[WIll_TO]

Does anyone have some insight on why Fibe doesn't provide the full on-demand content offered by TMN? For the extra $20/month and because they advertise "TMN On Demand" I would assume I'd get all available programming.

I have noticed that the TMN section has gotten beefed up a lot recently (used to only have a dozen or so HD Movies, currently it has 37)

However, if you look at http://www.themovienetwork.ca/ondemand/ even in the TMN HD Movie section there are nearly 75 films, not the 37 we have listed.

As well, MPix on demand is around HD Movies 75 films on the TMN website. All we get is "HD Spotlight". And online HD Spotlight has 40 films, only 23 of which are available on Fibe.

I would imagine that it's not 'rights management' because if Bell is purchasing TMN on demand for the customers, you would think we'd get the full experience... Why the discrepancy?

 

[MCIBUS]

Although I don't have Fibe TV and not sure about the other cable companies but Rogers TMN On Deman doesn't have "all" the TMN programing either. I believe this programs for On deman is provided by TMN itself and not the shows or moves are their. IE "Adult Movies TMN shows aren't provided. As to why TMN doesn't provide the excat same lione up they have each month for the ON Demand service that I don't know?

 

[57]

I believe that the servers/equipment that handle TMN-OD are at the service provider "head end", therefore each provider has different capabilities. Rogers Atlantic is different from Rogers Ontario. Eastlink is different, etc.

 

[WIll_TO]

I just don't understand why if it's available by TMN, the cable, sat, iptv carriers don't make it available from their head end. I mean, this is on demand after all, so bandwidth issues should not be a factor.

I feel like this is like them saying... "We have CNN available" and then you subscribe and they've blacked out CNN for 8 hours a day. I know some will say that some channels do blackout at some times (sports, TCM HD, etc.) but those are rights issues. TMN would have already negotiated the broadcast rights, so there doesn't seem to be any reason why a cable, sat, iptv provider shouldn't be providing them.

@MCIBUS If your Rogers TMN doesn't provide full content and neither does my Fibe, I wonder if any providers in the country actually provide it all. If not, why does TMN make the release lists available online?

 

[57]

Rogers Ontario probably carries everything that shows on the TMN-OD website since they're a large outfit with a huge customer base, but in smaller service areas and areas with fewer subscribers, the return on all the investment is much longer. It takes equipment, personnel, troubleshooting, time to load the movies, etc. Not sure about Cogeco or Videotron.

Rogers Atlantic has less bandwidth therefore everything that shows on Rogers website doesn't always apply to all areas and that disclaimer is usually on the website - depending on location, capabilities, etc.

If I'm wrong about the location of the servers, the rest still applies - personnel, equipment, troubleshooting, etc plus then the service provider needs bandwidth ($) back to TMN's servers. I'll see if my contact at Astral can shed some light.

Satellite doesn't offer TMN-OD since there is no realistic 2-way communication.

 

[WIll_TO]

Hi 57.

Firstly, here's a curious tidbit: today my TMN:OD HD movies section has 67 films available. Fibe is getting closer...

That would be great if you could find some background info from within Astral. I guess what has me confused is that the storage wouldn't be very large on the server's end (an extra 50 HD movies or roughly 100 hours of HD content could be stored relatively cheaply; my 320 GB STB advertises 100 hours of HD recording) and one of the main upsides of IPTV is that bandwidth is virtually unlimited (in that they only send what you are currently watching. I thought it could be rights issues, but I would imagine that the TMN-OD service would be set, like if Bell buys rights to TMN-OD, they can put it all up.

My theory on this is that the films they don't include may be ones that Fibe offers as part of their OD rental service for $4.99/rental. In that case, they don't want to cannibalize their rental service by offering the titles 'free' under TMN:OD. However, that still seems a little hokie, since it's not like I'm getting them for free, I'm paying for the TMN:OD service. Example: Friday the 13th is listed on the TMN:OD site, it's not available on Fibe, but it is available as a $4.99 rental. Could be a coincidence, but it would seem to make sense from a capitalist viewpoint.

 

[MCIBUS]

At least for Rogers not sure about others.

A movie whether its HD or SD won't appear on ON Demand till its appeared first on one of the TMN channels first.

IE if the movie HD/SD premier near the end IE FEB 25 of the month it won't appear on ON Demand until that date FEB 25 or later.

I also noticed the dates available and in some cases the movie or EP of series disappears after a certain date as well so you only have so much time to see that show or movie,some even disappear half way through the month, as to why this I don't know, Storage space? Bandwidth? Servers? Not exactly sure not to technical in this area.

 

[macjones]

to be fair, tmn on demand appears to be catching up. i have to admit, i had absolutely no idea there were that much more selection online.

recently though, the selection menus for tmn on demand have been overhauled to include categories. and the number of available movies seem to be increasing every week. it went from being around 12~15 to a solid 67 at this moment. and although mpix on demand still only features "hd spotlight", the number of offered movies there is also on the rise, now averaging around 30~40 from the just barely 8 to 10 choices of a month or two ago.

 

[WIll_TO]

Absolutely, we have been catching up fast; so maybe we can just chalk it up to growing pains with a new(ish) service

 

[macjones]

well ... mpix just dropped to 15 choices today.

personnally i can't see where those "pains" could be coming from ... it's not like where talking about an immense amount of storage; and bandwidth isn't really a factor since it's not like you use more of it watching on demand than you are watching live tv ...

a 2 TB drive could storage all of these movies easy ... those go for well under a hundred bucks .. maybe we could all chip in and get one for bell as a gift ? .........

 

[Dr.Dave]

@macjones, I think the content is licensed to the service providers until a particular date. That's probably why a lot of choices disappeared Feb. 1.

In western Canada we have Movie Central instead of TMN. With Mediaroom on MTS TV we can see the expiry date right on the program summary. Quite a few movies expire on Feb. 28.

 

[ppowell002]

Closed Captioning On Demand

I notice that my closed captioning does not work properly with On Demand. The words are garbled and unintelligible. Just wondered if anyone else experiences the same issue.
Thanks

 

[macjones]

a rant and a praise

just wanted to share that i recently had a bit of an issue trying to watch an on demand movie, happy gilmore. there was significant delay between the audio and video, as well as choppy playback at times. i had this issue a couple times when the fibe service was new in my area, but nothing ever since ... i dunno if anybody else has experienced this lately, but it sure didnt impress my friends..

on the other hand, i can't believe how much choice is available on demand when you subcribe to the movie network these days! while at times you can barely get 15 or 20 movies available on both tmn and mpix, today there is an incredible 207 movies to choose from in between the two channels ! not that i would spend 90 minutes watching each and everyone of them, but it's nice to see that they at least are offering them ...

 

[ppowell002]

Closed Captioning on Demand

I posted earlier that I get nothing but gibberish on all on-demand programming. I finally called Bell. They are working on it but think the problem is their server is incompatible with my tv. That sounds odd to me. I have a 2009 Panasonic Viera tv that worked just fine with Rogers on demand service.
Has anyone else experienced this issue?
Thanks