BBC licence fee could be means tested everyone pays regardless of whether or not they own a telev

Easy Rider, do you not see the irony in saying one version of media is rubbish and the other is good, when it's painfully obvious that they can both be subjective, however at least one gives you a choice to buy it.
The BBC "was" a tradition of the British public when it created brilliant tv, great comedy, had great sport, and entertaining family gameshows, and unbiased news.
Now it has tried to follow the crap the other tv shows make to pander to idiots who call in to vote, lost all the rights to any sports, and employed people like Miranda, ffs..
This is something they shouldn't have done, and frankly BBC content isn't worth paying for, even the Radio stations have turned to ****

I would bet a ton of money on a forum vote about whether you'd pay for the BBC ending in landslide victory to NO! (especially since there no more topgear, as we know it)
 
Last edited:
easyrider said:
Your referring to the polar bear scene? Wonderful shots and totally understandable....the error was not explaining why before the scene with a face to camera of DA
Click to expand...

If I remember it correctly the fact they filmed the polar bear cubs in a zoo was discovered by a hard hitting DM investigation where they dug in deep to the expense account for coffee and donuts and found where the BBC had cunningly hidden what they'd done on a website that was accompanying the programme along with the readon why (I think it was made all the harder by the url being shown at the end of the programme, the BBC are devious like that*).

I think it only took the DM several weeks to find the post on the relevant BBC nature blog/behind the scenes/how it was made page.

Given the shots themselves were of the bears acting naturally, but could never be done in the wild because the cameraman would have been at massive risk, or the cubs could have been abandoned if disturbed (assuming the film crew could have found a polar bear den in time to set the cameras up), I think I'll forgive them.


*It's like us putting important information on the forum, in a thread marked as "important information, read me", it acts like a chameleons camouflage and no one ever sees it.
 
easyrider said:
edit....people even justify the monthly cost for sky by talking about how Good the gui is ffs...

It's sad.


I have a 3x Humax HD 1000 boxes and the gui is great.
Click to expand...

To be fair the GUI is good, I wouldn't say it justifies any sort of cost however. I haven't tried Virgin for a while but it used to be so laggy and gash, TalkTalk TV box was the same. Never tried the BT TV box, not sure what that's like.

The only piece of equipment that comes close in my experience is the VU+ with a Blackhole image, and some add ons ;) That's where it was at.
 
Last edited:
Some foolish people in this thread.

The BBC is not just TV though is it ? But starting with TV I really dont mind for every crap show they make there will be something i can watch or enjoy watching on the Iplayer or live once in a while.

Then we have the Radio both national and local. Local in Nottingham is very good tbh great coverage of local sport in football and ice hockey.

There internet site is very good and wealth of stuff, from cookery to Astronomy, then all the children's programs.

The BBC is about everyone not just what some of your selfish postings seem to indicate. So i fully agree EVERYONE (apart from pensioners) should be paying for it. Better a independent broadcasting unit that covers the nation than a company like SKY, BT who answers to no one apart from the check book and there own secret political agenda to increase that check book.

So yes, let the BBC change it has to but it give the means to do it with the good stuff it has been making for years by everyone paying.

This Tory agenda to break it down is partly due to a significant number of Tory MP`s sitting on the board at various levels of Independent media company's who want the BBC out so they can do nothing but increase profit and turn out the same crap over and over again.

Look to America for how crap TV is, for every Game of Thrones there are 10000 dirge shows.

I dont understand why people pay a lot of money for SKY, VIRGIN etc and there are STILL adverts !!!! Besides SKY has destroyed football, cricket, F1 and numerous other sports.
 
Ok lets look at that.

Radio 1- awful, 2- ok, Radio 3 (don't even know what the hell that is)
Radio 4 - Classical and archers, what is this 1925)
Local radios, christ unless your a cabbie/whitevan driver or pensioner who the hell listens to those.
all alternative radios, awful. (personal opinion)
Would I pay for any of them NO!!

Their website is not a herald of website genius, it's pretty simple in nature to navigate and has good information but I don't go there at all really unless to find stuff on Iplayer, because I can get it everywhere else in the same format.

It's not special anymore like it was in the 40-90 because it was the one stop shop for great stuff, as it was funded by us and as such had the wealth to make great tv, but the internet has killed it and it hasn't moved on, and now it doesn't give you the best at most it gives you the average and makes you pay a lot of money for it.

What worse is you have no choice.

I dont understand why people pay a lot of money for SKY, VIRGIN etc and there are STILL adverts !!!! Besides SKY has destroyed football, cricket, F1 and numerous other sports.
Click to expand...
It's simple! Choice! I can pay £30 to watch 50 channels of stuff I want to record with a plethera of movies, or I can pay £60quid and get constant sport etc. There is 1200+ hours of tv per day for me to choose, or I can be forced to pay £10 for BBC 1, and 2 full of stuff I don't like.
If you create the package you want, then you pay about 50p-£1 per channel per month, if sky followed the BBC business model and removed adverts it would cost £500 a month.
 
Last edited:
R4 is far more than classical and archers ;)

It's got consumer affairs, woman's issues, comedy, drama, news, politics etc :)

The local news is handy if you're in any profession that may need to know the local conditions (so for example farmers, gardeners), or just want to know what's going on locally. It's also probably the best way to get information in the event of major weather situations as it tends to be available when the local telephone exchange is under water, or you're driving through heavy rain/snow.
 
Third Opinion said:
If the BBC is so brilliant, such good value for money and we all love it so much then why don't they make it subscription only?
Click to expand...

Look up the definition of a PSB or public service:)

It's impossible to be a PSB when you are subscription, and if you go subs you have to start actually chasing ratings (and thus subs) as your primary objective.

It's interesting to note that apparently the BBC has something like 20% of the TV spend in the UK but produces something like 40-50% of the new UK TV content, and about 90% of the new children's TV content for example.
 
New content does not equal good content. It just means they have an almighty budget to produce shows.
Being good would warrant that money.
 
Last edited:
ChroniC said:
New content does not equal good content. It just means they have an almighty budget to produce shows.
Being good would warrant that money.
Click to expand...
But they are good, BBC funded stuff is resold all over the world.
Even ITV/C4 content is strongly dependent on the BBC, whether it's TVL funding or Studios/infrastructure.

I am personally of the opinion that the BBC should focus on quality rather than quantity of output and always trying to compete with the popular thing be it on ITV or Sky1, but there is still a lot of high quality content there, more than any other UK network produce. Remember that half of the freeview/sat channels are BBC supported as well.
 
ChroniC said:
New content does not equal good content. It just means they have an almighty budget to produce shows.
Being good would warrant that money.
Click to expand...

It depends on your personal view of what is good.

Personally despite the fact that about 90%+ of the BBC content does not appeal to me in the slightest I understand that just because I don't like Strictly (which does have very good production values, and fills part of the inform remit as well as the entertain one), or Eastenders other people like them.
I thought Wolf Hall was great (and it looks like even the Americans thought it was good*), but can understand why someone who has no interest in History or drama might think otherwise.

It's also telling that the BBC is able to produce as much content it does for about the same that HBO charge for <10 hours of content per week.




*8 nominations for one of the main TV awards.
 
ron3003 said:
Doesn't bother me as I've always paid the licence.
This 'everyone pays' stuff was bound to happen eventually as too many people are pretending they're not viewing live tv when we all know they actually are. Telnefit scroungers ;)
Click to expand...

Not me. I haven't watch a single bit of live TV since scrapping my license. You can't just go around making wild assumptions based on your own prejudices.

CyZMyAssBaby said:
This is a fare point, and of which if the UK goverment wishes to fund. But this should not be done through TV licensing. The general public have a right to choice. If UK interests wish to be applied abroad then this can be through the appropriate goverment deaprtment which is funded through general taxation.

Albeit the commercial advatages that can be brought to countries around the world through commercial advertising therfore will fund the BBC broadcasting interests abroad. taking into account the license fee pays for these staff news offices around the world. As far as I am concerened this adds even more reason as to the BBC should be commercialised through commercial advertising. Taking into account the viewers and radio listeners around the world do not have to pay the BBC license fee. The UK resident is funding the world population who use BBC services through the £145.00 license fee.
Click to expand...

The BBC world service, at least the tv channel, has adverts, and as such is funded commercially.

visibleman said:
The license pays for vastly more services than just TV programming, so it'd be impossible to pay wall the lot (ie - radio stations for example).
Which is why i'm all for making the BBC an essential service and incorporating it into national taxes - everyone is using some form of BBC service (youview/freeview/freesat platforms etc) even if they don't watch BBC TV channels.
Click to expand...

Can't agree with that at all. There is no reason to force people to pay for something they don't use just because. Not everyone watches the TV, not everyone has the time. And when they do, they may well just prefer the £6pm for Netflix or similar. And not everyone listens to radio. I know many people who would never listen to national radio, and prefer instead to just listen to cd's / podcasts or whatever.

ChroniC said:
Ok lets look at that.

Radio 1- awful, 2- ok, Radio 3 (don't even know what the hell that is)
Radio 4 - Classical and archers, what is this 1925)
Local radios, christ unless your a cabbie/whitevan driver or pensioner who the hell listens to those.
all alternative radios, awful. (personal opinion)
Would I pay for any of them NO!!
Click to expand...

Agree with radio 1 & 2. Radio 3 is your classical station, not Radio 4 which is essentially a talk only station (Dessert Island discs etc being an exception). I find Radio Scotland quite good, well, 9-2 on weekdays, but equally I like Radio 4 at drivetimes.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom