Maybe it is the thinking, that if they go free to view, and don;t put them on the freesat epg, they will de-value the brand as people will go and purchase a fta satellite box, and sky get plenty of cheap adverts as well.

lets face it they are mainly old stuff and well cheap to keep showing!

If they are going FTA permanently I think it would be pretty petty of Sky to not pay the Freesat EPG fees when BBC & ITV pay Sky many times over that amount to list their channels.

Erm, helloooo? Where have you been all these years?
Sky love being petty. Just take the Sky Sports News removal from DTT, that was petty as petty comes.
Removing their channels off VM because VM refused to be extorted and called Sky's bluff.
Doing the same now with Sky Atlantic and the F1 Channel in HD

Not to mention Sky Atlantic HD and Sky Sports 3 and 4 in HD too

I do not know why sky advertise there programes on any of there channels I have watched a bit of pick tv and seeing the sky adverts of what is comming up on there other channels, has made me glad I do not have sky

They should put skysports news back on FTA not bothered about Freeview but should freesat

That's the old uncaring, non sharing Sky.

Sky are the ultimate at being petty, agree there!!

Maybe, and just a random thought, the BBC and ITV told Sky that getting their services on board all FTA platforms (inc. Freesat) was a condition for the value they'll both add Sky's platform for putting their iPlayer and ITV Player catchup services on to it. We know the BBC, ITV, C4 and C5 all negotiated a deal to reduce retransmission/carriage fees but maybe there was something involving Sky's pettyness with Freesat and part of the deal as both the BBC and ITV have vested interests in Freesat?? Who knows, maybe not but just a thought!

It wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility that ITV & BBC told Sky that playing the game fairly would bring alot to both sides and make each other happy.
We'll never know of course, but.....

I do wonder if they did come to a deal in this respect. It's odd isn't it how Sky like to sign channels in to encryption deals (eg Sony Movies, 5HD etc) but put their own FTV services in the form of Pick TV FTA! Looks like once 5HD goes FTA in the future the FSFS service will be defunkt apart from a small handful of niche channels.

Maybe this was on the cards when the encryption deal expired as it would save Sky money now NDS isn't part of the Murdoch family any more. It doesn't make sense for the services to be FTV/Pay on Sky when they are on Freeview, UKTV take note!!

With Sky moving to have HD version of all their branded channels it occurred to me that there probably won't be HD versions of Pick TV and Challenge and therefore these channels will eventually be sold off or let to die a natural death. In terms of their usefulness on Freeview to promote Sky subs, Sky still have Sky News and I've noticed Sky adverts popping up more on other channels recently.

fyi - bskyb have now sold their shares in nds (who charge for encryption services)

so sky now have no reason to keep its channels ftv.

BSkyB never owned NDS, News Corp did who also own 39% of BSkyB. Your right though that it was always done 'in the family' business-wise if that makes sense! Murdoch sold 49%'ish of NDS to a Private Equity firm some time back, now him and that Investment company have sold the lot to Cisco for an over inflated £5billion.

Sky still need NDS as Videoguard is their propitiatory CA system however if this change is permanent then they probably did take the decision that as these channels are free on Freeview then there's no point keeping them pay or FTV on Satellite, as per Sky News.

When UKTV get cosy invites to Osterley to discuss and dine with Sky management about carriage renegotiations for all their channels (whenever in the future that may be??), then when Sky's top dogs try to convince them to keep their Freeview FTA services pay on DSAT, UKTV can say "well you made yours FTA so we want to as well"......! Just being hypothetical here but Sky have set a bit of a DTT/DSAT FTA president with these. It wouldn't surprise me if we see Viva and 4Music FTA in the future, when though would be anyone's guess!

Been having a think about these channels and to why they may have, Maybe - as in previous post UKTV maybe thinking about moving some more channels Free to Air - Sky has been thinking about moving their channels go free to air!

Now UKTV was part owned by Virgin - Now sold

And Challange was owned By Virgin - Now sold

There where also rumours that discovery networks maybe making 1 of its channels free to air too (satellite wise)

They all maybe thinking the same - they can use old programmes with adverts for there premium programmes thus cheap add's and maybe more £££ down the line.

If they have made a firm choice and Pick and Challange remain free to air and don;t go on the freesat epg it devalues them.

If and this is hypothetical -

Gold - Alibi - Dave (UKTV)
Pick TV - Challenge (Sky)
Quest (Discovery Networks)

All go free to air there is a good chance some of these would go on freesat - but this could effect Virgin more although there is only 5 channels - this would make freesat or fta boxes much more attractive and could loose some custom

If these channels did move it would give a more rounded better package for nothing! - increase it viewers and thus increase in advertisement income

This is all worth pondering?

If UKTV make any channels FTA it will be Dave, Really and Yesterday as they are their current FTA offerings on DTT.

As stated though, that can't be the only reasoning as Challenge was previously pay on Sky. I am wondering if this isn't kind of first step Sky is making, but are expecting something in return from BBC/ITV before putting them on Freesat? Or maybe the deal has already been done and we'll see Challenge, Pick TV, the +1s, and Sky News being put on the Freesat EPG in the next couple of weeks? I'm not sure whether there is any precedent for a channel previously being FTV/pay and then going onto Freesat so I don't know what the usual gap of going FTA > going onto the EPG would be.

I was going to say the same. If anything, they would keep it inline with whats on DTT

only 4 other channels needed from freeview to be added to fta satellite

dave
yesterday
4music
viva

Yesterday and 4Music aren't even in Sky's Entertainment package, they're in Entertainment Extra, so I wouldn't count on those appearing any time soon!

Only six other channels, Quest and Really are also still missing from FTA satellite.

...and they might indeed come to Freesat at some stage when the viewer numbers increase so that it becomes attractive to those broadcasting groups to make that change. However, what's needed is much more and better advertising and promotion by Freesat and a more proactive channel invitation strategy to bring that situation about.

With the unit sales of Freesat now, its odd that more haven't come across knowing that them coming into the mix will boost unit sales even more than already and bringing more viewers to their channels, giving them more ad revenue in return.
Having a few UKTV channels, like whats on DTT would be one hell of a boast.

Making "Exclusive to Freeview FTA" channels available on Freesat not only boosts Freesat but makes Freeview look less attractive as a platform, resulting in more dishes being installed with the possibility of making the transition to pay TV for some of them.

From the broadcasters' point of view, satellite distribution is a lot cheaper than terrestrial.

That's exactly my mate's thought who's about to buy a Humax PVR (although has no intention of subscribing to Sky) - he wants the extra channel choice offered by Freesat not on Freeview. I told him it's likely the Freesat lineup will one day match Freeview's but not in the short term.

as jzee says, I do wonder too whether we may see these channels, plus Sky News added to Freesat's EPG - something I never thought would happen. It all depends on what the BBC/ITV have asked for in return, probably related to their on-demand content going on Sky's platform, who knows. I'd have thought both channels would be FTV rather than FTA, in fact I'm surprised Sky News has never gone FTV on DSAT too over the years (obviously it's always been FTA), just to be petty over Freesat's existence!

What I don't understand is why are there some FTA channels on Freeview that are not on freesat?