Dear Lifehacker,
So FOXTEL has now officially purchased AUSTAR. As a current AUSTAR customer can I reap the benefits of being a FOXTEL customer, such as bundled accounts with Telstra or other discounts? And will the the FOXTEL equipment such as IQ work with satellite, or am I stuck with my sucky Mystar to decode the satellite signals? Also why are there still price differences between FOXTEL and AUSTAR? Thanks, Star Switcher
The long-in-the-making merger of pay TV providers FOXTEL and AUSTAR finally became official this week after being approved in April. What difference does that make for existing customers? The short answer: aside from a few extra free channels, not much.
The ACCC has approved Foxtel's long-awaited takeover of Austar, although it's not without quite a few considerations.
Since last July, the ACCC has being weighing up whether Foxtel acquiring Austar would be anti-competitive, a question in which the likely future of the NBN plays a crucial role. An issues paper issued today suggests the ACCC might approve the merger, but only if Foxtel ensures that some of the content it acquires is also made available to rival IPTV providers such as FetchTV.
In practical terms, pay TV seems simple in Australia: you get Foxtel if you live in a big city, Austar if you live in a rural area, and essentially the same channels on offer through either service. Despite that, the ACCC doesn't seem too keen on letting Foxtel pursue its plan to take over Austar -- and the NBN plays a key role.
Foxtel subscribers have had access to TV downloads since last year. Now regional Australia gets its chance to burn through download limits with Austar launching its own online streaming service, Austar AnyWhere.
It's often tempting to assume Australia has five national networks, but we're frequently reminded that regional viewers have a quite different experience to people in capital cities. In the latest incident, Austar viewers have lost access to their regional ABC stations.
