It seems like BBCA may be a bonafide competitor to the SyFy Channel when it comes to luring the sci-fi tv audience,

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2011/04...-the-curb/90239

But they won't be a REAL sci-fi competitor until they have professional wrestling on their schedule.

LOL! I forget, is BBCA available as a "basic" cable channel or is it only available in some parts of the US or maybe only some cable carriers have it?

The short answer is, I don't know if it's basic or not, but I think it varies from cable provider to cable provider. Some may have it in their basic packages, others may only include it as part of an expanded group, and others may not have it at all.

For me, I think I get it as part of an expanded group. I get Russian TV (RTV), an extra History Channel, and BBCA, among other things, as part of one group, I think. I even get BBCA in HD, which is nice. Top Gear in HD looks pretty good.

Thanks for that info Arthonon, it seems to make good sense.

I find it most curious that how as SyFy deviates more and more from its original niche programming, it seems that BBCA is coming in and filling that niche that SyFY has mostly abandoned.

The Brits seem to have more interest in science fiction programming than the U.S., I guess.

I was in the caribbean a couple of months ago and the TV channels available in our room were mainly from the USA. One of the highlights of the holiday was that BBCA had Star Trek TNG on every evening at 9pm.
It's ages since I've seen TNG on our domestic channels.

The only annoying thing was that they made a 40 minute program last an hour by padding it out with adverts.

I was amazed at how much Top Gear was censored on BBCA though...

ROTFL, that's awesome. SyFy is only good at taking shows and destroying them over time. If a show ends up on SyFy, it's been relegated to it's own special level in hell.

It's an interesting dichotomy because it seems that there is more genuine interest for smart sci-fi in the UK compared to the US but its usually the US networks that have enough money to fund such shows.

LOL, even then the SyFy channel would beat BBCA when it comes to playing horrible low budget sci-fi movies.