If only the Liberals hadn't killed the NBN we'd have streaming we could rely on in far more places. Optus will tinker with their tech to let live games dominate bandwidth overnight, but that won't work this time of year with early games. And Foxtel still has UCL, cups, delayed matches of the 'big 5'...
But this whole process has been completely successful one way: people have
considered Optus. And:
- They overcharge like Telstra, but without the coverage Telstra gets thanks to the old government-build Telecom infrastructure.
- My mate had a Fetch box given to him for free. It has to connect to his modem so he runs a cable the length of his house to the TV room, already annoying him, and then of course, it doesn't work well. G-lit-ch-iitch-tchhyy y.y.
- If you are eligible for their Broadband it is $20 more than iiNet or $40 more than TPG (500GB) to get the PL plans. So they're deliberately keeping PL off their competitively priced plans. i.e. this is the Telstra business model - let's hope our customers are too intimidated by tech to not swap to the much cheaper options, but of course Optus don't have Telstra's back-up argument of coverage.
- It's the same with mobiles: An Optus 6GB prepaid mobile deal is $40/mth. A 6GB postpaid 24-month contract is $80/mth. Why on earth would anyone be on a long-term contract deal? Presumably it's because they get a 'free' phone that covers the $1000 worth of difference (give it 6 months and that prepaid deal will be 10GB for $40). And to show how truly dumb Optus thinks we are, they have introduced a $85 rate, identical to their 6GB $80 plan, that gets you the EPL 'included'. But of course you need $5 for the Fetch thing to connect it to your TV. So that EPL 'included' is actually an extra $10 - a MASSIVE $5 saving!
The idea of a loss leader is it introduces people to your company
in a good way. This has just highlighted how crappy Optus are, and how dissatisifed their customers are, and it's also unified a bunch of people who will probably now hold out for a cheaper offer even if Optus relents.
As an aside, I understand that people like to rail against the Foxtel "monopoly" (which is a not a legislated monopoly) and anything Murdoch-related but increased competition will ultimately leads to consumers spending more money. Do you think Sky Sports subscribers in the UK are happy that BT broke Sky's stranglehold on football and they now have to pay for two sets of sports channels?
Competition has already given everyone on Foxtel Sports
BeIn for an additional $1/mth which all Foxtel customers have to pay on their base package.
It's crazy that they think the EPL is that big. They way they've gone about it you'd think nearly a 1/4 of the country actually tune in live every weekend!
Premier League is big and getting bigger. Don't believe Foxtel's comments to shareholders after they lost the rights. Just use your eyes and look at the streets and parks. An immigrant nation is only going to get more round-ball followers. The UCL has taken some of the attention away, but LCFC fixed that.