I have been using DSTV for 12 years and during that time, I have always been paying for a premium subscription every single month. This despite so many repeats on almost all the channels. For those who enjoy local entertainment and sports, Multichoice believes DSTV is the number one stop.

Last month (February 2022), DSTV announced they would limit subscribers to one single streaming device per subscription from the 22nd of March (You can read more here and here). The reason DSTV gave for this unprecedented and illogical move was that they want to limit piracy/account sharing.

We are a family of 3 in the house and 90% of the time we watch different shows and we hardly ever watch on TV. We stream on our laptops and devices. If this move is indeed enforced only one of us 3 would be able to watch (some families are bigger and will endure the same issue).

If Multichoice really wanted to eliminate piracy, they could have implemented some smart algorithms to do this:

• Most families members are on the same Wi-Fi network when they stream so the public IP will be the same.
• Use Geolocation. Most streaming family members are usually in the vicinity of each other.
• And if the above does not work, they could always ask streamers to prove that they are family members indeed.

However, because of the monopoly DSTV enjoys and because of the sports rights they own, they will go ahead and implement this account limitation. My belief is that they are not trying to limit account sharing but instead they want to increase revenue by forcing any extra family member to pay an extra fee (I think around R112 per person). This despite that we already pay a premium fee (R934 if you include the access fee) which is set to be increased again next month. What Multichoice is doing to loyal subscribers is utter arrogance and disrespect.

Please join me in cancelling the DSTV subscription so that we can teach these behemoths that we, customers have the last say.

You can always use IPTV services to watch Sports and streaming services (Netflix, Amazon Prime, ...) to watch movies and series.

PS: Please share the petition.