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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

#221

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

xorcist wrote: post #207
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the government is the one who gave them the authority to levy the fees from you and the people running the public broadcasters are all directly or indirectly politically connected to the major parties. Which other independent private business can just straight up charge you without you signing up for their service beforehand? In Germany and I guess, in most countries, the public broadcasters are basically low…

It's not just any private business. Compare with social insurance fees that must also be paid, it is not something you can opt out of while being part of the society. The fact that it is not a state owned organization is a feature, not a bug. In Germany specifically it is not a revolving door between public broadcasting and politics, and there is clearly journalistic pride in taking down corrupt politicians, so while…

You're contradicting yourself. You say it's good that the TV tax is levied by the government like social insurance fees but instead of it going directly to the government like social insurance fees, it goes to an "independent" organization and that's the "feature"? LOL, what?!

Do you really think that money is no strings attached? Ideally it would be and I guess that's the idea on paper but in practice, the public broadcasters almost never criticize the ruling coalition on the "don't bite the hand that feeds you" rule.

IIRC during the 2015 migrant crisis, no public debate was allowed on public TV over the decisions made to open the borders and the only opinion allowed on TV was that "it's good for everyone" with any argument against mass immigration (not immigrants themselves) heavily verboten.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#222

Post by chrisseaton »

CodeGlitch wrote: post #140
Symbiote wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No idea what any of those shows you listed are. My interests are ..., politics _Today_ and _PM_ are amongst the most influential media in the UK. Not knowing about them is almost wilfully ignorant -- other media will report that "on the _Today_ programme this morning, Minister for Vaccines, Nadhim Zahawi, said…"

Like I said elsewhere, I don't watch much broadcast TV, honestly have better things to do with my time. I've been successful in life so I don't see why you are insisting I need to watch this show. I get my news and current affairs elsewhere. Edit: I'd also like to add that no one in my circle has ever asked me "hey did you see that thing on the Today Programme last night?". In fact very little conversation about TV p…

> Like I said elsewhere, I don't watch much broadcast TV

Today is a radio programme - this whole thread is about radio. So you won't 'see' anyone on it and it wasn't ever on 'last night'.

> In fact very little conversation about TV programmes in general.

Again... it's a radio programme. And I'd bet my life on the fact that whatever political media you consume actually does frequently has conversations about what happened on the Today programme.

> honestly have better things to do with my time

I think you're thinking it's an evening chat show? Today is essentially the nation’s daily standup, and it's in the morning. You’ll usually get a robust interview with a couple of ministers and often the Prime Minister. It’s a major way we have to interact with the Government daily. The Today programme will often be a primary source for whatever secondary source political media you are using.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#223

Post by jannes »

jonathanstrange wrote: post #216
haspok wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in the UK there is content on TV worthy of watching (I got addicted to snooker while there, also some quite interesting shows like "Benefits Britain: Life on the Dole"), also, when I moved overseas they paid back the licence fee for the remaining part of the year, no questions asked. Now I'm in Austria and the "content" on TV channels is just ridiculous. Targeted at 70+ pensioners, but why should I pay for t…

BBC is awesome, their news is very good and they produce some of the best series in the world. It's a shame that they have split up BBC UK and BBC International so strictly and do everything they can to lock all BBC UK offerings to citizens of the UK. It infuriates me that I'm redirected from bbc.co.uk to bbc.com and are being displayed something else than people in the UK. If I go to bbc.co.uk, I do that to find out…

Apparently there is a subscription service called BritBox - created by BBC and ITV, but it's only available in Australia, USA and Canada.

https://www.britbox.com/

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#224

Post by Hamuko »

deanclatworthy wrote: post #202
doikor wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Finland they just moved the payment into taxes in 2013. Basically 2.5% starting from income after 14000€ and maxes out at 163€ collected. https://www.vero.fi/en/About-us/newsroom/visual_aids_for_pre...

Which is absurd to pay for if you're a foreigner not speaking Finnish, as the public broadcaster basically offers no content in English other than (poorly) translated news.

YLE offers news in Finnish, Swedish, Finnish sign language, simple Finnish, English (https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/ doesn't look that poorly translated), Russian, Sámi and Karelian. Areena also has many English-language programs that are just subtitled into Finnish.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#225

Post by gambiting »

spuz wrote: post #134
ohazi wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no way for them to prove I was actually owning a television (Emphasis mine) This "playing fast and loose with language" that they do (and that you inadvertently did too, just now) makes me so irrationally angry. Why would the burden of proof be that low? They need ( should need?) to prove that you received broadcast television , not that you simply owned a TV. We hear these stories about TV detector vans as if find…

In the UK, you must pay if you are capable of receiving live TV, not only if you do receive live TV. Even if it was never switch on, a TV that is plugged into an aerial qualifies as meeting that requirement.

That is absolutely 1000000% not true. You only have to pay the TV Licence if you ever watch live TV, not if you merely have a televion set. I've never paid the fee because I don't watch live TV, ever, and when you go on the TV licence page to fill out the form why you don't need a licence, one of the options on the form is "I only use my TV for games consoles, netflix, dvd players etc".

So it's not some "clever hack" - the law specifically allows for not paying the licence fee if you own a TV set but don't watch live TV.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#227

Post by rozab »

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…

Also check out the various Mitchell and Webb sketch shows, as well as Bruiser! That's a good rabbit hole.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#228

Post by dash2 »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #183
stkdump wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does the state exert power over the broadcasters if their income doesn't come from the government? Edit: When I say 'how' I don't mean 'why', I mean 'by what means'.

Because the government is the one who gave them the authority to levy the fees from you and the people running the public broadcasters are all directly or indirectly politically connected to the major parties. Which other independent private business can just straight up charge you without you signing up for their service beforehand? In Germany and I guess, in most countries, the public broadcasters are basically low…

>In Germany and I guess, in most countries, the public broadcasters are basically low-key propaganda arms of the government. The whole separate tax thing is a intermediate smokescreen to give the public the illusion of independence.

This claim elides the difference between e.g. the BBC or Deutsche Welle and RT. It would be naive to think that the BBC is wholly independent of politicians. But it would be equally naive to think that they're no better than a state propaganda outlet.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#229

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #217
simonh wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They were a real thing. When an old style TV amplifies the TV signal and feeds it to the CRT tube, it leaks a lot of the boosted signal. I think the rumour that the vans were a fake was probably because they only ever had a few and it was mostly a propaganda show, but that doesn't mean they didn't exist. Intelligence agencies used receivers to snoop in on CRT computer monitor signals and could re-generate the display…

>> When an old style TV amplifies the TV signal and feeds it to the CRT tube, it leaks a lot of the boosted signal. I think the rumour that the vans were a fake was probably because they only ever had a few and it was mostly a propaganda show, but that doesn't mean they didn't exist. Just because the technology exists, doesn't mean the BBC actually used it. For one thing, it would have been far cheaper to put out the…

I used to get the letters because I bought a TV for use as a monitor for video projects and I was stupid enough to give my address when asked to.

They're sent out on a cycle with a bit of randomness. It's quite fun to collect the set.

They stopped when I phoned the Bristol office and they asked how I'd feel if an inspector came over. I told them they were welcome any time, and the drive over would be a nice day out. [True]

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#230

Post by [deleted] »

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…

[deleted]
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