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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

#461

Post by Silhouette »

saberdancer wrote: post #255
boffinism wrote: post #128

The BBC is currently dedicating hours of airtime a day to educational content to match our primary and secondary curricula because the schools are shut and lots of kids can't access online provisions. And still people complain about the licence fee in terms of whether or not they enjoy BBC gameshows...

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 agree that the licence fee is an anachronism and the BBC should have alternative funding instead, perhaps a ring-fenced budget paid from general taxation, but not because everyone has a TV.

Some people don't watch broadcast TV, and the BBC and its agents have been infamous for getting heavy-handed and harassing those who choose not to and who perfectly legitimately and legally do not have a TV licence. This is backed by a controversial law that criminalises the failure to have a licence if you do need one, which under any normal circumstances would only be a minor civil matter.

Meanwhile, today the BBC is very much a multimedia institution, but the licence fee remains tied specifically to broadcast television, a historical anomaly that could be fixed.

A different funding model that broke that link and removed the need for a separate licence fee could fix all of the problems with licence evasion and heavy-handed enforcement that have been a black mark on the BBC's history, as well as providing a fairer system where the public service is funded from public funds rather than singling out a particular group.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#462

Post by hef19898 »

account42 wrote: post #314
hef19898 wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lines are blurry in Germany sometimes, sure. But outlets like the ARD, and a lesser extent ZDF (there are some legal differences between the two, including independance) are way more neutral regarding the ruling, or major, parties like, say, Fox News and the GOP. And they have been, regardless of government coalition. They still are as far as their pure news formats are concerned, much mre "just the facts" then anyth…

> ARD, and a lesser extent ZDF (there are some legal differences between the two, including independance) are way more neutral regarding the ruling, or major, parties like, say, Fox News and the GOP. That is hardly a strong endorsement.

I could have used MSNBC and the Democrats. They have George W's former press secretary with her own show, so I'd say they are biased against the current GOP, less so against conservatives.

As far media and press is concerned, fact based and neutral is the strongest endorsement I can think of.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#463

Post by Chris2048 »

matthiasv wrote: post #269
kwanbix wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC in Germany Netflix €14, Disney+ €7, Amazon Prime Video €6. And all 3 I can watch whenever I travel. The TV/Radio Tax is about €18!!! and I can only "enjoy" it in Germany!!! Not only that, the quality of programming quite bad, and to make it even worse, I am forced to pay for it when I don't even watch it. When I moved to Germany it just blown my mind.

Are you also complaining about other parts of societal funding that does not benefit everyone? You could argue about so many things that might not affect you directly (schools, police, roads, …) but at the end of the day you may also profit indirectly from those as well (more educated people, fewer crimes, proper goods distribution, …).

How could you possible live in Germany and not benefit in someway from the roads? And everyone pretty much relies on the existence of the police/hospitals, even if they rarely need their services.

A million miles from what is mostly a luxury good with lots of competition.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#465

Post by mnw21cam »

eplanit wrote: post #458
faceplanted wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not law enforcement

So one can just tell them to f--- off and go away?

Yes, you can. Please do. It would be a net benefit to humanity if everyone did that. Capita only use the bullying tactics because they think that it will get them an increased return. However, they are technically nothing more than very pushy sales agents trying to sell you something. If everyone told them to get stuffed, there's an extremely slim chance that they might choose a more pleasant tactic. I wouldn't hold one's breath though.

You can also write to Capita and tell them that they are not welcome on your property, and then they can't even walk up to your front door. If you have a sticker on your front door rejecting cold callers and door-to-door sales, then they are trespassing as soon as they knock. Call the police if they don't leave. I have heard enough stories of Capita agents doing misdeeds once inside that you should not trust them, regardless of how many threats they make. The only circumstances under which you should ever let them in is if they are accompanied by police with a search warrant.

You can also write to them and tell them that you view their threatening letters as harassment, and that they must stop sending them. You don't need to tell them your name - just your address.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#466

Post by eplanit »

mnw21cam wrote: post #465
eplanit wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So one can just tell them to f--- off and go away?

Yes, you can. Please do. It would be a net benefit to humanity if everyone did that. Capita only use the bullying tactics because they think that it will get them an increased return. However, they are technically nothing more than very pushy sales agents trying to sell you something. If everyone told them to get stuffed, there's an extremely slim chance that they might choose a more pleasant tactic. I wouldn't hold…

Good to know, and you're right. Glad to know it's not as dystopian as it sounds.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#467

Post by jontutcher »

0xfaded wrote: post #432
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 socia…

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

The BBC is license-fee funded rather than tax funded so that (in theory at least) they don't have to rely directly on the government for funding - private citizens directly fund the corporation.

This goes some way to ensuring more independence, and fairer news output.

In reality, the government holds the BBC to ransom every eight years when the royal charter they operate under is re-written. There will always be claims of political bias on both sides.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#468

Post by scotty79 »

ballenf wrote: post #441
faceplanted wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People have clearly noticed the social and political issues with advertising for a very long time now. The issue is that it's hard to rally against one of the most lucrative businesses ever to exist that inherently has an extreme amount of messaging power to defend itself.

It's also worth noting that advertising is nearly a necessity in an industrialized society. Production of goods has high capital upfront costs and marginal costs that become negligible at scale. You can't get that scale without advertising or a government-mandated monopoly. Or, at least, you can't get that scale quickly enough.

For me economy is like a forest.

Trees (companies) compete for sunlight (purchases) and adverisements are their trunks.

They 'waste' enormous amount of energy on trunks not because longer trunks increase the amount of sunlight. They just lower the probability of being overshadowed by the others.

If somehow trees could agree on how high the trunk should be at most they could limit this waste.

Instead they literally grow trunks as long as the physical laws allow.

Instead of tons of in your face advertising everywhere you could have just one goverment manager directory of stuff and services. Where companies could register their products, services, pricing.

Of coure there would be law breakers and positive publications about brands paid for under the table but I think overt ban would lead to economy wasting much less money on advertising to outcompete itself.

I don't think such a drastic change will ever happen. Large percentage of our culture is created directly for the purposes of advertising. So advert free society would be different in so many ways. But I would bet it wouldn't be worse. And if it was, we could just lift the ban and see trunks grow back.

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#469

Post by marcosdumay »

audunw wrote: post #289
gyulai wrote: post #165

Many people here are commenting on the fact that public broadcasters tend to do documentaries and educational programming which wouldn't be able to survive at that level of quality under a free market system, which seems to be a cause that almost everyone can get behind and an argument frequently being used for defending this system. What riles me up personally: the ludicrous sums of money that these broadcasters pay…

> I really don't understand why I should be forced to give money to corrupt organizations like FIFA and the IOC to hold sports events that I don't watch and otherwise don't have a stake in, State media has to broadcast some content that's actually popular, that most people want to watch, otherwise they'd soon lose political support. I hate it too, but fact is that these events are extremely popular, especially among…

State media must focus on content that is useful to the society, not what is popular. Otherwise, why do you even need the state interference?

Re: TV detector vans once prowled the streets of England

#470

Post by afavour »

eplanit wrote: post #430
scotty79 wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if people will ever notice how socially and psychologically toxic is advertisement business and regulate it stringently.

Less toxic than law enforcement knocking on my door to see if I have a damn television. I'd rather reign in authoritarianism.

“reign in authoritarianism”?!?

It’s not dissimilar to a tax audit. Heaven forbid we could all be a little less hysterical.

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