Sky has confirmed it will roll out its Anytime+ catch-up service to users of any ISP “by Easter”.
The service allows you to watch a selection of films, sports events and TV shows after they’ve been aired via the Sky box’s broadband connection.
A reduced Anytime service is available free to all Sky customers, however this isn’t a true video-on-demand service because content is limited to a small selection of content pushed to the Sky HD box and stored on its hard drive.
At present the full Anytime+ is restricted to customers who also subscribe to Sky’s broadband service.
Last year Sky reached agreement with Virgin Media to make its content available to the cable company’s customers and is widely expected to offer programmes via the new YouView service when it launched later this year.
The arrival of Sky content on Virgin Media’s catch-up service has lead to a complaints on Sky’s own customer forums from users unhappy at the restriction.
Responding to these complaints, Sky forum staff have defended the Sky broadband requirement as was to to ensure customers receive the best possible service. However some customers have accused the firm of merely wanting to push its broadband service.
On Monday Sky Chief Executive Jeremy Darroch confirmed the service would be available to all customers, regardless of their ISP.
In a statement Darroch said: “We want customers to get the best out of their Sky subscription and Anytime+ is a great way to give them more control and choice over how they enjoy TV.
“We already know how popular Sky+ is and how it puts customers back in charge of their TV viewing. Anytime+ builds on that control and it’s no wonder we’ve seen such strong demand for it.”
In addition to content from Sky’s pay-TV channels, Anytime+ will also offer access to the iPlayer and ITV Player.
BBC Director-General Mark Thompson said: “Making BBC iPlayer available on all platforms is key to our commitment to universal access and this agreement takes us one step further towards that goal.”