TrueVisions Told To Drop 'Channel-Switching Ads'
By Khaosod Online



BANGKOK: -- The cable TV giant TrueVisions has been ordered to stop airing brief commercials displayed during channel-switching because they potentially "annoy" the viewers.

The National Broadcasting and Telecommunication Commission (NBTC) noted that the approximately 10 seconds advertisements which appear at the lower bar of the TV screen whenever the users change the channel cannot be disabled by the users, therefore forcing them to watch the "intrusive" contents.

According to NBTC, the practice violated the customers′ rights, as commercial also obstructs parts of the screen and limit the viewers′ access to the service.

The NBTC allows TrueVisions 90 days to dispute the measure to the court. In the meantime, the cable company must immediately drop the commercials per NBTC′s order, or risk facing a fine of 5 million baht plus additional 100,00 baht per day for violation.

Audiences are encouraged by the NBTC to alert the agency about any violation by calling 1200.

Source: http://www.khaosod.co.th/en/view_newsonline.php?newsid=TVRNM09ETTRNell3TVE9PQ==

-- KHAOSOD English 2013-09-06

When you are paying to watch a show, you don't want to be bombarded with commercials or advertising.

Viewers should drop true vision

This is a great development for a country like Thailand where usually it's every man for himself up against the big guys. Consumers, the regular Joe shmo Somchais of Thailand, are usually at the mercy of the business power elite.

If they are forced to drop the ads, will they also be forced to stop raising prices to cover the lost revenue?

Great, am pleased they (maybe) will be dropping the ads permanently, but I have a sneaking suspicion they will simply make the regular ad spots longer to compensate.

I don't like these things either.

A permanent feature on many channels, crap scrolling across the bottom of the screen.

Sure I can see it on news and financial channels, but Thai soaps?

Viewers should drop true vision

A sizeable amount of Thais and Brits have due to the fact they lost the EPL rights. They also charge extortionate fees for a piss poor service.

Since losing the EPL True must be on their knees due to lost revenue I went from paying 2,155 per month to 590 per month as the wife likes the Lifestyle Channel of course we have CTH at 899 per month which means I now save some 600 baht per month and have two satellite providers. HAPPY DAYS !!!!!!!!!!!!!

*whine* but Youtube does it all the tiiiiiiime!

Viewers should drop true vision

Yes, they should, but what would be the appropriate replacement, is it only CTH or are there additional cable companies as well.

Nevertheless CTH would no doubt be the first choice for westerners due to their 100% EPL view holdings.

Viewers should drop true vision

I already did this month! And amazingly, they were pulling out all the stops to keep me. They offered to cut the 2000 baht I was paying for a Gold package plus one ala cart package to only 1000 baht!!!!!

I never watch and was only looking forward to EPL, but since they don't even carry that anymore I said Sayonara. I'm perfectly happy watching bittorrented stuff and news online.

Anyway. TIP OF THE DAY: Anybody wanting a discount, call up and threaten to stop subscribing!!! They'll bend over backwards for you after years of making you bend over!

No one is forcing anyone else to read the ads. No one is forcing anyone to use True Vision. It is rather funny that some of the same people who want the government telling True Visions what to do are the same people who say they do not want the govertnment manipulating other prices. such as cooking oil, rice, etc. When politicians intrerfere in markets there is a payoff - to the politicians, and a pay loss to the people. If the politicians did not get something for their actions (votes and/or money) they would not be bothered. The real question is whether or not the TV component of True can survive without the ads? According to Wikipedia True Visions has about 1.4 million subscribers. If there are really objections to the ads, shouldn't the majority of the paying subscribers be the ones to determine that? And if the imnpacts of dropping the ads involve higher subscription fees, how many of the subscribers will be willing to get rid of those ads? If a feww people complaining can dictate to the majority of paying customers, that is a formula for disaster.

The rational approach is to decide whether or not keeping True Visions is worth more to you than the fee.

1) If the value of keeping True is worth more to you than the subscription fee, then don't srop your subscritpion.

2) If the money is worth more to you than the value you get from keeping True Visions, then you should drop your subscription.

Viewers should drop true vision

A sizeable amount of Thais and Brits have due to the fact they lost the EPL rights. They also charge extortionate fees for a piss poor service.

"A sizeable amount of Thais and Brits ..."

I doubt you have any idea how many have dropped the service. Just because a few of your friends have thrown a tantrum, doesn't project to a mass defection of subscribers

approximately 10 seconds advertisements which appear at the lower bar of the TV screen whenever the users change the channel cannot be disabled by the users

The fairly large channel indicator at the bottom of the screen that appears when changing channels and sometimes has an ad on it , disappears immediately if I hit "OK" once again. Somewhat annoying, but the effort to push one button isn't too exhausting.

On the other hand, some of the channels have pop-up ads about upcoming programming that appear, including Fox, HBO, Nat Geo, History ...

True doesn't have any control over that.

As far as the alleged "piss poor" service is concerned, that seems an exaggeration. I recall only one loss of service for an hour or two in the past 5 years. Occasional sun spot issues, but once again that's not something True has any control over.

The loss of whatever football content has obviously caused a problem for some, but other than that the quality of programs available is more a problem with the people at STAR/Fox, HBO, BBCE, etc. True doesn't produce the English language programming. They just buy it and pass it on and there are limits to what's available. I agree a lot of it seems aimed at the brain-dead demographic subset in the English speaking segment of the population, but I doubt True can raise the intelligence level of that community. Aside from the football, most of the Thai speakers seem to stick to the Thai language programming. Not positive, but I doubt many of them gravitate to 40 year old reruns of Fawlty Towers.

What is really annoying is half the screen being obscured by logos!

perhaps they can stop the website switching too :/

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/665817-anyone-know-about-parkingps-virus/

Been here for 13 years since they were UBC. I recall UBC then saying that they had to charge so much because they, unlike other cable operators, were unable to show ads. There were numerous press articles quoting them as saying this, and in responses to complaints in Bangkok Post's Potsbag. Lo and behold, some years ago they were allowed to carry ads and did they decrease the subscription fees? Of course not.

They replied to my emails on this subject by saying they were investing in new, better technologies and new programming which cost them an arm and a leg and therefore they would not be reducing the fees.

And now they are preparing us for a 2nd channel change this year (they did 2 or 3 last year, too).

I migrated my mobile from TrueMove to AIS last year and what a breath of fresh air that was. Unfortunately they have me by the short and curlies for cable, fixed line and internet.

It is without doubt, my most disliked brand in Thailand and typical of a company that puts shareholders before customer. I hope one day their greed brings them to their knees.

Viewers should drop true vision

I already did this month! And amazingly, they were pulling out all the stops to keep me. They offered to cut the 2000 baht I was paying for a Gold package plus one ala cart package to only 1000 baht!!!!!

I never watch and was only looking forward to EPL, but since they don't even carry that anymore I said Sayonara. I'm perfectly happy watching bittorrented stuff and news online.

Anyway. TIP OF THE DAY: Anybody wanting a discount, call up and threaten to stop subscribing!!! They'll bend over backwards for you after years of making you bend over!

Sounds like a great tip. I will give them a call because for 13 years they have offered me squat for my loyalty. I'll post back how much they bend over! Thanks SpermWhale

what is with all the acronyms ? epl cth etc.

I used to be very critical of True Visions but since their upgrade to MPEG4 and HD last year picture and sound quality are now equal to the best - the likes of BSkYB and Astro. They have several good quality programmes with the notable additions of H2 and Life Inspired this year. I have to admit to preferring tennis and golf to soccer so the loss of EPL is no deal breaker for me. I do wish True would add Sky News HD though which I used to watch on Astro.

As regards CTH, 900 Baht/ month is expensive for a programme package that has little more to offer than EPL (for footy followers) even if it does also have Sky News HD:) Otherwise, the rest of their sole package comprises some second tier offshoots of main brands which are shown on True Visions (e.g. National Geographic Wild rather than National Geographic) and programmes that are already available free-to-air with C-Band dishes (e.g. Australia Network, France 24, Euronews). There is no History Channel or Discovery Channel; also none of the BBC Enterprises programmes such BBC Entertainment and Lifestyle.

No one is forcing anyone else to read the ads. No one is forcing anyone to use True Vision. It is rather funny that some of the same people who want the government telling True Visions what to do are the same people who say they do not want the govertnment manipulating other prices. such as cooking oil, rice, etc. When politicians intrerfere in markets there is a payoff - to the politicians, and a pay loss to the people. If the politicians did not get something for their actions (votes and/or money) they would not be bothered. The real question is whether or not the TV component of True can survive without the ads? According to Wikipedia True Visions has about 1.4 million subscribers. If there are really objections to the ads, shouldn't the majority of the paying subscribers be the ones to determine that? And if the imnpacts of dropping the ads involve higher subscription fees, how many of the subscribers will be willing to get rid of those ads? If a feww people complaining can dictate to the majority of paying customers, that is a formula for disaster.

The rational approach is to decide whether or not keeping True Visions is worth more to you than the fee.

1) If the value of keeping True is worth more to you than the subscription fee, then don't srop your subscritpion.

2) If the money is worth more to you than the value you get from keeping True Visions, then you should drop your subscription.

True vision are charging you for movies etc, and also showing adverts. That is wrong it should be one or the other. I also don't think this only applies to Thailand, I believe it applies in all countries.

*whine* but Youtube does it all the tiiiiiiime!

Youtube is "FREE" so you cant really complain about that.

You don't like it ?... Don't use it.....

A post discussing illegal viewing has been removed.

I bet they find some way to dodge this. Like they'll stop channel switching ads and just show them all the time, or insert 30 minutes of ads (think cinemas) whenever you turn on your TV...or something else equally irritating.

Their upcoming 'channel realignment' would be a good time to unveil new tricks. It's not like they'll be too busy improving anything. All they do is move the channels around, totally screw up programming for three or four days, confuse everyone and then claim to have given everyone a vastly superior product. Kind of like supermarkets moving products around to force customers to roam the store looking for whatever they came in to buy.

Most technologically adept countries had better cable TV 30 years ago. Amazing how inept True is when it comes to providing decent service and how creative they can be when it comes to abusing their customer base.

True visions is starting to annoy me, especially since they changed all their channels around, I really need to go on the full package to see a decent selection i think.. I've heard about the dodgy pay tv places that can set you up, anyone have experience with these?

I just moved from the dodgy channels ( Vietnamese) to True Platinum the viemamese channels to ofte are 'srambled' due to the fact no decoding through internet sometime for hours even days..........................

I have the ( 6) openbox receivers for sale at any reasonable offer, and they work for the 'normal' free channels as well, interested PM me

Viewers should drop true vision

A sizeable amount of Thais and Brits have due to the fact they lost the EPL rights. They also charge extortionate fees for a piss poor service.

Oo a whole 3,000B for 4 HD Boxes.

and how much does your beloved cable operator charge for the same service?

Soccers not the only sport in the world.

*whine* but Youtube does it all the tiiiiiiime!

...but we're not made to pay extortionate monthly fees to watch YouTube..!

Viewers should drop true vision

A sizeable amount of Thais and Brits have due to the fact they lost the EPL rights. They also charge extortionate fees for a piss poor service.

"A sizeable amount of Thais and Brits ..."

I doubt you have any idea how many have dropped the service. Just because a few of your friends have thrown a tantrum, doesn't project to a mass defection of subscribers

You are correct I have no idea the exact amount and was merely putting my opinion across, perhaps I should have led with 'I'd imagine' to keep you happy, this is after all a message board where opinions are allowed isn't it? For the record the 6 Brits & 4 Thais I work with have all dropped TV for the same reason. No EPL and overpriced for what remained. That's 100% of my work colleagues, even if that was reciprocated divided by 10 it would still represent a 'sizeable' amount of their customer base. The fact a poster on this thread was offered the same package half price when he called to cancel in a way indicates all is not well at TV.

I am not at all a fan of True Visions, indeed, I am still waiting for the return of my deposit following my cancellation of their service about three years ago - I'm not holding my breath by the way...!

Anyway, as something of an aside to the gist of this thread, every day in Thailand, we see someone being killed, maimed, robbed of a husband/wife/child, robbed of their ability to make a living, or robbed of their freedom, and find that the penalties against those responsible are really quite abysmal. For example, only yesterday we heard of an innocent person who was locked up for two years, based upon poor police work, and who was awarded a total of 300,000 baht or so (about GBP3,000 for each year of freedom lost).

Yet, the authoritative body for TV service providers has the power to apply a 5 million baht fine, with an additional 100,000 baht payment for every day that the TV service provider fails to comply.

Where on earth do they get the idea that pop-up ads on TV are a more heinous crime than taking away someone's livelihood?

True visions is starting to annoy me, especially since they changed all their channels around, I really need to go on the full package to see a decent selection i think.. I've heard about the dodgy pay tv places that can set you up, anyone have experience with these?

Yea there was a copy (hacked) Astro Tv Sat Tv Set top boxes, cost 250 Baht per Month,Now Malaysian stopped the transmission in Thailand so now have to get the True visions and lose the money it did cost for the Astro Dish and top box 6000 Baht for installing,