Now that's just silly.
TV detector van
11–20 of 345 posts
Re: TV detector van
#12While reading I thought, "for sure we will get to the part of the article where the British realized their folly and discontinued the licensing." But that part never came. Brits: is this for real, does this still exist? Do you pay a license to use your TV? Is it only for OTA programming or using the device in general?
We pay the licence fee to fund the BBC. They make some amazing documentaries (Planet Earth, Blue Planet etc). They also have radio stations, all advert free. Being advert free is rare these days.
Re: TV detector van
#13This is such nonsense. In my opinion the BBC should be paid for by a proper tax, as an informed public benefits everyone, or they should just give up on calling it a license. The people going around houses just send threatening letters, and act as though they have some right to enter your home and inspect it (they don't). They go around terrorising people who don't know their rights, but don't watch TV anyway. I routinely get threatening letters from them despite not having a TV on the premises.
Re: TV detector van
#14God I love the USA.
Re: TV detector van
#15The warrant revealed that a BBC contractor had used an "optical detector" to reveal the possible presence of a TV.[10] The warrant stated that: "the optical detector in the detector van uses a large lens to collect that light and focus it on to an especially sensitive device, which converts fluctuating light signals into electrical signals, which can be electronically analysed. If a receiver is being used to watch broadcast programmes then a positive reading is returned." [10] The BBC stated that this was strong evidence that a set was "receiving a possible broadcast".
According to The Comptroller and Auditor General of the National Audit Office, "where the BBC still suspects that an occupier is watching live television but not paying for a licence, it can send a detection van to check whether this is the case. TVL detection vans can identify viewing on a non‐TV device in the same way that they can detect viewing on a television set. BBC staff were able to demonstrate this to my staff in controlled conditions sufficient for us to be confident that they could detect viewing on a range of non‐TV devices."
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That device description is entirely consistent with a video camera, perhaps with a telescope in front of it, used for peering through people's windows.
Does this put the BBC at risk of violating anti-peeping-Tom legislation?
Re: TV detector van
#16I lived in a flat in England in the early 2000s which kept getting letters from the BBC saying we didn't have a TV licence. The letters were sometimes more threatening for a period, then sometimes more reconciliatory. They were also running TV adverts at the time claiming they had detector vans about, and if you didn't have a licence you'd be caught. I did some research at the time, and it seemed that evidence from a…
> evidence from a detector van had never been submitted
How could it be, if the mechanism behind the detector is not made public?
Prosecutor: This machine says you are guilty.
Defendant: How does that machine work?
Prosecutor: You aren't allowed to know.
Defendant: ???
Judge: Case dismissed.
Re: TV detector van
#17“Ministry of oooowsinge?” “it was spelt like that on ‘t van!” “what van?” “the cat detector van.” “you are a loony. “
My immediate thought too! I'm glad someone else got the reference.
Re: TV detector van
#18I lived in a flat in England in the early 2000s which kept getting letters from the BBC saying we didn't have a TV licence. The letters were sometimes more threatening for a period, then sometimes more reconciliatory. They were also running TV adverts at the time claiming they had detector vans about, and if you didn't have a licence you'd be caught. I did some research at the time, and it seemed that evidence from a…
As a child in the 80s I remember my family being scared of this van even though it probably never existed. Because of this my mum got a pay TV instead which we had to put 50p coins in periodically that paid for both the TV rental and the license fee.
Re: TV detector van
#19While reading I thought, "for sure we will get to the part of the article where the British realized their folly and discontinued the licensing." But that part never came. Brits: is this for real, does this still exist? Do you pay a license to use your TV? Is it only for OTA programming or using the device in general?
Yes, it still exists. A TV Licence is required to watch any television programme live as it is broadcast. This applies to online live streams of TV channels, even if viewed on a PC or mobile phone.
It is legal to use a TV set without a licence, so long as you do not watch any TV programmes live. So it's fine to connect it to a laptop and use it as a monitor, or listen to radio programmes through it, for example.
Re: TV detector van
#20Relevant: http://bbctvlicence.com/