That price rise - vote now!

Sorry about the delay in adding the poll to gauge reaction to the announcement of yet another price hike due early in 2016 - you can vote now.

Time to get angry - yet another Virgin Media price hike announced

I've just about had enough of this - anyone else feel the same? A poll top right to assess the customer reaction to yet another price hike. Here's the story:

Virgin Media customers who are signed up to one of the company's "Big Bundles" will soon see their monthly bill get an inflation-busting price increase. The cable provider says "the vast majority" of subscribers will see their packages rise by up to 5.4 percent (between £3.49 and £3.99 a month), which will include a £1 line rental increase. The changes won't happen right away -- they'll come into effect next February.
The pricing breaks down as follows: customers on a Big Connection or Big Easy package will have an extra £3.49 bolted on to their monthly bill. Those on the Big Bang, Big Kahuna, Big Daddy plans will get the slightly larger £3.99 increase. Broadband-only customers who were lumped with a bigger bill in November are exempt from Virgin Media's latest price review.
The timing of the hike has prompted many Virgin Media customers to voice their displeasure on social media. When the company bumped its top broadband speed up to 200Mbps at the end of September, it said the boost would incur no extra charge. However, just six weeks later, many of those customers are now receiving notice of a price increase.

New in November on Netflix UK

(Stuff I'd recommend is highlighted in bold, and the links are to a site I've just found called The List which looks pretty neat.

1 November 
Awake: The Life Of Yogananda
The Captains
Chaos on the Bridge
Chicken Run
Dominion Creek: Season 1
Doomsdays
The Duchess
Enemy at the Gates
Laid: Seasons 1 and 2
Home Alone
Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
Moving Art: Underwater
Moving Art: Waterfalls
The Seven Deadly Sins: Season 1
Slingshot
Still Game: Seasons 1, 2, 3
The Thread
Twinsters
Urban Legends: Season 3
Velvet: Seasons 1 and 2

4 November
Big Momma's House
Shutter

6 November
Master of None: Season 1

10 November
Big Eden

11 November
The French Connection
That Thing You Do!

13 November
Call Me Lucky
John Mulaney: The Comeback Kid
Jungle Book 2
Some Kind Of Wonderful
With Bob & David: Season 1 (what Bob Odenkirk did before Breaking Bad)

14 November
Nebraska

15 November
Bad Blood
The Brittany Murphy Story
Don't Look Back
Fear
Mandie and the Forgotten Christmas
Meet My Valentine
Nanny Cam
The Voices

16 November
Happily N'Ever After
Testament of Youth

18 November
Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Life Without Dick
Lords of Dogtown
Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List
Stuart Little 3: Call of the Wild

20 November
Marvel’s Jessica Jones (looks promising: in the same space as the excellent Daredevil series)

22 November
Love is Strange
Pound Of Flesh

23 November
Mortdecai (it's that Johnnie Depp movie that bombed. Approach with caution but it might be fun)

24 November
The Haunted Hathaways

25 November
Beavis and Butt-head Do America
King Solomon's Mines
Red Riding Hood
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
Some Kind of Wonderful

28 November
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues
Best of Enemies

29 November
Force Majeure

I've been watching almost exclusively Netflix in recent weeks, catching up with The Bridge and Line of Duty. Still great value for the £5.99 I pay each month (early adopter) and it does make me wonder why I pay so much for the hundreds of channels I never watch. Anyone else feel like that?

TiVo passes four million customers

TiVo announced this week that it has passed four million customers, mainly thanks to its success at overseas cable companies:

Tivo today announced that the company has surpassed 4 million international subscriptions through its traditional TiVo offering. This announcement represents an important milestone in TiVo's international growth and comes as the result of accelerated subscription growth in Europe through customers such as Virgin Media/Liberty Global in the United Kingdom, ONO/Vodafone in Spain, and Com Hem in Sweden -- each respectively the largest cable company in their country.
"TiVo continues to offer one of the most compelling experiences for international television operators through the ability to integrate traditional linear content, video on demand and internet streaming services, such as Netflix, all in one interface on the television or on mobile devices such as the tablet or smartphone," said David Sandford, Vice President, General Manager, International at TiVo. "Our recent acquisition of Cubiware has expanded our ability to service international markets allowing us to offer products to almost every television operator regardless of size or ARPU in a given market. We now offer a portfolio of products to large, medium and small sized operators seeking a diverse array of products and features to serve a wide spectrum of subscribers."

More on CNN Money.

Lifetime and H2 in HD, arriving December 1st 2015

Be still my beating heart.
Dateline Hollywood has reported that;

John Malone’s Liberty Global [owner of Virgin Media] has extended its distribution deal with A+E Networks and is also launching two new HD channels in the UK. The long-term pan-European carriage deal covers A+E Networks’ UK channels on Liberty Global platforms in the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland, Romania, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Lifetime and H2 will be also now be available in HD in both the UK and Ireland for the first time. 

But still no History Channel HD on Virgin Media? Surely that would have been the obvious one to add? After all, according to A&E:

“H2 allows us to expand on the quality content available on our flagship History channel by representing the very heart of the History brand as well as offering viewers more information, more facts and even more entertainment.”

Sounds a bit like having ITV2 without ITV. Even odder it's reported that H2 is closing down and being replaced by new channel Viceland.
In other news on the VM channel lineup...oh, there isn't any. No more rumours of Sky Atlantic or Universal HD or AMC or an Amazon Instant Video app or anything. Been a dull year, notable only for price hikes and broadband speed promises.

UPDATE: Lifetime HD has arrived early (9th November) on 209 (thanks for the tip, Media Boy)

US TiVo Bolt reviews

TiVo Bolt commercial :-)

Blogger delays on VMHD

Apologies to a number of guys who attempted to post comments on a number of recent posts - Spam filters on Blogger have been a little over enthusiastic of late. All comments incorrectly quarantined have now been published.

4k TV inevitable?

"No," says a broadcasting pro in this interesting piece from TechRadar: The TV industry wants you to go 4K, but the professionals won't be joining you. Are we in danger of falling for the manufacturers hype again?

"In 2013 the average UK screen size in the UK was 36.8 inches (diagonal). At this time Sharp was predicting that by 2015 the average screen size would be 60". Here we are in 2015 and the latest BARB research suggests that the majority of UK homes own a main screen in the 35-50" range. Only some 3% of homes have a 51"+ size screen."

For me that's the hard reality of the dimensions of the average UK home. As I walked the other night around the streets where I live I was amazed to see how many large panels are bolted (too) high on living room walls, but I reckon few if any are over 50 inches.  Living rooms just aren't big enough, and no-one really likes sitting in the front row of the cinema, do they? Worst seat in the house.
So 4K to my mind will only become dominant if it comes with a telly whether you want it or not. Much like 3D, broadcasters will struggle with the bandwidth requirements and lack of content, and in a market where DVDs still outsell Blu-Ray discs the appetite for greater than 1080p resolution is questionable, especially if it comes at a premium.
There's more to 4K than just packing in the pixels, but I can't see people upgrading solely to get the upscaled content and odd BT or Sky channel.

New on Netflix UK in October

Here are some of this month's Netflix new arrivals, courtesy of Vodzilla:

Scream: Season 1 – 1st October

Stewart Lee: 41st Best Stand Up Ever – TBC

Atlantis: Season 1 – 1st October

About Time – 3rd October

A time travel rom-com from Richard Curtis

What We Do in the Shadows – 10th October

Brilliant comedy from the Flight of the Concords guys

The Pirates! Band of Misfits – 10th October

Better known in the UK as "Pirates in Adventures with Scientists". From Aardman Animation and top stuff.

The Muppets – Sunday 11th October

The 2011 movie

Homeland: Season 4 – 12th October

Season 4 of the spy thriller arrives just in time for Season 5’s broadcast on Channel 4

Archer: Season 6 – 15th October

Super – 15th October

Beasts of No Nation – 16th October

Idris Elba stars in Netflix’s first ever original feature film. 

All Hail King Julien: Season 2 – 16th October

Netflix’s Madagascar spin-off

Alfie (2004) – 17th October

Jude Law remake

American Horror Story: Freak Show – 21st October

Just disturbing...

Kung Fury – 22nd October

How to Get Away with Murder: Season 1 – 22nd October

Hit US show stars Emmy winning Viola Davis 

Saving Mr. Banks – 24th October