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The Beeb mafia The news today seem to be full of ‘juicy goodness’. And yes, that is sarcasm. Not only ID cards loom on the horizon at a £40 pound a pop, hold the civil liberties, but another ‘venerable’ British instutition, the BBC is attacking your wallet. Next April, the TV license that finances the BBC is to increase to £121 ($194) a year.
Ms Jowell has already insisted the BBC’s core public service output would be protected for at least 10 to 15 years.
This settlement is designed to enable the BBC to provide a strong and distinctive schedule of high quality programmes and remain at the forefront of broadcasting technology.
Or perhaps help them pay for more ‘coverage policemen’ to monitor their bias.
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Wow. I am glad advertising pays for American TV. It is hard enough just paying the Cable bill, hate to have to add another 15 dollars a month on top of that.
I love the stated reason for the above-inflation increases:
“They will enable the Corporation to respond to the challenges of quality broadcasting in the digital age while meeting demands for greater transparency, accountability and cost effectiveness.”
And a baboon might fly out of my …
I was trying to explain the concept of racketeering to a Chinese classmate; it was amazing seeing the lengths of the convoluted rationalization she’d go through in order to avoid admitting that government actions like the BBC license, American steel tariffs, etc. are in essence the same thing.
After she admitted that they *logically* are, she then stated that rules of “right and wrong” don’t apply at the “macro” level, then becoming visibly upset when I pointed out that that’s the exact excuse used by tyrants in murdering millions of people.
Let’s hear it for doublethink!
Advertisements on American TV are so bad that I might pay $15/month to dispense with them.
I might, except that American TV in general is so bad that I really haven’t watched it much since, oh, the Ford administration (except for some sports events, and not many of those).
This should do wonders for the sales of video viewing systems offering, as a feature the absence of broadcast reception capability.
I used to feed the output of my VCR to a composite color monitor meant for a Commodore 64, but the VCR itself contained a tuner so I wouldn’t have been exempt. I presume the fact that the tuner had never been configured would not be considered a sufficient defense.
In short: Y’all are screwed.
I find it consistently astounding that your government charges you for the ‘privilege’ of receiving an openly broadcasted signal.
It just goes to show what people will put up with once they’re used to it.
The solution to this problem is simple enough. Kill your television. There’s still radio, the Internet, newspapers, magazines, even *gasp* books! Or do you get charged the fee even if you don’t have a television set?
And the height of their rapaciousness is that they charge you -only- half price if you are blind!
Jason,They even try to make you prove that you don;t have a TV.Letters are sent and inspectors sent round,it is all very totalitarian.Still it is run bt socialist mult-millionaires!
Sitting here watching US TV I find myself unable to worry too much about a hike in the license fee.
It beats the adverts on at the moment by a country mile.
I live in the UK, watch all the TV I want and have never paid my licence fee. This is one tax that is easy to evade.
If an inspector calls without a warrant, as they apparently always do the first few times, wish him good day, say nothing else and shut your front door. If you sincerely believe he will return with a warrant and a member of the constabulary, that is the time to pop down to the post office and pay your dues. Alternatively have your day in court and pay a £100 fine (magistrates rarely impose a larger fine than this).
Of course, unless you are a single mother or live in low income area, an inspector is very unlikely to ever call. They target what the BBC like to call the “socially excluded” and “underpriveledged” using quite sophisticated demographic data. These groups are more likely to not know their rights, more likely to let an inspector into their home without a warrant and less likely to turn up to court.
Last night there was 30mins of BBC TV that I could bring myself to watch. This morning the rabble on radio 5 were talking about mobile phone rings and how unfair it was to want to bring up little girls in little girl fashion, playing with dolls and pink ribbons and the like.
It is simply not value for money. More than that however, it is simply unfair. The whole arrangement needs ‘modernising’.
The licence fee is an assault on freedom of speech and association in the wider sense – not because people are being charged for receiving the BBC, which is optional, but because people are being charged for posessing the means to receive the ‘speech’ of other broadcasters. The BBC is in a protected position which would not be tolerated from a competition point of view in any other industry.
The license fee should be abolished and the BBC broken up and its frequencies sold to the highest bidders with the money refunded to previous licence victims and any surplus given in tax cuts.
As so much of its programme making is now done by independent companies, the most popular programmes would continue to be bought by other channels. Other parts such as the news and current affairs section might not find buyers in which case we would see a slight reallocation of labour resources in the media sector, possibly entailing new career opportunities opening up for all those lefty BBC journalists.
There would be a renaissance in UK broadcasting and programme making as a result of the proliferation of new free-to-air, advertising or subscription funded services on the old BBC frequencies. It is not the ‘unique way the BBC is funded’ that allows for the quality of British television. It is something in the national culture and character of the country that does that.
“Advertisements on American TV are so bad that I might pay $15/month to dispense with them.”
The BBC’s advertising is probably at least as bad – they just stick to advertising their own programmes ad infinitum.
And here’s proof that they don’t need the money:
‘BBC Licence Fee Rises, Budgets Tightened – and Executive Bonuses Increased’
http://dailyablution.blogs.com/the_daily_ablution/2003/11/bbc_licence_fee.html
I use my telly as a video player. That is, when I’m not just watching whatever-it-is from a nice little three-quarter-gig MPEG file downloaded to my hard drive. The beeb doesn’t take a penny from either. Broadband is good 🙂
I don’t pay the TV license, and do not intend to. I would rather not watch TV broadcasts than fund the BBC. I still use a detuned TV for watching my own DVDs, videos, and playing computer games, which is entirely legal without a license.
That is, when I’m not just watching whatever-it-is from a nice little three-quarter-gig MPEG file downloaded to my hard drive. The beeb doesn’t take a penny from either. Broadband is good 🙂
Yes it is. I do it myself.
But I try not to kid myself that by watching these without the advertising I am effectively stealing them.
Anyway, I reckon I get good value from the BBC myself. Their streaming news on broadband is excellent when I’m travelling on business.