Sky may be forced to not bid for exclusive access to big events of “national significance”. Well, it’s one of several proposals apparently, so let’s not jump up and down yet.
The result would be less incentve for sky to bid for those events, and therefore a lower final price. That means less money to the organisers of those big events, and therefore less big events. Do we want that? (arguably yes, what with all the big matches from a multitude of sports that we are expected to keep up with.)
It would also mean that whatever free-to-air channel wins the rights to those events will insert lots of ads, rather than the relatively ad-free Sky environment.
As with the world cup over here in Australia, I’d vote with my feet and watch the event later on Sky, ad free, rather than the HD yet ad-filled version on the free to air broadcaster.
Lance Wiggs 