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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

#41

Post by rtkwe »

jeremycarter wrote: post #33
mhh__ wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Britbox is supposed to be that, I think, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if the BBC cannot legally sell iPlayer subscriptions as easily as you'd think because the BBC's copyright library (especially music) is unbelievable [1] compared to most other organizations, so they'd have to make multiple versions of everything on their books to deal with licencing issues. Lots of British shows get their soundtracks neutered…

Is this because they operate radio stations or some other licensing deal?

Benefits of being a quasi-governmental media agency I bet, the laws get written to give you access to most things at very low or zero cost.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#43

Post by rkachowski »

offtop5 wrote: post #3

Pretty sure this was outted as fake. The idea of a van watching you is enough for many to change their behavior

I remember as recently as the mid 90s there were intimidating advertisements on UK tv about how tv license vans were going to find you and kick your doors down if you hadn't paid.

I had assumed it was complete scare tactics, I never once thought that they had existed in some previous era.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#44

Post by glandium »

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…

You can add France and Japan to the list. In France, they don't go door to door, though, it's only a check box on some tax returns forms. In Japan they do come door to door. I've never heard about "detection vans" in either, though.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#45

Post by pm215 »

chrisseaton wrote: post #36
CodeGlitch wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've not listened to the radio in 10+ years - my audio consumption is all from Podcasts, which IMHO blows any radio out of the water. It's not live but I don't need it to be.

> Podcasts, which IMHO blows any radio out of the water Can you please share which breathtaking podcasts you're listening to, because I've never found anything even close to as good as landmark BBC radio shows like Today, PM, Today in Parliament, In Our Time, The Moral Maze, Blood, Sex, and Money, From Our Own Correspondent, The Essay, and Night Tracks.

I listen to In Our Time as a podcast :-) It's actually better than the radio-broadcast version because it includes 10-15 minutes of extra time with the guests where they have a bit more discussion.

(rss feed: https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/b006qykl.rss)

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#46

Post by rtkwe »

zapdrive wrote: post #5
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.

Wouldn't it make sense to just add the license fee/tax at the source of sale, just like electronic waste recycling fee etc.

Only for one time fees, most TV Licenses style taxes are recurring. If you try to base it off an 'expected lifetime' you're just guessing how often people will replace the TV and either get under or over charged based on how long they keep devices.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#47

Post by chrisseaton »

pm215 wrote: post #45
chrisseaton wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Podcasts, which IMHO blows any radio out of the water Can you please share which breathtaking podcasts you're listening to, because I've never found anything even close to as good as landmark BBC radio shows like Today, PM, Today in Parliament, In Our Time, The Moral Maze, Blood, Sex, and Money, From Our Own Correspondent, The Essay, and Night Tracks.

I listen to In Our Time as a podcast :-) It's actually better than the radio-broadcast version because it includes 10-15 minutes of extra time with the guests where they have a bit more discussion. (rss feed: https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/b006qykl.rss )

Right but that's still paid for by the 'TV licence' and it's made by the same people.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#48

Post by LatteLazy »

CodeGlitch wrote: post #9

With Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, YouTube, etc. the BBC have a hard time justifying the license these days. The only exception would be live sporting events, which is something I don't watch. Given I only watch about 1 hour of "TV" a day I was very glad to stop my license last year. It will not be missed.

Respectfully, you're not just wrong, you're wrongly wrong.

The nature coverage on BBC is an order of magnitude better than anything else on TV.

The science coverage on BBC is better than anyone else on TV.

The news coverage on BBC is better than anything else on TV.

And that's just the starters.

The podcast revolution were in right now? Brits have had that since the 70s with radio 4 producing great audio programs. Everything from science to history to drama to comedy. Their programming makes up a big chunk of the best podcasts and another chunk are ripoffs of BBC shows.

Streaming? BBC iPlayer was the trailblazer in that space.

And we're still not done.

The UK has a similar problem to US media: its mostly owned by crazy right wingers and what isn't spends a lot of time navel gazing and sharing cat in tree stories. Not the BBC, they keep breaking big stories. They don't care or have to care about the editorial line or commercial interests of their advertisers or even their viewers prejudices. And educated, informed voters are one reason we have maintained (just) decent healthcare and a semi working benefit system. They actually force other media to be better. That's why we don't have Foxx news and our antivaxx movement is smaller than the US or Frances.

I'm not saying they're perfect. I'm not saying they're always right or they couldn't do better.

I'm just saying, we need more than just the commercial model, be it ads or subscription based. There are 1001 things it doesn't do well. It does other things great. But it can't give you everything. Why not keep both?

Thanks for reading my rant.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#49

Post by CodeGlitch »

chrisseaton wrote: post #36
CodeGlitch wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've not listened to the radio in 10+ years - my audio consumption is all from Podcasts, which IMHO blows any radio out of the water. It's not live but I don't need it to be.

> Podcasts, which IMHO blows any radio out of the water Can you please share which breathtaking podcasts you're listening to, because I've never found anything even close to as good as landmark BBC radio shows like Today, PM, Today in Parliament, In Our Time, The Moral Maze, Blood, Sex, and Money, From Our Own Correspondent, The Essay, and Night Tracks.

No idea what any of those shows you listed are. My interests are science, history, computing, polictics - and there are numerous podcasts covering these subjects. To name just a few in case anyone is intersted:

* Dan Snow's History Hits

* Triggernometry

* Lex Fridman Podcast

* Atomic Hobo

* Jason Scott Talks his way out of it

* Darknet Diaries

* Omega Tau

* Rob Reid After On

* Anatomy of Next

* page 94 - Private Eye Podcast

* Command line heroes

* Full Fact

* Guido Talks

* Dan Carlin's Hardcore History

* The Bellingcat Podcast

* On The Metal

Some of these podcasts have won awards (See Bellingcat, Page94). My point being that given the shear number of high-quality content out there, I felt it wasn't worth paying £120 to the BBC every year.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#50

Post by chrisseaton »

CodeGlitch wrote: post #49
chrisseaton wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Podcasts, which IMHO blows any radio out of the water Can you please share which breathtaking podcasts you're listening to, because I've never found anything even close to as good as landmark BBC radio shows like Today, PM, Today in Parliament, In Our Time, The Moral Maze, Blood, Sex, and Money, From Our Own Correspondent, The Essay, and Night Tracks.

No idea what any of those shows you listed are. My interests are science, history, computing, polictics - and there are numerous podcasts covering these subjects. To name just a few in case anyone is intersted: * Dan Snow's History Hits * Triggernometry * Lex Fridman Podcast * Atomic Hobo * Jason Scott Talks his way out of it * Darknet Diaries * Omega Tau * Rob Reid After On * Anatomy of Next * page 94 - Private Eye…

> No idea what any of those shows you listed are ... My interests are science, history, computing, polictics

Well I don't know what to say apart from that absolutely astounds me. They're the background noise of many British homes and you're severely missing out if these are your interests.

For example, In Our Time alone is 900 45-minute episodes each about an individual topic of science, history, maths, politics, art, culture, religion, etc, sometimes even computing, with genuine experts coming to discuss and debate it starting with a basic introduction anyone can follow and then going into the details.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_In_Our_Time_programmes

I think literally nobody else in the world produces this kind of super-high-quality and enduring intelligent spoken-word content. Even the NPR in the US is very poor in comparison.

And have you really never heard of the Today Programme or are you exaggerating for effect? It really sets the national daily political agenda in the UK like nothing else. I can't practically understand how you can follow politics and never had heard anyone say 'they said on the Today Programme...'

> I felt it wasn't worth paying £120 to the BBC every year

...but you don't have to, for radio.

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