Broadcasting Complaints Commission to decide if StarSat will be fined up to R60 000 after it broadcast its porn channels for a month without authorisation.

The Broadcasting Complaints Commission of South Africa (BCCSA) will have to decide what fine to level against On Digital Broadcasting (ODM) and StarTimes Media South Africa's StarSat satellite pay-TV platform after it broadcast it hardcore pornographic TV channels illegally for a month.

The BCCSA will decide whether StarSat, which kept broadcasting its porn channels, has been in breach of the BCCSA's Subscription Service Licencees' Code of Conduct, and what fine to level against ODM.

In a case before the BCCSA, the commission heard that StarSat kept broadcasting its set of sex channels in South Africa illegally and without being authorised to do so, from 10 December 2014 to 6 January 2015.

On 3 November 2014, Judge Lee Bozalek in a Western Cape High Court judgment, found against ODM and StarTimes Media SA's sex TV channels and that the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) erred in the licensing and licensing process of granting a licence for the porn channels.

ODM filed an appeal which was dismissed on 10 December, and ODM then applied to the Supreme Court of Appeal on 7 January 215 for leave to appeal which was also dismissed with cost to ODM.

"StarSat was required by law to stop broadcasting from December 10. They refused to do so," said Greta Engelbrecht for the Justice Alliance of South Africa (Jasa) on Tuesday in the case before the BCCSA.

"For the period 10 December 2014 to 6 January 2015, StarSat illegally and with impunity, broadcast the unauthorised channels," said Gerda Engelbrecht.

"We need to give a message to broadcasters who broadcast without authorisation. It is not a question of content , but a question of broadcasting."

Jasa asked the BCCSA to level a fine of R60 000 against ODM and StarSat.

Steve Budlender representing ODM before the BCCSA told the commission that ODM did infringe on the broadcasting code but called it "a technical infringement".

ODM revealed that 284 StarSat subscribers accessed the pornographic TV channels during the period.

The sex channels cost subscribers R159 per month and StarSat continued to broadcast PlayboyTV and Private Spice which has since been changed to the Brazzers porn channel.

Opposition grows against StarSat's pornographic TV channels; court case to have porn TV license reversed, likely to be heard in August.

Opposition in South Africa has been growing against the pornographic television that is broadcast by On Digital Media's (ODM) StarSat pay-TV platform, with a court case that will likely be heard in August in a now joint application to have ODM's license for a porn bouquet revoked.

ODM, with the help of its new Chinese financial backer StarTimes, started broadcasting two pornographic TV channels - Private Spice and Playboy TV - in a separate StarSat sex TV package of R159 per month in November 2013, shortly after receiving a license from the South African broadcasting regulator, the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa).

On Digital Media, asked last week how many StarSat subscribers have since subscribed to the porn TV channels as a separate bouquet over the course of the last 6 months, declined to provide subscriber numbers, citing confidential company information.

Subscriber numbers for the four year old Woodmead based South African pay-TV operator, currently in business rescue, is down to between 100 000 and 120 000 from 150 000 a few years ago.

The non-govermental organisation Doctors for Life, representing 1 400 doctors, that submitted its separate court application at the High Court in Pretoria, has now seen its application being joined to the applications of the Justice Alliance of South Africa (Jasa) and the Cause for Justice organisations that submitted their applications in the Western Cape High Court.

Jasa and Cause for Justice argue that South Africa's broadcasting regulator - which first denied ODM's porn channels application and then approved it during a second application a year later - erred in law in failing to find that the constitutional rights of children should have trumped the rights of StarSat's freedom of expression.

Doctors for Life in court papers argues among other things about the addictive nature of pornography. Doctors for Life notes the addictive nature of pornography on the human brain, similar to that of drugs like heroin, cocaine and LSD.

Jasa's application requests the court to review the broadcasting regulator's decision in granting a license for porn television channels to StarSat, formerly the TopTV brand, and for Icasa to apply the law and broadcasting regulations correctly.

BREAKING. R199 is what TopTV will be charging for its separate new porn package of 3 Playboy TV channels together.

You're reading it here first.

I can exclusively break the news that TopTV's porn package of 3 Playboy TV channels will cost R199 per month as a separate subscription for all 3 channels combined.

TopTV subscribers interested in this separate subcription package won't be able to choose individual channels but get all 3 channels together from Playboy TV for a separate monthy charge similar to TopTV separate Indian television bouquet from Star.

I've asked TopTV the channels' names but the pay TV operator has declined to reveal the channels for now, saying that the names of the channels will be revealed at launch.

TopTV told TV with Thinus yesterday that the pay operator was approached in the middle of this year by Playboy TV ''who had 3 adult video channels on offer'' and that TopTV recently concluded an agreement with Playboy TV and signed carriage agreements for these channels. TopTV is now waiting to hear from the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) after TopTV applied for channel authorisation.

The three Playboy TV channels will be linear TV channels. Subscribers won't do video-on-demand (VOD) or pay-per-view, and the channels will be running 24 hours a day each. TopTV says the porn will be on the three channels that will ''carry a strictly enforced R18 age restriction and will only be accessible on a secure, encrypted and separate subscription package''.

''It will not be possible for the three additional channels to be viewed inadvertently by TopTV subscribers,'' says TopTV.

TopTV is still finalising how subscribers will be billed on their TopTV invoices for this subscription package and what exactly the entry for this R199 separate subscription will be saying. From anecdotal experience over years in the hospitality industry, customers making use of hotel VOD adult channels are used to having a more euphemistical item line appear on their invoicing. ''Details are being finalised and will be confirmed closer to the time,'' says TopTV.