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BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

theguardian.com

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Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#131

Post by nickkell »

dazc wrote: post #100
thinkingemote wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you dont consume it, you do not have to pay. Nothing and noone is forcing you.

My dad has a TV licence despite watching 100% via streaming services. No matter what I tell him, he insists he has to have a licence. This is a widely held view with people of a similar age. Maybe the BBC could do an information campaign to educate them otherwise? I won't hold my breath though.

Which streaming service are you referring to? AFAIK you do actually need a license to watch BBC iPlayer

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#132

Post by zimpenfish »

Freskis wrote: post #40
mcintyre1994 wrote: post #35

I’m not sure how much cut through this has had outside of the UK, but the government are currently in serious trouble because of constant leaks about parties in Number 10 Downing Street during the pandemic - including a particularly poorly timed one the day before the Queen was photographed at her husband’s funeral alone. The leaks are ongoing, so we know that this particular plan is part of “Operation Red Meat”, whi…

Your comment does't make any sense. You are saying that the Conservative party are making this huge change to distract from their current problems. Are you saying they created the entire plan in a few weeks? Do you have any evidence for your extraordinary claims?

It's a perfect example of a "dead cat on the table."[1]

Also, > Are you saying they created the entire plan in a few weeks?

They frequently toss out new "plans" in response to news events, anger in the base, scandals, etc. which have -clearly- been thought up in a hurry as a distraction and will be silently forgotten / dumped when no longer needed as a news-based base-fury-whip.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_cat_strategy

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#134

Post by inglor_cz »

mschuster91 wrote: post #89
ssddanbrown wrote: post #9

I like much of what the BBC do and produce, especially BBC news, but the licence fee has always felt like a relic from the past with a bad strategy of enforcement (With their threatening letters and misguiding terminology as to when a license is required). Their actual broadcast service is lacking in some areas too. On BBC One HD I still get a blank place-holder screen for local news, advising to switch to the non-HD…

> I hope the BBC continues to survive, just with a more modern funding approach Difficult. There are not many ways to fund a public TV/radio program, and all of the non-per-household-license free-OTA variants have issues: - anything tax-based is just asking for trouble aka a populist government extorting the public stations after critical coverage - ad-funded... well that's just ordinary private TV, with the threat h…

To your last point: isn't it sort-of dangerous to rely on a TV news channel in case of serious events? Power to households may be off; people may not realize that they need to turn on their TV set.

Something like a network of alarm sirens that can also speak would be more resilient. We have such a system in Prague. Every 1st Wednesday of each month at noon, it is shortly tested. If Prague can afford it, most of the UK could surely as well.

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#135

Post by open-source-ux »

'Linear TV' (broadcast TV) is dead and the BBC probably have known this for some time. The idea of a TV schedule feels antiquated today amid unprecedented on-demand content. On commercial streaming services, only prestige series (seasons) are released weekly, everything else gets a whole series released in one go. (The BBC already does this on iPlayer for some series.)

It's worth remembering that the BBC is a Public Service Broadcaster (PSB) and does vastly more than YouTube or Netflix.

- News: the world's largest news organisation

- TV: everything from drama to documentaries to kids programmes

- Radio: national radio stations (covering every music genre + speech), 40+ local radio stations, and the World Service.

- Kids TV: ad-free TV kids programmes with strict guidelines on commercial influences and product placement.

- Education: massive educational content for schools (Bitesize) that has no commercial equivalent. (Who else other than BBC would launch the micro:bit project in schools with all the related educational resources to support it?)

- Music: promotes new music artists, funds 5 orchestras, runs the world's largest classical music festival (the Proms). Provides live music festival coverage (Glastonbury, Leeds, Reading etc)

- Accessibility: 100% of recorded programmes subtitled, + a proportion of audio-signed and signed programmes

The list goes on. Even simply browsing the BBC news website is one of the few news websites in the UK that is ad-free (if you are outside the UK browsing the BBC website, you're probably seeing ads).

Not all the above will disappear with a different funding model, but it's likely that the BBC will be slimmed down. (And that is something BBC critics will want to see happen.)

Aside: Nadine Dorries is minister for 'Digital, Culture, Media and Sport' - the BBC falls under the remit of this department. Dorries didn't even know that Channel 4 (another PSB in the UK) does not receive any public funds (it is funded by advertising). When this was pointed out to her when facing other politicians, she babbled incoherently unable to admit her error. Make up you own mind about the calibre of this politician: https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/nadine-dorries-channe...

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#136

Post by zimpenfish »

iso1210 wrote: post #83
nerdawson wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BBC and ITV shared coverage of the Euros last year and their streaming offerings couldn’t have been more different. The BBC were airing matches in 4K HDR and their service ran without a hitch. ITV, on the other hand, a private company, had a site which crumbled under load. When it did eventually work, it was so poor as to be laughable. It probably wouldn’t even be considered HD and the frame rate couldn’t keep up. It…

I wouldn't watch a live sports match online, certainly not something like an England match in the world cup / euros (think Superbowl if you're American) - you're talking 30-60 second lag. The neighbours cheer at the goal and you're screwed, not to mention things like twitter. The difference between DTT and Satelite is just about OK, but not online.

> I wouldn't watch a live sports match online, certainly not something like an England match

Unfortunately, some of us have no choice - no working aerial on this block (and a satellite dish wouldn't help.) It's online or nothing.

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#137

Post by youngtaff »

johnday wrote: post #64
Nextgrid wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The BBC is welcome to encrypt their broadcasts and sell subscriptions directly.

This is not feasible. In the UK we have Freeview [1], a free-to-access television platform which manages ~all terrestrial output. The BBC administrates this system along with the other major broadcasters (ITV, C4, ...). If the BBC did not put out its own output under Freeview, not only would Freeview collapse but the BBC would effectively be wiped off the face of British television. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/…

The BBC should have chosen the encrypted FreeView route when digital first came in so they could switch to subscription

Their focus on the easy money of a license fee, along with lines of “everyone loves to pay it” was going to land them in trouble sooner or later

If they'd have go subscription then, they could have chosen their own destiny

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#138

Post by dankboys »

kaashif wrote: post #111
cracrecry wrote: post #28

One of the great things of the Licence fee was that the Government does not get to control the national TV like it does when the one who pays is it directly. In places like Spain the national TV(and regional TV too) becomes a propaganda machine for the exclusive service of the Government(s, national and regional). It is awful to have your taxes redirected for the private interest of the Party in charge. In fact with…

> the Government does not get to control the national TV like it does when the one who pays is it directly. You may want to double check who's in charge of the BBC. The Director-General Tim Davie is a former deputy chairman of a local Conservative party and Conservative councillor candidate. Not that bad, perhaps. But the Chairman of the BBC, Richard Sharp, was a banker at JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs, advisor to Bori…

If this is the case, why did the BBC vote 5 to 1 in favour of Remain[1], despite the Conservative party being down the middle on Brexit.

75% of comedians are explicitly left wing [2]

Anecdotally, the sidebar of BBC News UK edition is littered with articles attempting to argue that any inequality between sex or race of people in a unvaried analysis is indicative of system X-ism. Very rarely do people leave the BBC and join right-of-centre media - more often than not they join left wing private organisations.

[1] https://www.express.co.uk/comment/expresscomment/1549752/Abo...

[2] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9047049/Seventy-fiv...

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#139

Post by philk10 »

nickkell wrote: post #131
dazc wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My dad has a TV licence despite watching 100% via streaming services. No matter what I tell him, he insists he has to have a licence. This is a widely held view with people of a similar age. Maybe the BBC could do an information campaign to educate them otherwise? I won't hold my breath though.

Which streaming service are you referring to? AFAIK you do actually need a license to watch BBC iPlayer

iPlayer asks if you have a license and you say Yes...

Re: BBC licence fee to be abolished in 2027 and funding frozen

#140

Post by petepete »

nerdawson wrote: post #75
dazc wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ITV also make short drama series which are often better, in my opinion, and manage to do this without threatening to send people to jail for not contributing financially. You can subscribe for £3.99 to have an almost ad-free experience too. I doubt the BBC could compete at this level as a subscription only service in its current state though? Worth noting also, the prevelance of BBC ads for its own content which have…

BBC and ITV shared coverage of the Euros last year and their streaming offerings couldn’t have been more different. The BBC were airing matches in 4K HDR and their service ran without a hitch. ITV, on the other hand, a private company, had a site which crumbled under load. When it did eventually work, it was so poor as to be laughable. It probably wouldn’t even be considered HD and the frame rate couldn’t keep up. It…

ITV still don't broadcast anything with 5.1 audio. BBC have done since the launch of BBC HD twelve years ago.
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