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“It’s all over.” IceTV closes, ends subscription service.

A week after entering voluntary administration, EPG company tells subscribers it can't survive without its staff.

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Independent EPG subscription service has closed down, despite last minute hopes to continue.

The company, which has been operating for a decade, was placed in voluntary administration last week, but hoped to find a way forward with its small band of employees.

Staff member Dave told subscribers on its user forum:

“IceTV as a TV guide and smart recording service almost survived. But a number of vital employees declined to take up the offer of working for the new version of IceTV so it’s all over. Everything needed to produce and supply a hand curated TV guide with smart scheduling still exists, except the necessary staff.

“Colin O’Brien and his family want to thank everyone for their support over the last 10.5 years. Without the many loyal customers IceTV wouldn’t have lasted as long as it did or been as popular as it was.

“I personally want to thank all those who have been supportive of me and offering kind words over the last week.”

IceTV launched in 2005 with a subscription based EPG that offered series link and remote recording, without having to manually adjust for scheduling changes.

But it was plagued with setbacks with the manufacturer of its ad-skipping Skippa PVR ceasing to trade last month, leaving IceTV no choice but to call in administrators.

Co-founder and executive chairman Colin O’Brien recently told subscribers:

“To say we are sorry for the mess that has ensued is trite in the extreme but nevertheless I hope you can believe how saddened we are by the events of the past week. Our Skippa project is defunct but it may be possible to licence our complete IceTV EPG and Smart Recording service to a new party. Before we can go ahead with discussions about saving that business we must know how many current subscribers would be prepared to re-subscribe to maintain their enjoyment of the ease of use that it brings to managing TV recording. Unfortunately I must state that your current subscription value is lost although you may he able to recover the unused proportion if you used a credit provider.”

While some customers received the Skippa PVR, its auto-skip feature has since stopped working while other customers who did not receive theirs will now become creditors.

IceTV will also be remembered for its landmark copyright case with the Nine Network after the latter claimed reproduction of its guide infringed its intellectual property. The case dragged on for 3 years, eventually won by IceTV which manually rewrote synopses of television shows for its subscribers.

13 Responses

  3. I dropped out of IceTV briefly recently; the refusal by the DVB broadcast schedule to tag repeats as such was the killer that rapidly pushed me back. Stupidly signed up for five years…

  4. The big losers are us users who have Elgarto Eye-tv USB adapters which ice tv was locked into the EPG and now we have nothing to use to schedule or record onto out Mac/PC. We can’t use any other EPG because it’s built in into the software. How do we now use another EPG on all Eye-tv products???

    1. About the only hope is to write to Elgato (the makers of EyeTV) and ask them to support another EPG (but what alternative EPG is there in Australia?) in their software. Problem is Elgato seem to be moving their product line away from the EyeTV products and concentrating on home automation products nowadays.
      elgato.com/en

    2. I use EyeTV and have been using the regular digital broadcast EPG for years. Just select this over the icetv EPG. Granted it is not as good, but you can use it to record and schedule your shows.

  5. A big win for the TV networks as IceTV was primarily for PVR users. The ad-skipping pvr has just been delayed. The early sales of the Skippa PVR came with lifetime Ice TV subscription! Hopefully someone will pick up their technology and staff.

  6. First of all I feel sorry for the staff. Always great.

    I’ve been a member for years. Between TV tonight, announcing up interesting up coming shows and Ice TV’s Coming soon never missed a program. New versus repeat also an amazing plus,.not to mention “any channel” option for when programs disappeared off the main channel.

    Now have to put up with fetch TV’s crappy series recording every episode of a series. Keeping a watch for channel changes.

    Does foxtel allow one to limit recordings to first runs only?

    2. Yes fetch series recording is crap. Hasn’t recorded shows properly, wrong times (an hour long scheduled show was only going to be set for 5 mins), really limited in what shows can series tagged. The problems with fetch are endless. It could be a really good service but they can’t seem to get the basics rights.

  7. It’s so sad for the employees and those who lost out on the skippa fiasco.
    We have subscribed to IceTV for ten years, and I don’t remember how to do FTA without it.

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