Jam Packed Edition

I was saddened but not surprised to see the news from Linda Moss yesterday of the domestic demise of VOOM HD Networks.

VOOM was ahead of its time when it was its own DBS service.  And the VOOM spirit lived on after the demise of the DBS service when 15 of the VOOM channels moved onto Dish Network.  It was sad to see VOOMs amazing programming slowly turn into nothing more then HD demo material as VOOM turned into repeat city.

In May Dish Network dropped 10 of the 15 VOOM channels, they wanted to keep the 5 most popular channels on their service, but I understand that VOOM was not happy and told Dish to offer all the channels or nothing.  Dish not liking ultimatums pulled the remaining 5 VOOM HD channels from their lineup the next day.

I believe that VOOM would still be on Dish today if the Rainbow Media folks would have worked with Dish Network to fine tune their services.  But instead of calmly working to end the dispute lawyers got involved, and we all know how those things turn out.

I still wake up wishing I had VOOM’s RAVE HD channel, and many people tell me daily that they miss Monsters HD.  Now that the plug is being pulled on VOOM perhaps Rainbow can take the material in their library and offer some great new channels to cable and satellite providers without requiring them to carry 15 channels.

Dish Network Announces Price Increase

Yesterday afternoon Dish Network held its monthly Retailer Chat.  On yesterdays edition they announced new programming package names, new satellite receiver names and new pricing, all of which take effect on February 1^st, 2009.

The new program package name are kind of silly, gone are the “Americas Top” names instead packages like “Americas Top 100” becomes “Classic Bronze 100”,  “Americas Top 200” becomes “Classic Silver 200.”  For a complete list of the new names please CLICK HERE.

Dish Networks satellite receivers are all being renamed as well.  A Dish 722 will be known as the “Enhanced HD Duo DVR Receiver” a Dish 311 will be known as a “Solo Receiver.”  This renaming is supposed to help consumers know what their receiver offers them, but I find it confusing. CLICK HERE for a list of the new receiver names.

Finally prices are changing on February 1^st.  In Dish Networks new Turbo Dish packages the prices will be going up anywhere from $5.00 to $10 a month. Dish Networks classic standard definition packages will be going up $2 to $3 a month. 

For a full recap of the retailer chat you can CLICK HERE.

Bubba the Love Sponge

Good news for fans of the Bubba the Love Sponge show, it was announced this morning that Bubba and his crew have reached a two year deal to remain at Sirius XM Satellite Radio.

Today was going to be Bubba’s last show on Sirius XM, but instead of a farewell show they had a celebration.  Congrats to Bubba and his entire crew!

Wow what a week

I talked about in previous editions of The Satellite Dish how hard it is to write this column sometimes as there is no news in the industry.

Over the past two weeks the floodgates have opened!  Just in the last two weeks alone I have written 10 editions of The Satellite Dish!  That’s way over my “quota” of 3 a week!

It feels good to have this much news flowing, and I enjoy bringing it to you!  Thank you for reading!

Happy Holidays & Have a great weekend!