Team Summit: General Assembly Notes

**TalonDancer** · 05-16-2008 06:33 PM

Originally Posted by jerryez

110, 119, & 129 are out west. Look again

Ummm... Maybe you need to look again. 110,119 & 129 are ALL east of Alaska and Hawaii

Hence the comment about whether 148 would be part of the "Western Arc".

Talon Dancer

**chidancer** · 05-16-2008 06:37 PM

Wonder the chance (fat or slim?) of having a combination of the $9.99 essential package and one of the constantly changing hi def packages? Ok, have been one of the early optimists since we watched the original VOOM go through it's struggles, and that was before most of the national feeds we now take for granted. Sean was really insane in the old days..

and he had this great avatar..............................who ever thought we would have to go to a favorites screen to ELIMINATE some of the hi def offerings, although I am starting to enjoy the fishin' thing a little...

**AKGolf** · 05-16-2008 06:56 PM

Originally Posted by jerryez

110, 119, & 129 are out west. Look again

Alaska has no problem seeing 110 and 119, but 129's footprint doesn't reach Alaska or Hawaii. That's why we have a "special" HD package with a whopping 10 channels. I was hoping that the Western Arc at some point would include 148 which we have no problem seeing.

**Yes616** · 05-16-2008 07:03 PM

Originally Posted by jermishere

I am a DISH retailer. I do not think this was a mistake. I activated approximately 800 customers in the last 12 months and have not received 1 telephone call regarding the Voom channels being gone. When Court TV and others were taken off because of negotiations going south on a new carriage agreement, my phone rang non stop. I think there are a select view that really enjoyed these channels. And I am willing to be, that when DISH went to the 2 tier HD Packages in February most were signing up for the first tier, because the Voom channels arent that much of a draw.

I have a few questions about this. Many moving from OTA or cable (not counting Cablevision). Probably never heard of Voom. Did you tell them about these channels or did you just say you would get Voom?

Did you also program their map downs so they would never have to venture around the 9400's?

Every time I show friends and family some of the Voom's, they get very interested. Especially MonstersHD and RaveHD. But also they are not in a position (except for a few) to get satellite for various reasons.

Do you, as a retailer or installers working for you have a way to just turn these channels on for a little while and show them the channels? If not, they may not even have known they were there!

Did you activate 800 HD customers? I cannot believe none of those subscribers complained if they had those channels and knew they were there. Geez.. I hooked my mother-in-law up to HD over a year ago and she still just goes to the SD channels. (TWC in this case as she would just rather just go to channel 2 than 702). She is killing me. She wanted and pays for HD but looks at SD. Interested people need to be informed. Some of you HD subs may have just called Dish and not you to complain? I don't know.

We all know about all of this on this site but the average Joe or Jo Ann does not. Burying the channels in the 9400's did not help. Now the new HD without a SD counterpart gets a place in the upper 300's! Dam! That would have helped the Voom cause as they would have been easier to find.

If Dish and Voom had kissed and made up and a map down into the some hundred channel range and not way out in the 9400's would have helped expose them more.

Voom is no angel in this either besides the not spending enough on programming. They should advertise on main stream TV what they are so people would not know about them. I know most people never heard of Voom and that was the biggest problem.

**PopcornNMore** · 05-16-2008 07:03 PM

Originally Posted by drdroo

I guess I'm kind of disappointed here that the 722 customers will probably need a new box in order to have Sling built in or support two-way remotes.

You'd think the hardware platform wouldn't be that much different and we could have a software upgrade to enable some of this stuff.

Who knows, maybe they will offer a software upgrade but I think history suggests I'll be waiting for my 18 month to end so I can upgrade again.

I fully agree, but its all about making money and Charlie is very good at that.

**jermishere** · 05-16-2008 07:18 PM

Many moving from OTA or cable (not counting Cablevision). Probably never heard of Voom. Did you tell them about these channels or did you just say you would get Voom? Many in our area have Comcast and probably never heard of Voom. They also have never heard of MGMHD, UNIVERSALHD, SMITHSONIANHD, MOJOHD (Comcast Channel)

Did you also program their map downs so they would never have to venture around the 9400's? We always put it on the "ALL SUB" guide. We also point out that the laminated channel card and tell them their channels dont stop in the 300s

Do you, as a retailer or installers working for you have a way to just turn these channels on for a little while and show them the channels? If not, they may not even have known they were there! We do not have ability to change any programming, give free programming, give credits, etc. It would be cool if we could.

Did you activate 800 HD customers? I cannot believe none of those subscribers complained if they had those channels and knew they were there. Geez.. I hooked my mother-in-law up to HD over a year ago and she still just goes to the SD channels. (TWC in this case as she would just rather just go to channel 2 than 702). She is killing me. She wanted and pays for HD but looks at SD. Interested people need to be informed. Some of you HD subs may have just called Dish and not you to complain? I don't know. I just did a check. In the last 5 months just over 50% received HD. It is possible that they called DISH, but we usually get the call first. We're the local dealer and most customers understand that calling the main 800# number can be a little more time consuming.

I think a lot of people are still very price sensitive. Honestly, fighting the bundle is much for difficult for us. Getting a customer to change from cable because of HD is simple! We have some smaller cable companies in our area that do not even offer HD yet.

I appreciate your reply. If I had my way. There would be 5 Voom Channels. Maybe a combination of all 15. I watched 2 of them semi-regularly. Rave and Rush. Good channels. Rave's content was pretty repetitive though.

**Geronimo** · 05-16-2008 07:22 PM

Originally Posted by drdroo

I guess I'm kind of disappointed here that the 722 customers will probably need a new box in order to have Sling built in or support two-way remotes.

You'd think the hardware platform wouldn't be that much different and we could have a software upgrade to enable some of this stuff.

Who knows, maybe they will offer a software upgrade but I think history suggests I'll be waiting for my 18 month to end so I can upgrade again.

I would expect that there WOULD be differences in the hardware.

**grodd** · 05-16-2008 07:23 PM

Originally Posted by JEFFinINDY

So really, you're obsessed over the channel count, and not the quality of the programming?

There's no question that the Dish lineup is stronger today than it was a week ago.

I disagree, and in fact it's now much easier to show that Direct TV has a stronger lineup.

http://ekb.dbstalk.com/dvse-HD.htm

**jerryez** · 05-16-2008 07:44 PM

Originally Posted by TalonDancer

Ummm... Maybe you need to look again. 110,119 & 129 are ALL east of Alaska and Hawaii

Hence the comment about whether 148 would be part of the "Western Arc".

Talon Dancer

Sorry, I think of California as out west. I forget about the two other states .

**jerryez** · 05-16-2008 07:49 PM

Charlie has a long way to go to get to 100 channels this year as far as I am concerned. I have the HD only pak and only get 45 channels, plus HBO, 5 Max, Cmax, starz, and Showtime, which makes 50. He needs another 50 to get to 100. How does he come up with 81 National HD Channels, Scott.