Sky TV the dominant pay per view satellite TV company are being accused of trying to block free digital TV in the UK.

The company have been told in no uncertain terms by British Telecom (BT) to stop trying to stifle its next gen free didgital TV ‘Project Canvas’.

Project Canvas is the brainchild of the BBC and ITV networks with BT acting as the broadband provider. It mixes together HD television and r
adio from a settop box and will be a free of charge service.

Project Canvas is the latest attemp at an online TV service after the closure of the project Kangaroo broadband TV Freeview service which was halted due to an unfair monopoly on the sector and that it would ‘lessen competition’. See Project Kangaroo killed before it can walk

Services expected from the new TV project include catch up tv and on demand viewing, web content and interactive television too.

The proposal has been hailed as “potentially the Holy Grail of future public service broadcasting provision in the UK” by the BBC’s director general, Mark Thompson.

However, Sky has put their oar in by calling for an Office of Fair Trading investigation and has said they will vigorously contest any moves to establish a digital terrestrial free TV venture that cuts across its satellite service.

Dan Marks, chief executive of BT Vision who is fronting the Canvas project said:- “We intend to make the most strenuous remonstrations with the regulator about any attempts by Sky to block what represents an open and competitive delivery of an exciting and important new era of rich digital free TV for all of Britain’s consumers,”.

Dan was employed by BT in 2006 to set up BT vision and is a former Hollywood-based Academy Award and Sundance Film Festival winning documentary filmmaker.

Marks also commented that whilst Sky “is a very big company” it has, to date, attracted significantly less than half of the UK’s 24 million TV households, with the bulk of the rest plumping for Freeview services.

He also said that he was “very confident” that the BBC Trust will approve the plan for the service.

“Canvas is primed to step up a gear on what is available by offering all those customers who already have a free subscription a better television service. It is clearly and overwhelmingly a great proposition for all concerned, from content and internet service providers onto the consumer.”

Sky like all the bloated self serving satellite and cable companies want us, the viewing public to keep paying through the nose. But the internet TV change is happening now so they better get used to it.

Related posts:

1. BBC Deliver More Details About Project Canvas
2. Project Canvas Online TV Could Be Approved This Week
3. Project Canvas TV on Demand Project Could Be Delayed Until 2011
4. Channel 4 Jump Aboard Project Canvas
5. Project Canvas Shows The Future Of Internet TV