The news - pt1
BT has at last launched its long-heralded BT Vision video-on-demand service - see, BT readies download-to-own and video-on-demand services - and is making great play of its low cost. There are, it says, no monthly charge - unlike, say, Sky, NTL or Telewest - and a digital-terrestrial TV Freeview personal video recorder comes free. In addition, there's replay TV to let you view programmes broadcast during the previous week.
All content is pay-per-view - well, in BT's own headlines it is - but, like the costs, things are other than they seem. The Freeview PVR - BT calls it the V-box - is said to be able to "instantly stream" pay-per-view content coming in via broadband. But it's only free if you ignore the £60 BT is charging for installation and the further £30 it levies for connection. Self-install is coming some time next year, apparently, though we don't know when.
There's another big gotcha as well. The service is only available to those who with a 2Mb-capable broadband connection who are signed up to BT Total Broadband - and that means paying a monthly subscription. This is either £23 or £27, depending on quite what options you want.
There's an £18 broadband option, too, but this lacks the necessary hub and buying that adds £50 to the cost (though only £30 if bought on line) and requires you to pay £199 for the BT Vision PVR on top of the installation and connection charges.
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All three broadband packages, in turn, require you to pay out for a BT telephone line - adding what we think of as a further £11 monthly subscription.
So, the monthly outlay required - even before you get a single fancy TV service - is £34 or £38 (or £29 if you're prepared to consider the 2GB-capped £18pm broadband offering).
And, of course, the fact that a phone line and broadband are required underscores why BT has gone down this route. It's desperate to find a way to stop losing phone customers to other comms companies and, if possible, reverse this trend and also keeping on growing its broadband base - something it's largely been doing by acquisitions rather than the attractiveness of its broadband offerings.
Home entertainment services, it clearly believes, are the way to achieve this and to find out what they consist of (as much as that's possible for us to tell you), dive over to page two...
