NOW

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Discovery according to the current BT NOW EPG leaves at 11am on 30th June, whist FOX goes at 6am on 1st July.

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Some 'Entertainment' catch-up on the BTTV EPG version of the service is now being offered on the reverse EPG. The programmes accessed in this way appear to be being offered in 1080p/50fps format. So far this offering has not been extended to Sport. The only access to this at present being via the NOW App in 1080/25.

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All Sports Live channel content is now in 1080p/50fps previously some channels still ran at 25fps.

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Major news - Ad based, PEACOCK to launch later this year FOC to All Sky Customers, including NOWTV and Sky Ticket ones, across Europe including UK.

[London Lite]

NOW have discontinued the Smart Stick, which means there are no longer any devices manufactured by Roku on behalf of Sky.

Presumably this is why NOW use third party devices such as Fire Sticks, Roku and YouView which are more likely to be used by potential customers than forking out £30 for a stripped down Roku stick.

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Sky-Q IPTV launches in Germany tomorrow. Can't not see it arriving here in due course after this news. We'll see, if (and I believe when) it happens it's effects on NOW.

[London Lite]

Sky-Q IPTV launches in Germany tomorrow. Can't not see it arriving here in due course after this news. We'll see, if (and I believe when) it happens it's effects on NOW.

They may well co-exist if Sky-Q IPTV has a 12 month contract while NOW continues to be contract free.

[Brekkie]

NOW have discontinued the Smart Stick, which means there are no longer any devices manufactured by Roku on behalf of Sky.

Presumably this is why NOW use third party devices such as Fire Sticks, Roku and YouView which are more likely to be used by potential customers than forking out £30 for a stripped down Roku stick.

Not too surprising but did think the NOW TV branded stick (or previously box) was a good way of reaching people new to streaming. Roku probably has very little brand recognition here, even though they have been making the devices for them.

[London Lite]

NOW have discontinued the Smart Stick, which means there are no longer any devices manufactured by Roku on behalf of Sky.

Presumably this is why NOW use third party devices such as Fire Sticks, Roku and YouView which are more likely to be used by potential customers than forking out £30 for a stripped down Roku stick.

Not too surprising but did think the NOW TV branded stick (or previously box) was a good way of reaching people new to streaming. Roku probably has very little brand recognition here, even though they have been making the devices for them.

It helped when NOW was in it's infancy and was charging £9.99 for the original white box, but when you can buy the Fire Stick Lite for the same price as the NOW stick and get most of the main apps including Discovery+, Britbox, Netflix etc instead of who Sky did deals with to allow their apps on the platform, it's a no brainer.

[WillPS]

This has been all but confirmed for a year or so now, so not particularly surprising.

Does this mean the end of the live pausing functionality, do we know? Or will that be rolled out to other smart devices?

[BcastCornwall]

This has been all but confirmed for a year or so now, so not particularly surprising.

Does this mean the end of the live pausing functionality, do we know? Or will that be rolled out to other smart devices?

On the non NOW devices I've tried, this is dependent on the NOW software loaded onto the respective platforms, not the base platform operating system.. It works on AppleTV4K and AZFS4K that I own and use.

[JAS84]

Think I recall that's gone back to how it used to be? Wasn't Kids part of Entertainment before it was spun off into its own pass?

That's right, it's going back into the Entertainment Membership. The reason for it splitting was that customers who only use it to keep the kids entertained didn't have to pay for premium content. But with Ent losing channels like Fox and Nat Geo in the near future, it raises the value of that membership.

And the kids pack lost Disney recently.

[RegularCapital]

Think I recall that's gone back to how it used to be? Wasn't Kids part of Entertainment before it was spun off into its own pass?

That's right, it's going back into the Entertainment Membership. The reason for it splitting was that customers who only use it to keep the kids entertained didn't have to pay for premium content. But with Ent losing channels like Fox and Nat Geo in the near future, it raises the value of that membership.

And the kids pack lost Disney recently.

The Disney Channels were dropped from NOW TV in 2016, not long after the launch of DisneyLife, it was a sign of what was to come, same for the removal of Disney XD+1 on Virgin Media back in 2018. Although it's not really a Disney channel, Sky Movies Disney closed at the end of last year.

https://kidscreen.com/2016/05/04/skys-no...g-service/

[JAS84]

Ah - I'd assumed it was only removed from NOW when the Disney channels closed, or slightly before that when Disney+ launched. Didn't know it was five years ago! :oops:

[RegularCapital]

Ah - I'd assumed it was only removed from NOW when the Disney channels closed, or slightly before that when Disney+ launched. Didn't know it was five years ago! :oops:

It can be hard to track these things as so many things have happened regarding Disney over the past few years, I'm active on the International Disney Channels thread over on the Anime Superhero (formerly ToonZone) forums just to keep an eye on what's happening.