Grk101

I will have some updates on the service from my friend soon. In the meantime, it looks like Ellas TV is in the process of re-doing their website and posted some new pricing options: ET-503 box service: • Mega Pack (5 Greek Channels) - $29.99 • Basic Pack (10 Greek Channels) - $39.99 • Starter Pack (20 Greek Channels) - $49.99 • Family Pack (30 Greek Channels) - $59.99 • Premium Pack (40 Greek Channels) - $79.99 (Currently $59.99 with promotion) • Sports Pack (5 Sports Channels) - $24.99 • Extra Box - $9.99 Web TV only service: • Mega Pack (5 Greek Channels) - $14.99 • Basic Pack (10 Greek Channels) - $24.99 • Starter Pack (20 Greek Channels) - $34.99 • Family Pack (30 Greek Channels) - $44.99 • Premium Pack (40 Greek Channels) - $54.99 iPad & iPhone service: • Basic Pack (10 Greek Channels) - $9.99 • Starter Pack (20 Greek Channels) - $14.99 • Family Pack (30 Greek Channels) - $19.99 • Premium Pack (40 Greek Channels) - $24.99 Roku service: • Mega Pack (5 Greek Channels) - $19.99 • Family Pack (30 Greek Channels) - $44.99 • Premium Pack (40 Greek Channels) - $54.99

Like I said, I think their current line up is pretty solid. I don't think they need to touch it for a while. However I think there might be room in the future for Skai to be added eventually. Their programing has been getting better year by year, despite the economic crisis. So it might be ready for prime time in a few years. (pun intended :P)That being said, I also expect some channels to shut down in the future. The advertising market in Greece keeps shrinking, and the channels are having a hard time getting by. Even the deepest pockets can't keep pouring money into the channels if it keeps going this way. Plus there is the whole television license issue finally coming into play in the next few years. That may very well become their biggest issue.

^^^ Things change in the Greek channel dealings as we have seen, I am sure even DKSat would tell you that since he hinted many times over the years about different potential outcomes. A lot of factors come into play it seems. We could argue all day “If Antenna never signed the exclusive deal”, “if DirecTV got ERT World”, “if certain people got the rights to certain channels”, if if if or should've would've could've. What matters today is that Dish and Mega were able to come to a deal. Looking toward the future, it would be nice if Dish continues to look into more additions. But like I said they have a pretty solid line up right now IMO, although Skai would be nice eventually. If you asked me a few years ago, I would also say Star, but their programming has gone way downhill since then. Their niche is easily covered by Alpha/ANT1’s programming currently IMO. I also wonder if we will ever finally see ERT World FTA on KU band in North America. :gr:

Great news that it will be in the Greek Elite package with no further increase! They have a pretty solid package now, especially since the launch of Greek Cinema IMO. I am surprised though that they got to be offered a-la-carte as well, and for $19.99 at that. I guess Mega wasn't the only desperate one, Dish must have really wanted them back. I am just glad IPTV is not the only option anymore.

Maybe they are just using 9839 during testing? Or maybe someone doesn't want Mega Cosmos before their flagship Ant1 Satellite. :LOL: In all seriousness we should know more info in a few days when Dish decides to release more information. It doesn't make much sense to stick with 9839 like you said, and have Mega Cosmos after all the radio stations.

^^^ I knew a good number of families that had the Greek channels on DirecTV. When they moved to Home2US, not so many followed. I think one reason was the high start-up costs. Even with the free receiver offer in the beginning, most people did not know how to realign their dish themselves and did not want to pay for an installer to come out. Also any "all new" customers had to pay for an installer no matter what. After Home2US closed, anyway you put it IPTV is still a new technology that many people are not ready to adopt or are not familiar with. There is a market for it as it appeals to some, but not nearly as big of a market as satellite at the current time in my opinion. Maybe that will change in the future.

Someone asked when it will launch, and they responded: "we are working for a December 5th date. Might be sooner :). Will keep everyone posted" So it looks like Mega Cosmos will relaunch on Dish Network within 2 weeks. No information yet about package pricing. Let me help you out there :D :D

I always thought Alpha distributed their channel on their own. At least someone mentioned they did on this forum. I could be wrong.Alpha TV is owned by Dimitris Kontominas, and earlier this year one of his companies won the worldwide distribution rights to ERT World. I am guessing that he also has some type of tie or deal with GMG for DKSat to say that. I could be wrong though.

Interesting developments! :gr:

Yeah I wonder if that price increase was related or if Dish plans to raise the price again? I also wonder how GMG came to their senses and finally got Mega Cosmos back on Dish, considering they were heavily pushing Ellas TV to customers after Home2US closed. (What happens to those customers by the way?) Perhaps an intervention from Greece for once?? This is great news though. By the way it will be ironic if Mega Cosmos is added to Dish on December 1st....six years exactly to the day it left. :LOL:

Well I did not see this one coming! According to Dish Network's Greek TV Facebook page, Mega Cosmos will be coming soon to their platform after leaving almost six years ago. http://www.facebook.com/pages/DISH-Network...109020472516999

Someone I know got Ellas TV. It looks like they fixed the delayed channels since addynia had service, because he says that the delayed channels are a true 7 hours delay. For example a show played at 8PM in Greece is played at 8PM eastern time on the delayed channel. (Well at least before the time changed, but the time changes here in a few days anyway) That seems like a pretty nice feature for these direct channels, as you can enjoy the programing in the US as it would be shown in Greece. Hopefully I can test it out as well soon and I’ll be sure to post of any pros or cons he tells me of as well.

I think you hit the nail on the head. This channel's success will depend on its catalog of movies. No one wants to watch the same movies over and over again. Hopefully ANT1 is smart about it. Well it is a very smart move on their part to offer a channel like this in a package of that price point, and in my opinion Ellas TV is now at a further disadvantage compared to Dish's package. :box: In order to get a similar channel from them, you have to subscribe to their highest package which is more than double the price. (Correct me if I am wrong.)

Interesting move! I had suggested a while back when Alter was having problems that they should just turn Alter Globe into a Greek movie channel. There is definitely a niche for a channel like this in my opinion, especially one with older films. I see ANT1 Prime was removed from the channel listing on Dish's site, but they have not added any new channel to the list yet.

Do you think it is professional for any company offering a paid service to get upset when customers or prospecting customers ask legitimate questions just because the company does not wish to answer?? Or get upset when a customer brings to light legitimate problems they are having with their service?? By your logic, everyone should just hand over their money to Ellas TV blindly, and just deal with any problems they might come across because they should be grateful that Ellas TV is offering the service in the first place. :rolleyes: And not to nitpick, but from all public account this service has not been around 2 years yet as you claim.... That being said and to be fair, as of recent it seems like Ellas TV was trying to answer people's questions and be helpful on this forum. But at the same time, one would think they would work better on their public relations as some of the responses have not been helpful at all, (And not to mention borderline rude) and they have also ignored a few questions that were asked.... I asked that earlier and still haven't gotten an answer... From one of their many sites, I see one mentions that a subscription is needed for every additional box, but I'm not sure if the subscriptions for the additional boxes on the account are full price or not.

I think you are missing the fact that addynia also subscribes to Mega Cosmos through Home2US, and does not experience the same lip sync issues with the Home2US stream of Mega Cosmos that he does with the Ellas TV stream. Therefore one would come to the conclusion that the broadcaster is not at fault in this case.

Comcast had a 250GB cap for years for all users, with no option to buy more. If you went over it a few times, they would cut your service. They just suspended it in May, in favor of studying two new approaches. They will start rolling out the new approaches next month in two test markets, and all markets will have a data cap again soon when they decide which one to go with. In both approaches though the customers will get a minimum of 300GB. http://arstechnica.com/business/2012/05/co...a-caps-for-now/ Thank you for finally answering this! :) I admit that the rates do seem low compared to other IPTV, but I assume you wouldn't put out false information about bandwidth as it is a need-to-know fact for some people because of caps. I noticed you did not answer the other two questions though, so I will post them again. Is it true that you have to pay for a second subscription (albeit not as much) if you want a second stream in your home? Why don't you list every channel you carry publicly on your website?

I admit I am not familiar AT ALL with the specifics on how Roku operates, but if what you say is true then how is WhereverTV on Roku? In fact they are listed right on their website under international (as Ελληνικ

It is funny, I don't think you or I would call Dish World IPTV a non legitimate company, but they also suggest "High-speed Internet connection of at least 1.0 Mbps (1.5 Mbps or higher is recommended)" on their site....

Alright I have a few questions then since you seem to be trying to answer them. (Some of which that I think have been asked over and over again without a solid answer) What is your bandwidth usage rate per hour? For example Netflix publicly claims that 1 hour of SD streaming from their site consumes around 1 GB. Is it true that you have to pay for a second subscription (albeit not as much) if you want a second stream in your home? Why don't you list every channel you carry publicly on your website? In all honesty, it doesn't help your image of being a legitimate business currently.

I think that's easier said than done for some. It would suck spending all that money on a set top box, then having the channels yanked if the providers get into trouble. Sure there is the Roku option (is that out yet?), but to my understanding it is best to have the Ellas TV box to take full advantage of all that they offer. (like video on demand) Going off the description on their site and what addynia wrote earlier about the Mega pack, I would guess the 30 dollar basic pack includes the different versions of Mega and Star channels.

Thanks for the info addynia, it's frustrating that this service can't just post all the necessary information on their website. I thought the point of time delay was to be able to watch the programs at the times they are broadcast in Greece. For example the program Mega Channel broadcast at 9PM Greek time would be shown at 9 PM Eastern time on the time delay channel. At least that is what I always thought was meant by "time delay". With the way it is set up now, it sounds like prime time shows are broadcast in the middle of the night on the time delay channel?! Whats the point of that?

Here is a summary of the video harlem_reporter posted above, for those who can't view it for whatever reason.

Wow, what a find! This guy names names and makes a number of claims. Here is my problem with his argument though. There very well may be a scandal like he claims with the allocation of rights for ERT World, (more than likely, this is ERT after all) but what I don't like is that he seems to think that before this scandal there were no problems and no scandals with the rights for ERT World. Maybe he should look into what went on during the years Comart held the rights. Which was a fixed allocation process as well from everything we have heard and read. There were a number of scandals that were reported on this forum during the time they held the rights, from suing UBI, to the Dish Network debacle, to ERT being forced to take down their online stream back then. I'm not saying that this makes it right, but if he wants to blow the lid off a scandal, he should go all the way back and bring everything up instead of just parts of it. It seems to me that this guy might have an agenda to get the rights back to Comart/France Telecom GlobeCast. Actually I would argue that forcing us living in North American to pay a subscription for the channel, while it is FTA on KU-band practically worldwide is the real scandal here. I'm still waiting for someone to bring up that issue.... EDIT: Wait, in the video he seems to claim that they won the rights with "dirty money" that was made from an Australian who was accused of pirating the ERT World signal. Is he talking about the UBI and Comart thing when they sued them because they were rebroadcasting the FTA signal to their subs for free? Didn't the Greek courts rule back then that UBI did nothing wrong and dismissed the case? If this guy wants to "break a scandal", maybe he should get his facts straight first. :box:

I believe at one point, ERT also had an English language newscast. If I recall correctly though, it was broadcast at some odd hour. As for subtitled programing, I believe there are a few shows currently that are broadcast with English subtitles. (I know I have seen at least one.) It will be interesting to see what exactly this new guy has in mind for ERT World. Let's hope it is nothing bad.