view was on ITV!!

[Damon]

Its alway going to be swings and round abouts with that sort of thing. As we've got someone here who's been watching it I've got some questions.

1) Are there any adverts?
2) Who is the commentry from?
3) How much is it?
4) Is it worth it?

[Ian-S]

>>1) Are there any adverts?

No, sometimes they miss the first couple of minutes of a session by chatting in the studio.

>>2) Who is the commentry from?

Can't remember their names, I watched the Italian service so had the track feed on most of the time, usually it was the guy who was the "Expert Witness" in the Ayrton Senna trial, and maybe Luba Badour (sorry) or Nannini.

Each broadcaster has their own commentary team, in Germany it is Hans Stouch (sorry again), I wouldn't be suprised to see one M Walker as part of the SKY crew.

>>3) How much is it?

Again, it different in each country, I think Premiere World charges about 30 EURO per race weekend.

For my service it cost abbout £300pa - it was part of the full subscription package for D+, it started as PPV but because of low takeup they switched it into the main package (hopefully Sky will do that, to date, no broadcaster has made money out of it, and I think only Premiere World in Germany still do PPV).

>>4) Is it worth it?

Overall yes, but it depends what kind of service Sky do, for instance, when I was over there once I watched the German version, they have about 10 hours dedicated to the Sunday alone, from the warm-up, through the Porsche Supercup, to the build up, race and interviews afterwards, then an round up prog in the evening.

You'll love it to start with, but eventually you'll get bored, no amount of super-tv coverage can make up for a boring race - I fell asleep in many races last year...

FYI, in europe the "views" they get are:

Splitscreen (all of below)
Superchannel (as on the big screens GP's)
Superchannel 2 (follows battles etc.)
Leader (follows TGF or whoever leads in pitstops )
In-Car (director chosen in-car cameras)
PitCAM (cameras rooving pits - the ones that pick up McLaren tactics)
Replay (time delayed coverage, highlights etc.)
Stats (the timing scoreboard as seen on the pitwall monitors - very funny when Martin says everythings gone down, you switch over to this to see a blank screen )

P.S. Normally the pit to car radio is time delayed, for example, you will not hear Ross Brawn say to Michael "Speed up a bit, we need 6 seconds", the most pit/car radio is in Friday practice, when they go around counting the corners, telling the crew where their breaking etc. for the trackion control etc.

You might hear Ross giving the good congrats to Michael on the slowdown lap, and you may hear the oll F or S over the radio.

Malaysia last year, when Montoya stalled on the line, they were eavesdropping, Montoya said "the cars just died, what do I do?" the reply from the pits came something like this : "Are you F**king stupid? If the cars F**ked, get out the F**king thing and get back here now!", Montoya replied, "Why?" and they replied "'cos the spare is setup for you, now leave the F**cking car where it is and get your..." and you can imagine the rest...

[Ian-S]

...oh, and one more thing, you can only watch one channel at a time

So if you're anything like me, you'll be watching the InCar channel on Bernievision, and the normal ITV service on the other TV

[Damon]

Thanks very much for all that info. It does look good to me, I guess this year we can try it out for certain races to see if its worth it. I love the idea of hearing the radio discussions

[Kalevi]

And if you are a true f1-freak just "tune up" your PPV system:

Freaks Multichannel

[Ian-S]

Yep, that looks familar.

Are you Palco, Canal+, Taquilla or Premiere?

Looks like Aston Xena boxes on the floor? (might be wrong).

[Crank Case]

People seem to be throwing prices around here but if it is £15 for 3 days viewing that would be just fine by me.
I've payed £9.99 and £12.99 for a few minutes of boxing.
So comparing the price in this way it's a bargain.Read it people 3 days of coverage The cameras and stats just add to that.
I'd pay £20 every month just for ITV not to have the coverage I don't care who it would go to just NOT ITV.

For those not exactly in the know (or who haven't noticed by now) this forum is full of people who do not like Formula 1 that's what you get for joining a general motorsport site.
So to get the response it has in here by some does not suprise me at all.
P.S. Where do I pay

[Stephen Green]

Crank Case, there are a lot of us here who LOVE F1. The discussion will always go both ways. As I said earlier each to their own, but I WON'T be paying the extra as I think the £37 I already pay per month should INCLUDE the F1 coverage. But that's my opinion.

[Ian-S]

I agree with you 100% Stephen.

I already pay SKY £37 a month, they want (unfconfirmed) £15 per weekend, that's two races a month, which has in effect doubled by subscription to £67 a month, now to be brutal - that taking the ****!

Think I will stick to Palco, at least it's £30 a month including the F1 coverage.

[Rob29]

I suggest we hold this discussion,until Sky actually anounce the price.Apparently football costs £8 per match,whereas,boxing costs £15 and can only last seconds.I suspect that Bernie may have given in to a cheap deal,after failing to find a UK carrier for 5 years.None but the wealthy or dedicated fanatics will pay £250 for the season.

[Ian-S]

The prices in France, Germany and Spain are the same, EURO30 a race weekend (£18.34).

Italy is the only Country to include the programs in their main package, because they couldn't afford the losses that the F1 and football caused them (bidding war between Telepui and Stream).

I think it is safe to assume that the price will be between £10 and £15 per weekend, there is no way Bernie would allow the service to be cheap or hackable here, this is the reason he went for Sky over ITV, not because of what they would pay, they pay a fixed amount (both wanted the service, and were willing to pay), like Sky do for the footy, but because ITV Digital is easily hackable and they have had their fingers burned in europe with hackers before, this is the reason they went for Sky.

[simon clark]

euros suck

[Ian-S]

especially if you get German ones that cause skin rashes

[Kalevi]

Originally posted by Ian-S
Yep, that looks familar.

Are you Palco, Canal+, Taquilla or Premiere?

Looks like Aston Xena boxes on the floor? (might be wrong).

That (obviously illegal) system is not in my living room. Found the pic in the net. I watch quite legally Canal Digital, which is a nordic subsidiary company for Canal+, I think.

2001 Bernievision season ticket cost me around 92 euros (57 £). No price for season 2002 has been given.

[Adam43]

Autopsort says that the new SKY digital package will be launched in the middle of next month. So I suppose we'll have to wait to then to know the full details of what package will be available.

I like the sound of £57. Sounds too good to be true. Who'd be without? (oh, looking at the rest of this thread - loads of you! )

[SILVERS95]

Originally posted by Ian-S
>>1) Are there any adverts?


You might hear Ross giving the good congrats to Michael on the slowdown lap, and you may hear the oll F or S over the radio.

Malaysia last year, when Montoya stalled on the line, they were eavesdropping, Montoya said "the cars just died, what do I do?" the reply from the pits came something like this : "Are you F**king stupid? If the cars F**ked, get out the F**king thing and get back here now!", Montoya replied, "Why?" and they replied "'cos the spare is setup for you, now leave the F**cking car where it is and get your..." and you can imagine the rest...

well i didnt need convincing , but hey ..how can you read that and not think its gonna add to the excitment....FANTASTIC !..it cant come soon enough for me.

[SILVERS95]

Originally posted by Stephen Green
, but I WON'T be paying the extra as I think the £37 I already pay per month should INCLUDE the F1 coverage. But that's my opinion.

just out of interest Stephen , how much value for money do you get out of SKY ?...as it was only recently that i relized that there was no way that i was getting £37's worth out of it every month...thats why i cancelled some of the package , which inturn free'd up some money to pay for the Bernievision ....as F1 is something that i love to watch , and for once am happy to pay SKY for it! ...if Sky had nicked it off ITV then i agree that they should show it on there current sport channels , but as this is a extra service to run alongside ITV , then i can see why they will want to charge for it.

[Stephen Green]

Interesting question Silvers. Probably not as much as I should is the honest answer, but with two grown up kids who seem to monopolise the TV even when I want to watch it, it's probably still just about worth it. We tend to watch the sports channels quite a bit (Motor Racing and Golf for me, Football for my son) and then we do watch a few movies as well. Funninly enough I quite enjoy some of the Discovery Channels, especially if I am home alone during the day. So, all in all it's just about worth the fee I suppose.

One of the other reasons I won't pay for Bernievision is that I am quite often out marshalling when the GP's are on, so tend to tape them and watch the whole thing 're-live' when I get home. I get desperately unhappy if anyone tells me the result before I've watched the video. It's like watching a football match and knowing the final score!

[SILVERS95]

i see your point there Stephen ,..normally the commentator at Brands is really good on a GP weekend as he wont give out the results incase anyone has set their videos's at home , but sometimes it drives me mad , as people have their radios on to listen to radio 5's commentry ...and its really hard not to over hear their conversations on who is leading or has just stalled on the grid etc !...the other year when Damon won in Spa for Jordan , i was going mad as everyone you walked passed was talking about the start line accident in Belgium...and i didnt want to know as i was taping it at home.....

as far as SKY goes , it kind of creeped up on me how much i was paying ...it seemed to become the norm to have all the channels , and i sort of stopped watching the movies a fair bit as well....i love the sports channels which has world motorsport programme on every monday , and the general entertainment channels are good too.....As for Bernievision alot of what im looking forward to , is to be able to watch some of the F1 practice sessions on a friday again , and sometimes the saturday practice before qualifing and hopefully a bigger bulid up to the race . I will still watch some of ITV's race coverage from time to time i expect , i always thought Martins grid walk before the race was excellent

[Stephen Green]

Thats what I was trying to say earlier in the thread. Things like the race buid up and Martin's pit lane walkabout are what make ITV's coverage so much better than the BBC's. Yes I hate the adverts like everyone else, but the overal package ITV versus BBC is better in my view.

As I said before, I have a particular aversion to paying for things twice, hence my stance on not paying for Bernievision hahaha.

Of course the thing we have to admit is, that if you don't subscribe to Sky Digital, even in it's most basic form, you won't be able to watch Bernievision will you!

[SILVERS95]

i think at the end of the day , its just going to great to see more f1 on tv...rather than just sat qualifying or the race....and also onboard audio and in car cameras , live timing screens , pit lane cams , full press conferences , no adverts , sunday morning warm up , watch the drivers that are racing close rather thn the leaders , ....DOH !..im getting carried away again....roll on march !

[Ian-S]

Believe me, it's not all it's cracked up to be.

Especially if what I read is correct, it will be "interactive" like the football, which means that you will have logo's all around the screen and at the bottom, and you'll only get abour 3/4's of the screen actually of the race, the rest filled up with ****.