Quote:
Originally Posted by Media Boy
Is Gems TV set to move to HD only stream from January 26th?
In the same month Gemporia cut Jewellery Maker from Virgin Media are more cut coming to Freeview viewers?
GemsTV is currently on COM5 LCN 44 for 24 hours/day
Jewellery Maker is currently on COM6 LCN 71 between 08:00 and 13:00
LCN 72 is currently Shopping Quarter (also a Gemporia channel)
What may happen?
GemsTV moves to BBCB - Midnight to 5pm.
Jewellery Maker stays on COM6 from 8am to 1pm.
Shopping Quarter - but hours cut to 5pm to Midnight (GemsTV share stream).
https://forums.digitalspy.com/discus...ment_100269882
It may not happen and is only a mixup by Gemporia.
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I think two of the three of your possibilities are more likely than the third MB.
That FB post they did isn't half inconsistent.
The text doesn't mention HD but the graphic does. The text calls Ch45 Gems TV, the graphic calls it Gemporia.
So it seems one of their channels is getting rebranded to Gemporia Lifestyle on Freeview, and another might change from Gems TV to Gemporia. And it's possible that one of the channels is disappearing from Freeview as only 2 channels are mentioned.
"
You can also watch our Shopping Quarter channel, which features a diverse mix of programming, including Gemporia Lifestyle from 5-10pm, Gem Collector from 10-11pm and silent auctions from 11pm to midnight every day:" Source: Gemporia Website How To Watch page.
The Shopping Quarter slot on COM6 is the newest, so probably has the longest contract still to run. As the website quote says above Gemporia Lifestyle is part of the Shopping Quarter schedule already from the 5pm start time given. That all suggests to me Gems TV is moving to share with the current Shopping Quarter stream and the Shopping Quarter name is disappearing from Freeview to be replaced with the Lifestyle branding.
The Jewellery Maker slot might be difficult for Arqiva to sell if PBS don't have the money to take more of that stream, so it might remain cheap enough for JM to keep running as an early in the day slot on its own is relatively unappealing.
I can't see anything being added to PSB3 (BBCB) unless they've determined that they can't fit in more HD streams. The encoders are likely getting updated as they are having to add HD regionalisation in England anyway. The encoder updates on Virgin Media have shown the technological progress made in encoding, even recently, and how you can fit many more HD channels on a multiplex just by updating HD encoders. With COM7 closing I think they are more likely to try to add HD streams if at all possible rather than add another SD stream to the HD multiplex.