Virgin Media has often been criticised for having a very weak High Def line up on its cable TV platform. Today they have announced 4 more HD channels will be broadcasting on the network soon.

Living HD, FX HD, National Geographic HD and MTVN HD will be added to the platform, starting later this month. For XL TV customers with a V+ box, these will be available as part of the current package. There are ongoing discussions about adding even more HD content to the platform. Currently there is a lot of On Demand content available in HD, but only the BBC HD channel.

Virgin have confirmed a decent HD line up is one of their priorities, now that more users are HD enabled at home.

Ofcom are proposing Sky should be forced to share certain of its premium content channels with competing broadcasting companies.

Ofcome is proposing that Sky would have to offer premium channels to its rival broadcasters at regulated prices.

While users of Virgin’s cable TV service can subscribe to some of Sky’s premium channels, opening up the access would make it more feasible for other broadcasters to also show Sky’s content.

Sky are against this idea, and have threatened legal action against Ofcom. I would have thought they’d want more viewers to see the premium content. With the collapse of Setanta, Sky currently broadcasts the majority of English Premiership matches, Ofcom would like to see this spread out more so others can access and broadcast without requiring Sky TV.

Ofcom is also talking with the English Premier League about putting more limitations on the packages of matches. This would allow more broadcasters to show some of the matches.

ESPN who have bought the rights to broadcast the English Premier League matches that Setanta were due to show before they went into administration has started to broadcast on Freeview Channel 34.

While this service is encrypted, it is currently being provided free to anyone who was previously a Setanta subscriber.

The channel was added to Sky’s “News and Events” pack today, it is also available as a standalone premium channel on Virgin Media priced at £10 per month. BT are also looking to supply ESPN over the BT Vision platform.

It has been confirmed that troubled broadcaster Setanta Sports has now gone into administration, with the loss of all jobs in the UK and Ireland.

It is going to stop broadcasting shortly to customers in the UK, and will immediately cease taking payments for subscriptions. It will however continue to broadcast elsewhere.

Unable to pay the money it owed for its broadcast rights, it lost its bundles of games for both the English Premier League and the Scotish Premier League. It hoped that a rescue package could be reached, but talks broke down and this couldn’t be accomplished.

On Monday ESPN bought the rights to broadcast the 46 English Premiership matches that Setanta were due to show, and its package of 23 matches for the next 3 years. They are going to be shown on one of ESPN’s channels via Sky.

Troubled Irish broadcaster, Setanta Sports, have lost the rights to broadcast the 46 premiership games this season due to failure to pay the fees to the English Premier League.

It all looked like Setanta might be saved by a US invester, but this deal has since fallen through. The idea was for the invester to purchase 51% share of Setanta, but this now won’t happen.

The matches will be auctioned next week to make sure they do get broadcasted. They have however started to accept subscribers again, for how long this will carry on is unknown but currently they are short on requirements of subscribers to break even.

Troubled broadcaster, Setenta Sports has started accepting subscribers to its service again (as has BT) after agreeing a rescue package with American businessman Len Blavatnik.

Blavatnik has agreed to pay £20 million to fill the funding gap that Setanta currently has, this is in exchange for a 51% share in the company.

While the deal has yet to be finalised, the company has started to accept new subscriptions which indicates that it feels that it is out of trouble now.

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