Seems to me a lot of folk are happy to say "it was probably streaming illegally" or similar without much in the way of evidence to back it up. The channel had ads, it was showing a lot of very old stuff few people watched, that's not likely to be very expensive.
We could do with a proper explanation as to why it was removed.
It’s unlikely Roku will ever provide an explanation. If there is a contact listed somewhere for Movieland.tv, they would need to be the one to provide the reason. While it is all just guesswork on our part as to why it’s gone, the reasons provided are the most likely explanations.
Just because it had few ads, or few people watched some of the movies, piracy is piracy. If they didn't have the rights to the movies, it is ILLEGAL and could cause legal issues for Roku. As noted, if Roku yanks a channel, it's almost always due to a violation of some Roku terms, and piracy, which is also a violation of Roku's service terms.
Big allegation, slim on evidence. -IF- they didn't have rights to the movies. We don't know who pulled the channel or why, it's absolutely fair and reasonable to ask for information as to why that happened.
@cabd, those of us that have been around here a while have seen this same question many times. Roku just doesn't comment, so don't expect some special treatment in this case. The most you'll get "officially" is this link:
Why is a channel no longer available on my Roku® streaming device? | Official Roku Support
Movieland TV was a great channel. Nowhere else when searching for a movie could I find one like the original "Operation Petticoat", or the Walter Pidgeon version of "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" (which came out years before the TV series of the same name) without having to buy the movie. Now Roku has pulled the channel with no explanation?
I look at it this way: If Roku can take the time to give you a message like "This channel is no longer available. Visit the Roku Channel Store to discover more entertainment. For more details, visit go (dot) roku (dot) com (slash) channelremoved", then why can't Roku simply put the reason why the channel was removed? That web site Roku directs you to gives you no explanation or information on why the channel in question was removed (implied in the web site's name - i.e. "channelremoved").
There is plenty of room on the nearly blank screen that I'm currently look at for such an explanation to be placed. How hard is it to put "This channel is no longer available due to <brief explanation here>" before carrying on with the rest of the meaningless message of how to "discover more entertainment", or directing you to a web site that, according to its name ("channelremoved"), does nothing to explain why the channel was removed. (Are the Roku message typists so lazy that they can't give us - their paying customers - a brief-yet-decent explanation?)
Great channel, not so great Roku service. I hope that channel comes back soon.
The old Disney was great. I do not allow my children to watch any of their new movies.
Best thing to do is not talk about the channel, if it re-appears. Roku will just shut it down again.
That is why I am moving away from Roku, they have removed too many of my favorite channels with no explanation.
@DownWith wrote:That is why I am moving away from Roku, they have removed too many of my favorite channels with no explanation.
Don't kid yourself. It will happen on an Android device (although there are ways to side load apps on those) and an app like this would never be approved on an Apple TV in the first place. If you think Roku is strict, it's nothing like Apple.