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TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

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Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#111

Post by Tomte »

matthiasv wrote: post #101
Tomte wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The trick is to watch the smaller "third programmes" or the programmes with special focus, not the big two (ARD and ZDF). Then you'll see a plethora of really well-made documentations about regions in Germany, regions in the world, culture, archeology etc. The third programmes are also where new comedians, hosts and artists are given a chance to refine their show concepts and prove themselves.

> The trick is to watch the smaller "third programmes" or the programmes with special focus, not the big two (ARD and ZDF). To be fair, The Big One is actually just all "third programmes" with some additional programming such as news.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

Take a look at the first column of https://www.tvinfo.de/tv-programm/ard

Pretty much nothing in there is also shown at any third programme. The programmes are almost completely distinct.

Evening news are actually the one part where the third programmes show the same as the ARD.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#112

Post by tonyedgecombe »

4ggr0 wrote: post #93

A bit off-topic maybe, sorry. I am not from the UK, but quite a large chunk of things I watch on YouTube are british panel shows. I'm just in love with them. Which seems funny to me, because as a non-uk twenty year old, I don't think that I'm the target demographic for these shows. "8 out of 9 cats does countdown", "Would I lie to you?" and of course my favourite, "Taskmaster". Thanks for all of these great shows. "B…

There is a lot of those shows because they are cheap to make. In reality the BBC's funding has been squeezed for years, largely for political reasons.

The current government would love to kill it completely but they can't do that directly.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#113

Post by _ph_ »

dsnr wrote: post #97
sleavey wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In Germany, the situation changed a few years ago, every household has to pay now, even if they don't own a television or radio. This was literally the first piece of mail I got when I moved to Germany: a letter demanding I pay for the TV networks I don't watch. I didn't even own a TV by that point, nor would have understood much of what was being said! A German explained to me once that the forced payment by non-w…

> A German explained to me once that the forced payment by non-watchers is justified as it benefits society as a whole. Do they really believe these things? This is the Kool-Aid you have to drink as a society, in order not to go crazy when you pay for things you never use and benefit from. If you ever move out, make sure to let them know, otherwise they will keep hunting you for ever.

I firmly believe this, especially in recent times. Those mandatory fees finance the "public" radio and TV stations, which have a set budget and can freely operate within the budget. They are not depending on advertisement revenue (they have a limited amount of that too) and are not working to create a profit. As a consequence, they do have a certain degree of independence and overall can afford into a lot of good quality content. Of course, they have their share of low quality content too, but overall they do offer an environment where good journalism still can happen. Meanwhile even the most reputable newspapers, which traditionally were a place for quality journalism, are struggling a lot and it is not clear how long they can afford to present quality content.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#114

Post by smcl »

4ggr0 wrote: post #93

A bit off-topic maybe, sorry. I am not from the UK, but quite a large chunk of things I watch on YouTube are british panel shows. I'm just in love with them. Which seems funny to me, because as a non-uk twenty year old, I don't think that I'm the target demographic for these shows. "8 out of 9 cats does countdown", "Would I lie to you?" and of course my favourite, "Taskmaster". Thanks for all of these great shows. "B…

I think you're more the target demographic than you think. Taskmaster didn't exist when I was still in the UK but the first two were popular enough with my age group at the time (20-30 year old students). You might also like "Have I Got News For You" - it's supposed to have gone a bit downhill recently, but at its peak it was stupendous.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#115

Post by matthiasv »

Aachen wrote: post #17
comprev wrote: post #2

Ireland also requires a TV license for each home. If you have any device _capable_ of receiving a signal you're required to pay.... even if you only use the TV for games consoles or Netflix.

Same in Germany, or at least it used to be that way and somewhat recently they just got rid of the requirement to have a TV. It's just yet another tax. Moving to Germany feels a bit like they pretend to keep "tax rates" low by splitting out various things and making it "not a tax". In the Netherlands I had income tax and that was it, from that the govt just pays development aid and old age money (AOW) as needed. Here…

While these things feel like taxes they are not because they are not managed by the government. Taxes (no matter their labelled purpose) are pooled and spent according to the yearly budget. Other fees collected by an agency are spent just for that purpose maybe propped up by money from the tax pool. Besides budgetary reasons, having a separate TV fee prevents (in theory) the government from interfering with the public media as there is no direct dependency.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#116

Post by gerikson »

cpach wrote: post #72
lqet wrote: post #38

> The United Kingdom is somewhat unique in the world for requiring those households which view broadcast television to purchase a licence for the privilege. I know at least three countries (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) which do the same (edit: according the Wikipedia [0], such a fee exists in basically every European country, Japan, Israel, South Korea and Namibia). In Germany, the situation changed a few years…

Sweden also had this system until recently.

Worth noting that the license fee is now paid as part of the regular tax payment. So the tax authority manages the collection, as opposed to previously when it was a separate agency.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#117

Post by _ph_ »

lqet wrote: post #38

> The United Kingdom is somewhat unique in the world for requiring those households which view broadcast television to purchase a licence for the privilege. I know at least three countries (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) which do the same (edit: according the Wikipedia [0], such a fee exists in basically every European country, Japan, Israel, South Korea and Namibia). In Germany, the situation changed a few years…

I don't know whether these vans were ever used here in Germany to detect TV watchers which don't pay, but these vans certainly existed. Their official, and I do think main purpose, was to detect signals which could interfere with TV and radio reception coming from defective electric devices or even illegal transmission sources.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#118

Post by progre »

jamesrr39 wrote: post #95
progre wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, alledgely, using scanners to catch cheaters. Though I got a visit from a man checking for unlicensed TV sets once and he didn't have a scanner, just a long list of people that didn't have a TV license.

I bought a new TV and got a phone call from Radiotjänst a couple of weeks later, asking where they should send the bill for the TV license. Busted! Now that the fee is discontinued, and it comes out of tax money instead, I sure don't miss getting those invoices.

The electronics stores had a reporting duty as I remember.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#119

Post by GoblinSlayer »

lqet wrote: post #38

> The United Kingdom is somewhat unique in the world for requiring those households which view broadcast television to purchase a licence for the privilege. I know at least three countries (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) which do the same (edit: according the Wikipedia [0], such a fee exists in basically every European country, Japan, Israel, South Korea and Namibia). In Germany, the situation changed a few years…

The TV fee exists everywhere, but usually if you have the cable, you pay; if you don't pay, you are cut off and that's the end of story.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#120

Post by joosters »

raverbashing wrote: post #90
beerandt wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say simply, but I think that's much more difficult than just detecting the presence of em noise conforming to a broadcast standard. Anyone that's put an AM radio next to a CRT TV knows it emits em noise. The CRT itself is, to over simplify, a high voltage capacitor. It's one of the most popular devices used to power hobbyist Tesla coils... I don't know why everyone seems to think that just because TVs were "recei…

You're thinking too much like an engineer Here's my TV detection method: look at their windows and see if there's a light flickering pattern that looks like a TV (if behind curtains) or maybe you can see the TV

'TV Light Simulators' are actually a thing:

https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=tv+light+simulator&atb=v172...

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