And effectively Fetch has replaced them, with a better offering, and a way easier/cheaper system (IPTV).
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Austar Wireless Cable channels in 1996/1997:
2 - ABC TV (via antenna)
3 - SBS (via antenna)
4 - Discovery
5 - Showtime
6 - Encore
7 - Prime (via antenna)
8 - Fox Sports
9 - WIN (via antenna)
10 - Southern Cross Ten (via antenna)
11 - Nickelodeon
12 - Arena
13 - TV1
14 - Red (became Channel [V] in 1997)
15 - CMT
16 - BBC World
17 - CNBC
18 - World Movies
19 - Fox Sports Two (from 1997)
20 - The Comedy Channel (from 1997)
21 - Cartoon Network/TNT (from 1997)
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Went bust and folded
Hah, that Selectv looks cheap, but is pretty poor value for money. Movie channels from only two studios, junk reality, Eurosport and Nat Geo for $30 a month? Bleh.
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One kids channel, one doco channel. It was crap.
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No sky news?
Sky News wasn’t added to Austar until April Fools Day 2000.
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It went up to around $40 before it collapsed. By then they had added a bunch of Discovery multi-channels (but not the actual Discovery Channel) and the MTV multi’s too IIRC. It was still a very over-priced service for what it offered.
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Great thread. Austar was literally my childhood 
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Did anyone here ever have Neighbourhood Cable?
SelecTV existed in an interesting time - Foxtel’s tieup with Optus that effectively removed any competition saw the introduction of a range of ACCC enforced undertakings around access to content, but the reality was that the content that was included wasn’t great.
The content wasnt enough to get people to sign up - the movie channels were limited and their sports offering was basically non-existant which at the time were two of the major drivers for people to sign up to subscription television.
It probably didnt help that they were on a different satellite to Foxtel/Austar, which made swapping a little more tricky than a new box and card
It’s foreign language services were more successful, but if I recall correctly, it was a reasonably competitive market with a few players (and a decent number of foreign language services available for free if you were willing to go to a C-Band dish)
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I still have my select tv stb but not sure what happened to the smart card.
I remember getting galaxy in Melbourne via Satellite and how amazing the preview channel was!
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Optus Vision channels from March 1997
| 01 | Disney Channel | |
|---|---|---|
| 02 | ABC Television | Free To Air |
| 03 | Movie Greats | |
| 04 | MTV Australia | |
| 06 | CNN International | |
| 07 | Seven Network | Free To Air |
| 09 | Nine Network | Free To Air |
| 10 | Network Ten | Free To Air |
| 11 | ESPN | |
| 12 | Sports Australia | |
| 13 | Sports AFL | |
| 14 | TNT | |
| 15 | Cartoon Network | |
| 16 | Sky News Australia | |
| 17 | The Movie Network | |
| 18 | The Movie Network 2 | |
| 20 | Channelvision | |
| 21 | Weathervision | |
| 22 | CMT: Country Music Television | |
| 24 | Horizon Learning Channel | |
| 25 | TVSN: Television Shopping Network | |
| 26 | Sports Australia II: Special Events | |
| 27 | Video Wall | |
| 28 | SBS Television | Free To Air |
| 29 | CNBC Asia | |
| 38 | Chinese Television Network | |
| 41 | Central Chinese Television | |
| 42 | Pay Per View Channel | |
| 45 | ART Australia (Arabic) | |
| 46 | RAI International (Italian) | |
| 47 | NHK (Japanese) | |
| 48 | Antenna (Greek) | |
| 49 | Mega Channel Australia (Greek) | |
| 50 | Localvision | |
| 55 | The Education Channel | |
| 62 | How To Channel |
Sports AFL was the first ever dedicated AFL channel on Pay TV in Australia and there was an overflow channel called Sports Australia II: Special Events listed.
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Local vision was their community TV service correct?
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yep
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I seem to recall the audio of 2CCR-FM (now Alive 90.5) was played on I think the video wall channel on Optus Vision in Sydney.
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I found this on YouTube. A trial of the failed ABC-Fairfax-Cox Communications pay television news channel in 1995. The news channel, and sister children’s channel which would have included Nickelodeon programs, didn’t launch after the joint venture failed to secure carriage deals with Foxtel, Optus Vision and Galaxy as they all said it was too expensive. Also, Rupert Murdoch didn’t want Foxtel getting into bed with mortal enemies the ABC and Fairfax.
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Missed opportunity for local television!
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Great find. I’ve never seen this.
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