Dialog TV
| Dialog TV logo | |
| Subsidiary | |
| Industry | Pay TV |
| Founded | Colombo, Sri Lanka (2005 as CBNsat) |
| Headquarters | Union Place, Colombo 02, Sri Lanka |
|
Area served
|
Sri Lanka and north to Nepal |
| Products | Direct broadcast satellite |
| Parent | Dialog Axiata PLC |
| Subsidiaries | Dialog Television Trading (Pvt) Ltd (100%) |
| Website | www |
Dialog TV (DTV) is a direct broadcast satellite pay TV service provider based in Sri Lanka. A fully owned subsidiary of Dialog Axiata PLC, Dialog TV was launched in July 2005 under the name "CBNsat". It was later renamed to Dialog TV in February 2007 after the company was acquired by Dialog Axiata PLC.
Dialog TV currently has over 500,000 subscribers. Its main competitors in the pay TV market in Sri Lanka are Lanka Broadband Networks (LBN) which provides cable television services in analog and DVB-C in selected areas in Sri Lanka and PEO TV, which is an IPTV platform operated by Sri Lanka Telecom PLC.
Dialog TV has coverage over the entirety of Sri Lanka, Nepal and neighboring countries through the Intelsat-12 satellite (45.0 E).
Contents
Services
Dialog TV is a provider of Standard Definition TV (SDTV), High Definition TV (HDTV) and Personal Video Recording (PVR) services in Sri Lanka. Dialog Television currently offers 111 TV channels, including 7 HD channels.[1]
Dialog TV offers 2 payment options for customers to receive their service. "Per Day Packages" allows the customer to pay a daily rental fee ranging from Rs.3 to Rs.12 for a limited number of channels. Alternatively the Postpaid payment method has 5 package options with a monthly rental fee of between Rs.699 to Rs.1949 for higher number of channels.
Value Added Services
Activating Channel Packs
Dialog Television offers you the convenience to choose additional Channel Packs varying from Movies, Sports, Entertainment, Edutainment and many more categories via SMS.[2]
Activating Day Pass
Daily Pass gives you access to all of Dialog Television channels for a day, two days, one week or one month. Subscription via USSD or SMS from your mobile.[3]
Activating Individual Channels
ON or OFF your Dialog Television Channels from the comfort of your home via SMS.[4]
High Definition (HD)
Dialog Television brings you the latest digital revolution, Dialog Television HD DTH service. With great picture quality, incredibly vivid colors, sharper images and stunning surround sound, this new service will give you a breathtaking entertainment experience.[5]
PVR (Personal Video Recording Feature)
Dialog TV customers who upgrade to High Definition pack will enjoy the Personal Video Recording (PVR) feature from Dialog Television which enables you to record, pause, rewind and fast forward Live TV as and when you please from the widest selection of international and local channels. Customers will have to simply plug in a USB drive to their decoder & start recording.[6]
Channels
Local
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Religious
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Movies
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News
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Sports
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Music
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Kids
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Entertainment - English
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Entertainment - Tamil
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Entertainment - Hindi
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Educational
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Edutainment
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Development and expansion
Dialog TV expresses its hopes to soon expand their digital network to other neighboring countries.
Dialog TV signed an agreement with ESPN and Star Sports on 7 March 2006, and launched the channels on 24 March 2006. The Zee package (Zee TV, Zee Cafe, Zee Cinema, Zee Trendz, Zee Sports, Zee Muzic, Zee Studio) was launched in January. Al Jazeera English was launched on 19 April 2007, replacing the SET channel.
In March 2007, Dialog TV won exclusive rights to broadcast the Cricket World Cup 2007 in Sri Lanka.[1]
Dialog TV's third transponder was launched in late April 2007. The third transponder is now available on Dialog TV for all subscribers, and all except one of the new channels are launched. The STAR package was launched on August 3, 2007. STAR Cricket was added on August 7, 2007.
A software upgrade was tested on 8 June, although it only updated to the June 1, 2006 software, which is included on all decoders sold from January 2007. The 2007 July update was made available on July 18, 2007. This update changed all logos and names on the software to "Dialog TV" from the previous "CBNsat". The software was automatically installed to decoders at 3.00 pm on July 18, 2007, and at 6.00 pm and 9.00 pm on the same day for those who missed the previous updates. If all automatic updates were missed, it is possible to update the software using the IRD Upgrade menu option on the decoder.
By mid 2012, Dialog TV had introduced South India's pioneering Tamil channels,namely Sun TV, KTV and Sun Music.
By 18th February 2015, Dialog TV had decided to upgrade it MPEG-4 service by increasing its channel rate from 94-120.
By 18th May 2015, Dialog TV had reached over 500,000 active subscribers.For that reason, Dialog TV gave 30 days free subscription to all channels to all Dialog TV subscribers. [7][8]
Controversy
CBNsat and NTT
On June 6, 2006, the Sri Lanka Police's Criminal Investigation Department raided the CBNsat broadcast premises and ordered to shut down the service. CBNsat was accused of not possessing the correct DTH broadcasting license and broadcasting the NTT channel (of the LTTE) on their service. CBNsat was also blamed for broadcasting possibly illegal adult content on Fashion TV(India).
The Media Ministry took over the case when the CID dropped their charges in late 2006. It was not possible to show evidence of CBNsat broadcasting the NTT channel as it blocked Free To Air channels from the customer decoders and NTT was a Free To Air channel.
The Media Ministry could not prove any of the allegations and was finally forced to provide the necessary license to CBNsat. Meanwhile, CBNsat was financially crippled and was acquired by Dialog Telekom in December 2006. The service was finally relaunched in February 2007.
As a result of the closure, a few subscribers gathered together to form CBNsat Subscribers Unite. The subscribers worked hard to bring CBNsat out of trouble during the closure, and ultimately caused the government to give up their vested interests.
Blocking Local Channels
On November 22, 2014, there were disruptions to Sirasa TV, Shakthi TV and MTV Sports telecasts of an important political programme on Dialog TV.[9] Occurring at a time when a presidential election had been announced by the Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa a few days earlier, this was widely criticized as an attempt at depriving the right of communicating the views of his rival Maithripala Sirisena to the public through the free media.[10]
Dialog TV is also accused for blocking local channels when important sports programs are being broadcast. Subscribers are then given the opportunity to subscribe for another paid channel to watch them.
See also
References
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