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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

#431

Post by lotsofpulp »

_ph_ wrote: post #282
lultimouomo wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a state wants to fund public radio and TV stations, it doesn't need to do it through a mandatory, regardless of use flat fee. I would argue that that is the worse possible way to do it: * Increased bureaucracy (why not add a 0.1% to an existing tax?) * Regressive taxation (you pay the same amount regardless of your income; if you used the income tax, you would distribute it more fairly) * No market shaping (you co…

The point of having a fee vs. a tax is, that the government has no direct control of it. So they can't just adjust it at will. The fee is set for several years in advance and increased from time to time to adjust for inflation etc. But it is an independant entitiy deciding about this.

> So they can't just adjust it at will. The fee is set for several years in advance and increased from time to time to adjust for inflation etc.

What stops legislators from adjusting the fee at will? There’s legislation enacting the fee, defining the fee, enforcing the fee. Surely, there can be legislation to modify the fee and remove the fee. Same as any other tax.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#432

Post by 0xfaded »

ajsnigrutin wrote: post #428

> The United Kingdom is somewhat unique in the world for requiring those households which view broadcast television to purchase a licence for the privilege Not really, we have that in Slovenia too. In the past, you could avoid it by claiming you had no tv (and a grey-legal area of letting them verify). Then they expanded and added the "radio" part, where you paid less if you have a radio (and no tv), including car ra…

I live in Europe now, and I'm fine with high taxation. But for heaven's sake, call a tax a tax.

There are so many little things, whether its TV licenses, overpriced interactions with the DNV equivalent, overpriced tolls that were promised to be eliminated. The list goes on.

Fortunately most European countries have an awesome statistics office that gives visibility into government wastage. Unfortunately, the the social democracies historically(?) stuffed their public sectors in lieu of full employment policies, and bureaucracy is an existential threat over here.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#433

Post by CodeGlitch »

seanalltogether wrote: post #401
saberdancer wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the point of this license fee in this day and age? Everyone has a TV, so everyone pays the license fee. Wouldn't it be simpler to just use a part of the taxes already collected to go to BBC. My problem with this type of license fee collection is that it bring forward a number of costs associated with it that could be removed if it went directly from taxes and that today everyone has TV so it doesn't really "t…

I've brought this argument forward many times since I moved to the UK, and everyone I've talked to hates the idea of turning the fee into a general tax. It's a weird refusal that I genuinely can't understand as someone not born here. Everyone seems happy enough with the idea of paying tax for public libraries or parks or other social institutions they may never use because it benefits society, but bring up the tv lic…

Have you seen how much BBC bosses and stars are paid? Far higher than other public servants, so yes I would be against making it compulsory

https://www.taxpayersalliance.com/bbc_rich_list_2020_37_5m_b...

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#434

Post by DrBazza »

Hard_Space wrote: post #368
DrBazza wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My girlfriend would gladly pay for being able to access BBC UK series, but that's apparently impossible. There's the Britbox streaming service, but I have no idea whether it is international. Otherwise, there's limited amounts of BBC content on Netflix. But again, that may just be the UK version.

It's not international, and is jealously geo-blocked. As a Brit expat, I wish it was available. They are effectively refusing my custom, presumably because they can make more money from international licensing deals for terrestrial stations and higher-reach streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon.

Can you use a VPN, and your parents or friends postcode in iPlayer?

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#435

Post by ookdatnog »

jeofken wrote: post #246

The state not punishing you for publishing is free speech. The state forcing you to pay for their publishing is forced speech. Working for a company like the BBC can not be ethical, if ethics are universal.

Your argument only works under the assumption that money=speech, a belief that doesn't hold up to much scrutiny.

AFAIK, it's perfectly legal to speak in support of, say, an active terrorist organization. I doubt it is legal in many places to donate money to support an active terrorist organization.

If you believe that money=speech, the law is inconsistent in this matter. Assuming you want the law to be consistent, there are really only two ways to resolve the inconsistency:

1. Speaking in support of terrorist organizations should be illegal, or 2. Donating money to terrorist organizations should be legal.

I disagree with both these statements, so to me, money /= speech.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#436

Post by gambiting »

nailer wrote: post #387
M2Ys4U wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I find the wording here fascinating. Is watching a live stream over the YouTube app on my TV 'live TV'? Is watching a UFC event on the UFC app? What about the website? If it's broadcast simultaneously by other means (e.g. satellite, cable, terrestrial transmitter etc.) it counts as "live TV".

What if an event is on YouTube but also shown by satellite, cable, terrestrial transmitter etc? Does that mean I owe a license fee for YouTube? Am I obliged to check before every video? (Obviously these are ridiculous hypothetical questions, and I don't expect answers, but the policy itself is ridiculous)

Yep, it technically does. If there is a live channel on Youtube showing say a football match, then yes, technically you have to pay a TV licence for watching it, since the same match is broadcast on a TV channel.

I don't think the policy is that ridiculous, it's just that it's one of these where certain edge cases like this one can be safely ignored. You will be tracked and found if you use the BBC iPlayer without having paid the licence, you will not be found out for watching some random live youtube channel. It's an imperfect rule for a complex world.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#437

Post by Chris2048 »

seanalltogether wrote: post #401
saberdancer wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the point of this license fee in this day and age? Everyone has a TV, so everyone pays the license fee. Wouldn't it be simpler to just use a part of the taxes already collected to go to BBC. My problem with this type of license fee collection is that it bring forward a number of costs associated with it that could be removed if it went directly from taxes and that today everyone has TV so it doesn't really "t…

I've brought this argument forward many times since I moved to the UK, and everyone I've talked to hates the idea of turning the fee into a general tax. It's a weird refusal that I genuinely can't understand as someone not born here. Everyone seems happy enough with the idea of paying tax for public libraries or parks or other social institutions they may never use because it benefits society, but bring up the tv lic…

possible reasons:

1) concern about the neutrality of the BBC, esp. if you don't think they are currently neutral. It also might change the incentives of the BBC if funding is either guaranteed, or controlled by government.

2) the principle of general tax without strong reason. The government isn't trustable, they already privatised much of the railways. consent to general taxation give more power to government.

3) I don't have a television, and more people are choosing not to have one. There are shifts happening both wrt to media is consumed, as well as how laws are changing to adapt (e.g. requiring any device with a screen requiring a licence). Would be better for the situation to stabilise before deciding if a general tax is a good idea.

4) The whole TV-Van issue sours the issue. Public Libraries (AFAIK) don't send people after you for paying fees. The issue of censorship and management of publicly available information are also hot topics in libraries, but there is (arguably) a greater degree of "self serve" in a library, as opposed to planned/programmed broadcast - libraries don't generally create the majority of their content.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#438

Post by stkdump »

hef19898 wrote: post #266
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'.

Thanks for the edit. In Germany, the means are to put people leaning to certain parties in top positions. Or people with the right connections. As a result, the bavarian contribution, the BR, is not necessarly known for its liberal agenda. Others are more left leaning. One other way is to have former press and spokes persons from a government taking up positions at the braodcasters. When the current (?) spokesman of…

Is public broadcasting more prone to these things than privately funded broadcasting? If yes, why?

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#439

Post by thesuitonym »

laurent92 wrote: post #409
flower-giraffe wrote: post #211

I think the funding and governance (by Royal Charter) of the BBC have historically provided a huge benefit to society in the UK. Advertising free children’s TV (and radio) may have delayed the onset or rampant consumerism fuelled by commercial TV elsewhere. The BBC microcomputer project is arguably the origin of ARM CPU’s. Initially the license fee was for radios, I can’t find a reference but I remember being told as…

> What is absolutely clear from history is commercial media outlets fuel political bias, and it seems to be increasingly damaging to society. Public broadcasting fuels political division a lot. The most worrying is that you don’t notice it. It is increasingly worrying because when people are exposed to the other side, they immediately « catch fire », wonder why they have been lied to, and never trust public broadcast…

>It is increasingly worrying because when people are exposed to the other side, they immediately « catch fire », wonder why they have been lied to, and never trust public broadcasting anymore.

Compare this to people who watch commercial TV, see an opposing view, and immediately wonder why they're currently being lied to, and go back to trusting their single source of commercial programming.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#440

Post by benrbray »

tjpnz wrote: post #348
glandium wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

No detection vans in Japan but the door knockers are persistent as hell and not beyond making people feel unsafe in their homes.

The worst part is the intercom systems which are standard in every home. Not only do you hear the doorbell and the knock, but they get to broadcast their face directly into your private space! (I have since disabled the camera / audio feed but it spooked me more than a few times!)
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