I worked with Sky broadcast computing staff back in the day. Apparently they had some massively expensive plan for enforcement technology.<p>During one meeting someone said 'why not just put a glass in the corner of the streamed image to indicate it's licensed for a pub?'<p>Job done.
I was talking about this to someone behind the bar once, and he also said that the reason they chose a pint glass over some other icon was that it made people more willing to buy a drink while watching the game. They'd occasionally glance at the pint glass and think "better have a pint".<p>Not sure whether this is true or not, but it wouldn't surprise me if it had this effect. It'd be interesting if someone else had heard this, or knew whether this was true.
Sky also add a number to the screen to help inspectors or to shut down streaming <a href="http://helpforum.sky.com/t5/Archived-Discussions/Strange-9-digit-number-appearing-on-screen/td-p/5559" rel="nofollow">http://helpforum.sky.com/t5/Archived-Discussions/Strange-9-d...</a>
Germany has this as well. Looks slightly different and I've never payed enough attention to see if it changes. Interesting how the glass is localized :)<p><a href="https://planetofsports.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/38917790.jpg?w=500" rel="nofollow">https://planetofsports.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/38917790....</a>
What's amazing/amusing to me is a hacky technical solution that solves the problem for "inspectors", instead of a solution that removes the need for any inspector to inspect the TV. A good administration system would make it easy to automatically check whether pub addresses use a business subscription.
Here in Spain, they show a B (as in bar), but also, they randomly put a banner with some code related to the customer (pub), so if an internet stream shows the code, they know who is the customer.
The sticker-on-screen hack seems a bit easy to detect.<p>I've always wondered why there isn't (or maybe there is?) a black market for a wee box that takes the Sky box video output and overlays a pint glass icon in the corner.<p>But I didn't know until this article that the pint glass volume and colour changes each day; that would make it a lot tougher. Plus I guess the pint glass isn't always shown, e.g. during adverts.
They sometimes fill them with different colours, too. Here is a link to a picture. <a href="http://goo.gl/ZDnSE0" rel="nofollow">http://goo.gl/ZDnSE0</a>
Interesting, a lot of pubs who can afford it simply get a satellite dish and a subscription to a foreign channel. Saves them thousands a month and they get all of the important matches. Although some commentary is in a foreign language.
You'll probably also notice a small rectangle which appears in the top right of the screen made up of moving black and white stripes.<p>This often indicates when an advert break is coming up, so it's pretty handy to notice if you want a head start on getting to a likely-busy pub toilet.<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cue_mark#Other" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cue_mark#Other</a>
Is this only for satelite TV service providers or cable too? Also, is this strictly a UK thing? I have not noticed anything similar in the US but from what I can tell, all the bars I go to all have Comcast boxes. And a lot of times, you can see a rack of Comcast equipment stacked up either behind counters or right at the entrance behind the person that checks people in.
On a related note, I wonder why a lot of public places in the US have stuff on cable (not just sports) and often not HD. They could just use an antenna and get a great picture. I makes me wonder if that's not allowed because it would be a public showing - even though anyone with a portable TV could view it right there anyway. It this the case?