Wow, I think some folks here need to take a breath and calm down - the 'death' of F1? Really? The BBC have probably made the best of a bad job with this arrangement - they would almost certainly have been outbid for the F1 rights when their current contract ended in 2014, so by doing this deal now they at least extend partial live coverage on the BBC for a few more years beyond that. Personally I'd like to see them dump all non-English language channels rather than lose full F1 coverage, but perhaps that's just me...
I'm no fan of the Murdoch family or their business practices, but visually at least, Sky has changed the coverage of sports events immeasurably for the better - I don't believe for a second that I'm the only person here old enough to remember when major football matches were covered by a single camera somewhere around the half-way line! No, I don't like adverts in live sports events either - look at ITVs early coverage of F1 to see how badly that could go - but then I don't like how the BBC continually advertises its programs between other programs either…
And as fine as the BBC is (for my money Clive James' famous quip about it being the 'least worst television in the world' sums it up…) let's not be too keen to hold them up as the gold standard in broadcasting as they still make their fair share of calamitous errors e.g. despite losing F1 to ITV for (was it nine??) years, then making a big push to bring it back to the beeb, it's taken them two seasons to get a decent F1 commentary team in place in the shape of Martin Brundle and David Coulthard - that's two solid seasons, 30-odd races of leaden speech (I wouldn't gild the lily by calling it 'commentary') from the desperate, dire Jonathan Legard, when it was plain to anyone who follows the sport (or any sport come to that) that the man simply wasn't up to the job.
Martin Brundle has also mentioned elsewhere that he's out of contract from 2012; I find it seriously, staggeringly short-sighted that the Beeb didn't tie down their main commentator for the duration of their F1 contract - maybe we'll see him on Sky in due course...
One last thing. Nobody wants to be press-ganged into paying more for their TV entertainment, but it's the 21st century, guys - £30-odd a month for a TV package that includes one of the best PVRs around (Sky+) and broadband access really isn't expensive these days (family pizza on a Friday night costs me more than that, weekly) and many people, including my octogenarian parents willingly pay it for the benefits it brings them - and a years worth of Sky subs is still a heck of a lot cheaper than actually going to watch just one F1 race live.
Cheers, Pete.
p.s. - if you hate ad-breaks during your favourite shows and have a PRV (e.g. Sky+) just start recording as soon as the prog begins, then wait ten minutes before hitting 'play'; as soon as the ads come on you can fast-forward through them. Doesn't do anything about the interruption, but it minimises it - you don't have to sit through the ads if you don't want to!
