BBC / Sky Sports

[forty-two]

Seems to be the most popular one at the moment.

But the epetitions website seems on the brink of falling over. Did our wonderful government perhaps underestimate how many people might want to use the website?

[Diesel]

It does seem to be struggling a little bit. Still, please try to spread the link around through as many mediums as possible, my worry is now everything has cooled down this petition, which is an official one, might not get as much attention.

If we can get it discussed in the houses of parliment they might rethink the decision not to protect F1 coverage - which they opted not to earlier this year.

For those of you not in the UK, things like the world cup are protected in the UK such that they must be broadcast free to air. F1 is not, the government had an option to protect it earlier this year, but opted not to. Lets see if we can atleast get them to rethink that decision.

[SiLo]

Signed the petition and posted it to as many places as possible, hopefully the ball will get rolling and we can get some more signatures! Someone should post it to Autosport forums too.

[richard_leeds]

the government had an option to protect it earlier this year, but opted not to

After convivial lunch with executives from Sky and neglecting the fact that their constituents will be out of pocket, and tax revenue will go down.

[Pup]

I want to sincerely urge you technical boffins to work together (perhaps PMs?) to work out a workaround that is understandable, accessible, and usable by the average F1 fan. The ideal goal is to have thousands (at least) F1 fans watching the races FREE -- and legally. I ask not for myself: my 70-hour weeks provide me with enough filthy lucre to buy the cable package that includes Speed.

Just out of curiosity, at what point do you declare victory in this plan? Is it when the BBC's numbers fall enough that their already tenuous support for F1 drops to zero and they cancel their contract entirely, or is it after Sky realizes that their subscriber base isn't rising enough so they decide to supplement their revenue with adverts during the race?

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

It cannot be free and legal. Unless you run RTL with BBC radio 5 commentary which will be out of sync and kilter with that of the german feed.

So you pay up, or you use less reputable means on the internet to source F1 live.

[richard_leeds]

Just out of curiosity, at what point do you declare victory in this plan? Is it when the BBC's numbers fall enough that their already tenuous support for F1 drops to zero and they cancel their contract entirely, or is it after Sky realizes that their subscriber base isn't rising enough so they decide to supplement their revenue with adverts during the race?

The only possibility of victory is if F1 teams, circuits and FOM need to return to free to air to get viewer numbers to satisfy their sponsors.

Sky will see this as further strengthening their dominant grip on sports broadcasting, it's a strategic move to weaken their competitors. They have a track record of building a dominant position even when they make losses. Once F1 is in their grasp they will not let go.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Sk ... ng#Finance

[Pup]

The only possibility of victory is if F1 teams, circuits and FOM need to return to free to air to get viewer numbers to satisfy their sponsors.

I wonder how many teams' sponsors are heavily dependent on the UK market. McLaren come to mind, since their Santander sponsorship seems to be entirely geared toward the UK, but what of the others?

Surely many of the sponsors target the UK market along with the rest of the world, but I'm talking about those who are primarily targeting the UK. What I'm getting at is that if the UK is, say, 5% of the F1 market, and the Sky deal reduced that number by, worst case, half, then the average sponsor is only looking at a 2-3% drop in penetration overall, which is within the yearly fluctuations of the viewership anyway. And of the viewers who drop out, you of course have to ask if they were ever in the sponsor's demographics to begin with. That is, Mercedes or Tag Heuer probably don't care if someone who can't afford the price of Sky drops out of the market, harsh as that may sound; though someone like Santander might. That's what I meant when I suggested that the Sky viewership might well be more valuable to many sponsors, even if it's smaller.

[Diesel]

I highly doubt the UK is only 5% of the F1 market. Where are you getting these figures?

[Pup]

I highly doubt the UK is only 5% of the F1 market. Where are you getting these figures?

According to this, the UK market was 4.8%, at least in 2008...

http://www.paddocktalk.com/news/html/mo ... sid=100719

Formula one's global television audience grew in 2008, a report by the sport's commercial authority has revealed. The figures for last season jumped to 600m per race, which is 3 million more than in 2007, F1's official Global Broadcast Report said. Italy, with nearly 38 million viewers in 2008, remains the leading television market in Europe, but the British market jumped 7 per cent to over 29 million viewers per race as Lewis Hamilton drove to the title.

But I don't know how these numbers are calculated - they all seem very high, as I've read in multiple other places that the BBC's F1 audience averages about 5mil, with peaks in the 7-8mil range. Households vs viewers, I'd guess, but I know that FOM has been criticized in the past for grossly inflating it's viewer numbers. But since all of the numbers above came from FOM, I figure its safe to assume that they are all inflated equally.

[forty-two]

Just a few thoughts on this one...

- Back in 2008, we had ITV covering the races, ads every ten minutes etc.
- Since 2009 the BBC have done a great job of the coverage, that must increase figures?
- We've had two English WDCs since then, this must have increased the appeal?
- For the first time in a long time, at any given race there is a chance that one of the three (2) British drivers might be on the podium.

I guess these figures are always a bit skewed as their sample size is tiny, and the BBC are unable to actually tell how many people are watching at any one moment. In addition to this, I don't know if the data gathering is carried out in the same way in every country.

Whatever the figures might actually be, I expect there's one person viewing illegally (via a web proxy to iPlayer) for every three viewing legally, and these numbers can never be accurately judged. Granted, these people aren't contributing to the TV license, but they are still being exposed to the sponsorship on the cars/drivers/circuits.

[Pup]

You might take a look through this thread on Atlas, as it covers this subject in detail with what seems to be a lot more authority than certainly I can offer...

A detailed look into UK F1 television ratings

Long story short, the UK is a bit under 5% of the total F1 TV market. But as I said, that 5% might be incredibly valuable to some sponsors, and completely irrelevant to others.

[wesley123]

You might take a look through this thread on Atlas, as it covers this subject in detail with what seems to be a lot more authority than certainly I can offer...

A detailed look into UK F1 television ratings

Long story short, the UK is a bit under 5% of the total F1 TV market. But as I said, that 5% might be incredibly valuable to some sponsors, and completely irrelevant to others.

How are these ratings actually used? I mean, from the amount of viewers there still are a lot outsude the UK, and a lot of those outside the UK cant even get a Sky subscription if they wanted to. That is even a worse concern, they are now effectively blocking whole Formula 1 for me and a lot of others. Sure I can watch in my own country, but that is so ridiculously bad, it makes you cry, Germany isnt an option either, since well, I hate Germany(Sorry guys). The excuse of Globalisation is an complete joke, Sky serves like 5 country's or so, and BBC is available for most of europe, and I believe a lot of countries out of Europe can receive BBC too.

[Diesel]

You might take a look through this thread on Atlas, as it covers this subject in detail with what seems to be a lot more authority than certainly I can offer...

A detailed look into UK F1 television ratings

Long story short, the UK is a bit under 5% of the total F1 TV market. But as I said, that 5% might be incredibly valuable to some sponsors, and completely irrelevant to others.

Can you please post a reputable source for TV ratings, something a bit more official? A bunch of users pulling together stats from several different sources is hardly reliable.

Can we get a hard copy of the "Global Broadcast report from FOM" ? Have they issued one for 2009 onwards? I am sure as hell popularity of F1 in the UK increased massively after Lewis won the WDC, and then even more so when JB did it.

[Pup]

I'll be glad to entertain any contradictory figures you can find.