BBC viewers

[CoopsII]

Actually, Im out on the lash on Saturday night so Im glad theres no need to get up real early on Sunday. Every cloud and all that.

[dinizintheoven]

You should not do the victory dance just yet. In my cable provider I once had RTL and when F1 switched from open signal to pay-per-view channel people moved on to RTL. For a few races at least because after this the signal was codified only for the race. Lots of complaints after the cable provider said that it was not their fault because since RTL did not had the rights to broadcast the race outside Germany, their signal was scrambled only for the race (afterwards the same thing happened for football matches and soon the channel was dropped by the cable provider (TF1 suffered the same fate)) which happened just in their satellite feed. I sure hope that doesn't happen with you...

And this weekend I will find out. I'll be in Wales for the race, hence I'll be probing the nether regions of the internet for the full experience, but I will link up the satellite box to my trusty old VHS machine and record RTL's coverage. I expect to see it unscrambled and for DanielPT's warning to be completely unfounded - but, of course, I want to make sure before the Malaysian race.

Hope springs eternal.

[CoopsII]

Remind, what is the walking, talking F1 encyclopedia, Karun Chandok, doing this season?

I believe he is starring in The Big Bang Theory.

[Klon]

Remind, what is the walking, talking F1 encyclopedia, Karun Chandok, doing this season?

I believe he is starring in The Big Bang Theory.

A fate worse than death.

[CoopsII]

Remind, what is the walking, talking F1 encyclopedia, Karun Chandok, doing this season?

I believe he is starring in The Big Bang Theory.

A fate worse than death.

What, no 'bazinga' on the end of that?

[AndreaModa]

Remind, what is the walking, talking F1 encyclopedia, Karun Chandok, doing this season?

I believe he is starring in The Big Bang Theory.

Nah that's Nelson Piquet!

[Bob]

I have exactly the same dish as dinizintheoven, except mine's not wall-mounted.

Clicky

Picks up RTL a treat.

[CoopsII]

Ive noticed a suprising amount of people dont realise that the race is on at all on the BBC. Obviously, these arent hardcore fans (of F1 ) but its amazed me that when I mention F1 just how many people believe its only on SKY.

Well done BBC on your excellent handling of all this

[dinizintheoven]

I have exactly the same dish as dinizintheoven, except mine's not wall-mounted.
Clicky
Picks up RTL a treat.

It does, doesn't it? I see you've left your satellite finder in line, though... I took mine back because I couldn't get it to work the way it was supposed to, and connecting the LNB directly to the receiver and the TV so I could watch the signal quality change on-screen was far easier. Better still, I can set the video to record RTL, so at least I'll be able to check it's not all scrambled when the race is on this weekend. The signal quality's up to 76% as well, which is the best I've seen.

DanielPT's words of warning will echo in my ears until the end of this weekend, though. Should the worst come to the worst, I propose a new Forum Award for this year. Back in the late 90s, when I was a geology student on a field trip on the Isle of Arran, our postgrad demonstrator, Jeff Parke, introduced his magnetometer to us. "It's a magnificent bit of kit!" he said, in his northeastern accent. The magnetometer proved to be so troublesome that it couldn't get any meaningful readings of the magnetism of those rocks we were looking at, which was the whole point of that part of the trip. We had some awards at the end of the week, including the "Magnificent Bit Of Kit Award" for those of us who had brought something completely useless.

If the RTL feed goes awry while we're trying to watch the Grand Prix, given that we have bought that satellite equipment only to watch the Grand Prix on RTL, then I propose the "Magnificent Bit Of Kit Award" for the Forum Awards at the end of this year, which will go to me, Bob, and anyone else who has done the same. That's if it doesn't work. If it does, though, you will see both of us looking very smug and satisfied with a Murdoch-sending-home job very well done.

[DanielPT]

DanielPT's words of warning will echo in my ears until the end of this weekend, though. Should the worst come to the worst, I propose a new Forum Award for this year. Back in the late 90s, when I was a geology student on a field trip on the Isle of Arran, our postgrad demonstrator, Jeff Parke, introduced his magnetometer to us. "It's a magnificent bit of kit!" he said, in his northeastern accent. The magnetometer proved to be so troublesome that it couldn't get any meaningful readings of the magnetism of those rocks we were looking at, which was the whole point of that part of the trip. We had some awards at the end of the week, including the "Magnificent Bit Of Kit Award" for those of us who had brought something completely useless.

That happened here in Portugal, although, at the time, I failed to notice happening outside our country. Perhaps it was the cable provider all along scrambling the signal... Let's be optimists and say that everything will be fine!

[Bob]

There's a Youtube video kicking around of someone in the UK showing how to pick up RTL, they tested it with the Singapore GP and it worked.

Can satellite signals even be scrambled? Cable's another matter.

[DanielPT]

There's a Youtube video kicking around of someone in the UK showing how to pick up RTL, they tested it with the Singapore GP and it worked.

Can satellite signals even be scrambled? Cable's another matter.

You can if you scramble the signal in its origin point. Any way I am confident it will work.

[P_Friesacher]

Satellite signals can, in theory, be scrabled just like cable channels. However RTL is extremely unlikely to do that (with their SD service) because millions of Germans watch that channel via satellite - so if they chose to scramble their singnal they would lose a large part of their audience (and along with that, advertisers). Also, RTL have been broadcasting F1 for more than a decade via satellite, so it seems hard to believe that they would have to change anything now.

The fun thing is: In Germany as well as here in Austria (we get to watch German tv channels) F1 fans have had the opposite experience of British viewers over the winter, because for most of the time it looked like Sky Germany might not continue braodcasting F1 - and we would all have to watch RTL (who have ad breaks and dreadful commentary) instead. (It would not have been as bad here in Austria, because our public TV service ORF also braodcasts the races with somewhat better commentary and without ads).

For those of you who have now bought a dish for Astra 19,2, it might be worth noting that there are some other TV channels that broadcast racing free to air via Astra 19,2:
- Servus TV (owned by Red Bull) will probably broadcast the odd NASCAR race live (mostly Saturday nights, presumably), in HD and with an English commentary option. They also have one hour recaps of every NASCAR race on Monday evenings (although with German commentary only).
- "Das Erste" (German public TV) has live broadcasts of every race the most boring series on earth (DTM) has to offer. (Also in HD).
- German TV station "Kabel 1" has live brodcasts of Germany's most interesting GT series, the "ADAC GT Masters".
- n-tv, a German news channel owned by the RTL groups, will most probably have live broadcasts of every race in the F3 Euro series and, perhapsm the Macao F3 Grand Prix (this is not confirmed yet, but they have shown F3 Euro and Macao for the last few years)

[Klon]

- "Das Erste" (German public TV) has live broadcasts of every race the most boring series on earth (DTM) has to offer. (Also in HD).

Hey! DTM is likely to become awesome this year, don't ruin it for those that might be drawn in.

[P_Friesacher]

Hey! DTM is likely to become awesome this year,...

[Klon]

Hey! DTM is likely to become awesome this year,...

No, seriously. The new cars are better and not as antithetic to overtaking, not to mention that there are more of them, increasing the odds of overtaking. Don't be too hasty in writing the series off.

And even if it doesn't get better, it's still more interesting than the WTCC

[DanielPT]

No, seriously. The new cars are better and not as antithetic to overtaking, not to mention that there are more of them, increasing the odds of overtaking. Don't be too hasty in writing the series off.

And even if it doesn't get better, it's still more interesting than the WTCC

Arggghhhhh! Please don't mention the BoreTCC! I might just die of boredom here!

Seriously, there should be a book to remind us of those good or potentially good series that were wrecked by rules tinkering to satisfy factory backed teams.

[Klon]

Arggghhhhh! Please don't mention the BoreTCC! I might just die of boredom here!

Seriously, there should be a book to remind us of those good or potentially good series that were wrecked by rules tinkering to satisfy factory backed teams.

You tell me. At least they now fixed the duration issue. Seriously, don't call it a world championship if your races barely make a three-digit number in distance.

You can if you scramble the signal in its origin point. Any way I am confident it will work.

And risk potential signal trouble for the German audience? Yeah, even if Murdoch would want to scramble the signal, RTL would most likely tell to bathplug off.

[DanielPT]

Arggghhhhh! Please don't mention the BoreTCC! I might just die of boredom here!

Seriously, there should be a book to remind us of those good or potentially good series that were wrecked by rules tinkering to satisfy factory backed teams.

You tell me. At least they now fixed the duration issue. Seriously, don't call it a world championship if your races barely make a three-digit number in distance.

Or having one sole manufacturer winning every race and filling podium places. Or having what little interest it can gathers only in Europe. Or having an idiot weight penalty system that still fails to balance the field... Oh well, I would stay here all afternoon if I could...

[Klon]

Or having one sole manufacturer winning every race and filling podium places.

The worst thing about that was, due to the Chevrolet drivers knowing that they can get away with it, them behaving like the last morons. I mean, racing between team mates is fine and dandy, love to see it, but when you pull off stuff like that in last year's Monza race you just insult that little bit of intelligence I have.

[dinizintheoven]

The fun thing is: In Germany as well as here in Austria (we get to watch German tv channels) F1 fans have had the opposite experience of British viewers over the winter, because for most of the time it looked like Sky Germany might not continue braodcasting F1 - and we would all have to watch RTL (who have ad breaks and dreadful commentary) instead. (It would not have been as bad here in Austria, because our public TV service ORF also braodcasts the races with somewhat better commentary and without ads).

Hang on... I may be able to pick up ORF. I'll have to go looking for it. No adverts is, obviously, a bonus!

For those of you who have now bought a dish for Astra 19,2, it might be worth noting that there are some other TV channels that broadcast racing free to air via Astra 19,2:
- Servus TV (owned by Red Bull) will probably broadcast the odd NASCAR race live (mostly Saturday nights, presumably), in HD and with an English commentary option. They also have one hour recaps of every NASCAR race on Monday evenings (although with German commentary only).
- "Das Erste" (German public TV) has live broadcasts of every race the most boring series on earth (DTM) has to offer. (Also in HD).
- German TV station "Kabel 1" has live brodcasts of Germany's most interesting GT series, the "ADAC GT Masters".
- n-tv, a German news channel owned by the RTL groups, will most probably have live broadcasts of every race in the F3 Euro series and, perhapsm the Macao F3 Grand Prix (this is not confirmed yet, but they have shown F3 Euro and Macao for the last few years)

Nice. I suppose it's too much to ask for a German channel to show Indy racing...

Das Erste I know I've seen flicking through the channels, and I think I've seen Servus as well.

[P_Friesacher]

Hang on... I may be able to pick up ORF. I'll have to go looking for it. No adverts is, obviously, a bonus!

Yes, it's on Astra. But no, this won't help you, because contrary to German channels, Austrian TV, apart from Servus, is encrypted. (sorry!)

Nice. I suppose it's too much to ask for a German channel to show Indy racing...

Sadly it is. After being on Eurosport for quite some time (CART was, not the IRL) US Open Wheel Racing switched to Sky Germany in the Mid-2000s (ChampCar and the IRL). But sadly, a few years ago, Sky Germany dropped the IndyCar Series, and there has been no way to (legally) watch Indy racing in Germany or Austria since then.

[dinizintheoven]

Hang on... I may be able to pick up ORF. I'll have to go looking for it. No adverts is, obviously, a bonus!

Yes, it's on Astra. But no, this won't help you, because contrary to German channels, Austrian TV, apart from Servus, is encrypted. (sorry!)

As I found when I looked at the channel lists. Bah!

[Collieafc]

Ive noticed a suprising amount of people dont realise that the race is on at all on the BBC. Obviously, these arent hardcore fans (of F1 ) but its amazed me that when I mention F1 just how many people believe its only on SKY.

Well done BBC on your excellent handling of all this

Says it all. To be fair to Sky they have been promoting very aggressively.

[mario]

Ive noticed a suprising amount of people dont realise that the race is on at all on the BBC. Obviously, these arent hardcore fans (of F1 ) but its amazed me that when I mention F1 just how many people believe its only on SKY.

Well done BBC on your excellent handling of all this

Says it all. To be fair to Sky they have been promoting very aggressively.

I guess that they have to promote their package fairly aggressively given that they need to persuade people to part with much more cash for the coverage than they are used to. They have been clever in tapping into other forms of advertising, such as audio ads through Spotify, and they are putting a fair amount of effort in to make people associate them, and only them, with live and uninterrupted coverage of F1.
It has to be said that the BBC have also been playing into their hands as they haven't really done all that much to promote their coverage - there have been a few adverts between programs on the BBC, but otherwise they haven't really tried to attract the same sort of attention they did the previous year, almost as if they want Sky to be successful and to take the franchise off their hands.

[14 Hundred Hours]

True. I watch the BBC much more than I do any other channel, but the few times I've watched another channel I've been bombarded with Sky F1 ads. Seeing as I don't and probably never will have Sky, this has really ruined watching Midsomer Murders.

[madcat]

Well, that wasn't too bad. Watched BBC qualifying highlights and then watched the race ok...

[dr-baker]

Well, that wasn't too bad. Watched BBC qualifying highlights and then watched the race ok...

Yeah, but having live radio coverage meant that you wouldn't have to worry about isolating yourself from discovering the result...

[Stramala]

The spam bots are becoming more advanced as the weeks pass

[spam_v5_1_1]

The spam bots are becoming more advanced as the weeks pass

I'm obsolete!

[Stramala]

The spam bots are becoming more advanced as the weeks pass

I'm obsolete!

Obviously so, considering you failed to advertise any wares in that post. You have failed at your raison d'être, your existence is now pointless.

If you're anything like Marvin the Paranoid Android, that will probably cause you to suicide. But whatever, you're a spam bot, no-one cares.

[CoopsII]

Ive just noticed that this weekends race coverage begins on Sunday at 1030pm and finished on Monday at 1230am! As it happens Im not in work on Monday so I can watch it but if I was I think Id give it a swerve. And, you know what, now the anger and annoyance has been and gone I wouldnt be that bothered about missing the race. Im a little bit 'meh' about it. I wonder if anybody else feels similar and, if so, how will that affect F1s appeal in the long run?

Imagine if theres a repeat of last years rain? I'll be up all night

EDIT:No I wont, I'll think "knackers to it" and I'll go to bed.

[AdrianSutil]

Clearly some people aren't as possionate about F1 as me eh Coops?

I've actually got someone to cover my first half of my shift on Sunday night so I don't have to be at work until 3am.

Sad? A bit obsessive with watching every race? I don't care. Mock away, mock away...

[CoopsII]

Sad? A bit obsessive with watching every race? I don't care. Mock away, mock away...

Not at all and in 25 or so years of watching F1 Ive only missed a handful of races but as watching the sport has been made difficult by others I feel no regret at missing out. Maybe its an age thing . If myself and others find their interest in F1 has diminished slightly its hardly down to us, is it?

[DanielPT]

Sad? A bit obsessive with watching every race? I don't care. Mock away, mock away...

Not at all and in 25 or so years of watching F1 Ive only missed a handful of races but as watching the sport has been made difficult by others I feel no regret at missing out. Maybe its an age thing . If myself and others find their interest in F1 has diminished slightly its hardly down to us, is it?

I still have my interest fully intact. Don't know for how long, but I expect to wane in a few years time. When I was a teen, I wouldn't miss a race for anything and now I couldn't care less. I mean, if I have other business to attend to I won't postpone or cancel it to watch the race.

[eurobrun]

Sad? A bit obsessive with watching every race? I don't care. Mock away, mock away...

Not at all and in 25 or so years of watching F1 Ive only missed a handful of races but as watching the sport has been made difficult by others I feel no regret at missing out. Maybe its an age thing . If myself and others find their interest in F1 has diminished slightly its hardly down to us, is it?

I still have my interest fully intact. Don't know for how long, but I expect to wane in a few years time. When I was a teen, I wouldn't miss a race for anything and now I couldn't care less. I mean, if I have other business to attend to I won't postpone or cancel it to watch the race.

I feel like I'm not a true F1 fan as I haven't watched some races until the next day because of the ridiculous times they were on TV.

[CoopsII]

I feel like I'm not a true F1 fan as I haven't watched some races until the next day because of the ridiculous times they were on TV.

I now know that, unless you've learnt the result beforehand, that makes no difference. All this 'watching it live' nonsense is imaginary (so thanks SKY and thanks BBC for not letting Channel 4 buy it!).

[eurobrun]

I feel like I'm not a true F1 fan as I haven't watched some races until the next day because of the ridiculous times they were on TV.

I now know that, unless you've learnt the result beforehand, that makes no difference. All this 'watching it live' nonsense is imaginary (so thanks SKY and thanks BBC for not letting Channel 4 buy it!).

So I'm not inhumanly evil. That is good.

[DanielPT]

I feel like I'm not a true F1 fan as I haven't watched some races until the next day because of the ridiculous times they were on TV.

I now know that, unless you've learnt the result beforehand, that makes no difference. All this 'watching it live' nonsense is imaginary (so thanks SKY and thanks BBC for not letting Channel 4 buy it!).

So I'm not inhumanly evil. That is good.

No you are not. I just cannot see it after because, a) reruns are at stupid hours and b) it is very unlikely to not find out the result...

[AdrianSutil]

Watching it live or a re-run later doesn't bother me either. As long as I don't know the result, I don't care. What I am tempted to do however, is read the first post in the IIDOTR thread after the race, just in case there's a post like:

1. Hiekki Kovalainen - Great drive for Caterham
2. Narian Karthikeyen - I can now click the link in FMecha's sig