BREAKING. Struggling TopTV drops two more TV channels from its bouquet; Top Junior and Top Movies+24 cut from Wednesday.

The struggling TopTV, currently in business rescue and trying to avoid bankruptcy, is dropping two more channels - Top Junior and the timeshifted Top Movies +24 - from midnight on Wednesday 17 April.

On Digital Media (ODM) which runs the TopTV satellite pay-TV service which will turn three in May, is awaiting word from South Africa's broadcasting regulator, the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) on whether it will be granted a license to start a new separate porn bouquet of three sex channels.

ODM is in negotiations with China's StarTimes media group which is also operating a pay-TV business in Nigeria and several other African countries, to bail out the struggling pay-TV operator with a cash injection, and for StarTimes to become an equity partner in TopTV.

ODM says Top Junior and Top Movies +24 is being "discontinued with immediate effect" due to operational reasons". ODM says it "regrets the timing of this change" to its channel make-up.

ODM says it has to prepare for a "proposed new channel structure" which indicate more major channel line-up changes should TopTV be able to continue operating.

TopTV has now dropped several TV channels since it started its commercial operations in May 2010, and has constantly been looking to find replacement channels but not always for all of the lost channels. Of the three Turner channels TopTV lost in November it only added Fashion One as one replacement. Meanwhile TopTV subscribers are not finding a reduction in their monthly subscriber fees although their overall amount of TV content is diminishing.

"As TopTV continues to operate under the business rescue plan, announced in October 2012, it has become necessary to review the pay-TV operator's current channel line-up and make certain adjustments in the interim period," says ODM.

"TopTV is currently in negotiations with a prospective investor and more details regarding this issue will be made public in the coming weeks. These talks are at an advanced stage and should they reach finality, a much-needed cash injection will be made into the operation that could result in a restructure of the business and the channels that are currently on offer."

TopTV says it "awaits confirmation of new developments for an exciting new future for the pay-TV operator".

TopTV's 100% rerun movie channels are still separate TV channels even though they're exact repeat programming, rules the ASA.

TopTV's separate, yet rerun movie channels are still separate and individual TV channels and can be counted as such, even though the content is 100% rebroadcasts.

The Advertising Standards Authority of South Africa (ASA) said in a ruling following a complaint, that TopTV can count its separate time-shifted TV channels as separate channels on its bouquet offering, even though the content remains exactly the same.

While MultiChoice has no time-shifted TV channels on its DStv bouquet, TopTV has some of these so called time-shifted channels with "+1", "+2", "+12+ and "+24" channels which are very common on pay-TV platforms around the world. The exact same line-up of programming as on an original channel would always start one hour later, two hours later, or 12 or 24 hours later on these channels.

On Digital has the Top Movies +2 (TopTV 101) and Top Movies +24 (TopTV 102) channels on the TopTV platform. On these channels movies always start 2 hours later and 24 hours later than on the original Top Movies (TopTV 100) channel.

The ASA received a complaint saying that TopTV advertising 9 movie channels are misleading since the Top Movies +2 and the Top Movies +24 channels are merely duplicates.

In ad advert headlined "Take a defining journey with 9 movie channels on TopTV" TopTV also advertised Top One (TopTV 150) as a movie channel and not a general entertainment channel. TopTV admitted that this was a mistake.

The TopTV ad also included Star Gold as a movie channel, but that channel is only available on a separate subscription to the Indian TopTV bouquet. TopTV admitted that the advert was incorrect.

The ASA asked South Africa's National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) for help and clarification regarding the time-shifted channels issue.

The ASA said in its ruling that the channels, although duplicates, are separate channels, since a subscriber would be seeing, at any given point in time, different movies on the various time-shifted channels.

"While the Directorate accepts that the complainant would have preferred three distinctly different TV channels with different content, the opinion from the NAB appears to suggest that this is a common practice," the ASA says in the ruling.

"The Directorate also accepts that this would ... potentially allow subscribers who were not able to record it, to still see their preferred movie, only at a different time or date."

'Plus' movie channels doing well for TopTV; subscribers like automatic time-shifting on additional channels.

You're reading it here first. 

True. The so-called "plus" channels - Top Movies+2 (TopTV 101) and Top Movies+24 (TopTV 102) - are doing well for TopTV. Viewers are watching. 

Although Top Movies (TopTV 100) as TopTV's main movie channel has two time-shifted channels - Top Movies+2 showing all movies 2 hours later behind the main channel and with TopMovies+24 a day behind the main channel - TopTV says viewers love the opportunity to "time-shift" movies.

Heather Kennedy, the vice president for marketing told journalists and TV writers last week at the pay TV platform's first ever programming preview held in Cape Town that movies remain a top draw for pay TV audiences. 

She said TopTV subscribers love movies and series. She said Top Movies+2 and Top Movies+24 are "performing very well". "People who possibly discover a movie which has already started know they have more convenient opportunities to catch it - or to watch it again."

[It's therefore no wonder that the SABC, planning 18 TV channels in the public broadcaster's migration to digital terrestrial television (DTT) has been thinking of employing similar time-shifted channels to help fill out the number of new channels. Viewers without VCRs and PVRs get automatic time-shifted "buffered" TV content with "plus" channels.]

BREAKING. Top movies? TopTV's Top Movies channel makes the grade.

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TopTV, South Africa's new satellite TV pay operator started its commercial service on Saturday, May 1, with several TV channels including some of its own packaged and compiled TV channels like Top Movies (TopTV 100).

So, how does Top Movies (TopTV 100), one of TopTV's premium TV channels, compare to the movie channels South African viewers have had access to before TopTV came along? My verdict: Very well. Top Movies (TopTV 100) has some excellent movies and is as a TV channel on par, and better than several other available DStv movie channels that's available to South African viewers.

TopTV has also introduced another South African first: time-shifted movies by way of TV channels. Besides the Top Movies TV channel, TopTV also have Top Movies 2 (TopTV 101). Top Movies 2 is the Top Movies channel, but time-shifted by two hours. For instance, if you have missed a movie, you can catch it two hours after it has started on Top Movies 2.
Then there is also Top Movies 24 (TopTV 102) employing the same concept but stretching it a day. Top Movies 24 has every movie that was on Top Movies, but starting exactly a day later.

I have the schedule for Top Movies and it compares very well as a single movie channel regarding the films on offer. From comedy like Are We Done Yet? and action adventure like Spider-Man III, to sci-fi flicks like Ghostrider and romance like The Notebook, Top Movies has a selection from every movie genre. In May Top Movies debut - to name just a few, movies running the gamut from Murder on the Orient Express (2001), Reign over Me, Die Hard IV, The Seeker: The Dark is Rising, Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer, Epic Movie, Wind Chill, Love and other Disasters, Plain Truth, Dragon Hunter, The List, First Comes Love and a lot more.