Topic: The BBC

[jillcwhomever]

I agree on decriminalising. And I don't see the point of BBC3 and 4*, nor Radio 1 and 2. *Channel 4 is the hybrid appealing to the younger audience. Trimming the BBC and decriminalising the licence fee might draw some of the criticism.

You get some good stuff on BBC4. There are good documentaries and music shows on BBC4, it still has a role to play for me.

[Licky]

I’ve backed them all my life, a unique way to be funded and not some greedy corporate.  However, their political sway to the right is alarming, question time has become a joke and don’t even get me started on Liara Kuenssberg, if they can’t be impartial they may as well be owned by some other faceless corporate peddling their agenda, they are done for me, should be subscription funded now, they no longer have the credibility to be the nations channel

[So… Howard Philips]

I’ve backed them all my life, a unique way to be funded and not some greedy corporate.  However, their political sway to the right is alarming, question time has become a joke and don’t even get me started on Liara Kuenssberg, if they can’t be impartial they may as well be owned by some other faceless corporate peddling their agenda, they are done for me, should be subscription funded now, they no longer have the credibility to be the nations channel

Give it a month and the Daily Mail will be slagging them off and calling for them to be privatised.

And you'll get your wish.

[No666]

You get some good stuff on BBC4. There are good documentaries and music shows on BBC4, it still has a role to play for me.

I can't see why those can't be transported to BBC2, though. The good foreign dramas, the Scandi noirs, could be picked up by Netflix. You could argue that the BBC should not buy in content and should only create.

[Mutton Geoff]

I can't see why those can't be transported to BBC2, though. The good foreign dramas, the Scandi noirs, could be picked up by Netflix. You could argue that the BBC should not buy in content and should only create.

They are on the production side for many of the Scandi Noir and i take your point about docs to BBC2 but that is used now a bit like a BBC1 overspill has its fair share of quiz shows and psuedo comedy slots and reality shows.

[Red-Soldier]

Gary Lineker says BBC should make licence fee voluntary

The BBC licence fee should become a voluntary charge, the Match of the Day presenter Gary Lineker says, in comments that are likely to cause dismay at the national broadcaster as it faces a battle with the government over its future.

Lineker, the highest-paid BBC star with earnings from the corporation of £1.75m in 2018-19, told the Guardian the licence fee was the broadcaster’s “fundamental problem” and in need of reform.

“You’re forced to pay it if you want a TV, and therefore it’s a tax,” he said of the £154.50 annual charge on every household watching live television. “The public pay our salaries, so everyone is a target.”

Lineker suggested the fee – which is currently enforced through the criminal courts - should become voluntary and be charged at higher rate to subsidise elderly and poorer viewers: “I would make the licence fee voluntary. I’ve always said for a long time, I would make it voluntary. I don’t know the logistics of how it would work.

“You would lose some people, but at the same time you’d up the price a bit. It’s the price of a cup of coffee a week at the moment. If you put it up you could help older people, or those that can’t afford it.”

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/jan/27/gary-lineker-says-bbc-should-make-licence-fee-voluntary

[Jiminy Cricket]

That's a bit mad. And I usually Like Lineker. It is on par with the notion of having a voluntary income tax. I recall a Question Time audience member suggest that very thing (about tax), perhaps 20 or 25 or more years ago. The reaction from the audience was one of incredulity. And rightly so. But the audience, panels and QT as a whole was better back then. Given the general inability of people to reason these days, maybe Lineker's idea will catch on.

[thejbs]

I’ve always said for a long time, I would make it voluntary. I don’t know the logistics of how it would work.

Here’s how, Gary: it wouldn’t. 

[KillieRed]

What would people do if the BBC stopped being "free"?

Personally i watch very little of it live and i`d probably find other avenues to watch the stuff i was interested in, or just let it slide and do/watch something else. It`s sad, but i can no longer watch news output on the channel(s) without questioning it`s veracity. Perhaps I should always have thought that.

It`s no longer essential to have, and if it went to subscription I would not choose it over other services I use.

[So… Howard Philips]

What would people do if the BBC stopped being "free"?

Personally i watch very little of it live and i`d probably find other avenues to watch the stuff i was interested in, or just let it slide and do/watch something else. It`s sad, but i can no longer watch news output on the channel(s) without questioning it`s veracity. Perhaps I should always have thought that.

It`s no longer essential to have, and if it went to subscription I would not choose it over other services I use.

The BBC is the only service I use live as all the others are riddled with adverts. Even recording and speeding through them is a drag.

[Titi Camara]

Only way it survives long term is to sever all ties with government/legalities, become a paid for service and actually get back to being a credible broadcaster.

It also needs to eject all employees with a previous background in politics (time limited) or major contributors.

It should be apolitical and needs to learn that balance is not having a nutter on speaking hokum in order to balance out an intellectual talking in facts.

[eddymunster]

Only way it survives long term is to sever all ties with government/legalities, become a paid for service and actually get back to being a credible broadcaster.

It also needs to eject all employees with a previous background in politics (time limited) or major contributors.

It should be apolitical and needs to learn that balance is not having a nutter on speaking hokum in order to balance out an intellectual talking in facts.

Agree with this.

[killer-heels]

BBC News is utter dog turd. I used to believe that the Beeb should be funded through a tax but not any more, we should be allowed to choose whether we want it or not therefore I fully believe the licence fee should be scrapped.

The people who work there are representative of a certain portion of society as well. They seem to think all black people look alike after their LeBron James and Kobe Bryant mix up.

[SP]

It should be apolitical and needs to learn that balance is not having a nutter on speaking hokum in order to balance out an intellectual talking in facts.

More critical is the devotion to balance even in inappropriate circumstances. Climate change is the most stark example, but it was also there with the anti-vaxxers.

Sometimes the "balance" is just wrong, and it is wrong to present it as any kind of debate. Too many Arts grads who just don't understand Science, and too many microtargets that lose sight of the bigger picture and the reason the targets exist in the first place.

[eddymunster]

More critical is the devotion to balance even in inappropriate circumstances. Climate change is the most stark example, but it was also there with the anti-vaxxers.

Sometimes the "balance" is just wrong, and it is wrong to present it as any kind of debate. Too many Arts grads who just don't understand Science, and too many microtargets that lose sight of the bigger picture and the reason the targets exist in the first place.

Hate to repeat myself but... the Daily Mash summed it up pretty well with this piece.

The Earth: is it flat or round? An unbiased BBC report
8th August 2019

THE BBC is always at pains to present both sides of an argument. Here news editor Nathan Muir discusses the ongoing ‘round or flat Earth’ debate.

A controversy is currently raging as to whether the Earth is flat, or, as some scientists have speculated, spherical.

Certainly photographic images from the Apollo missions would seem to suggest the latter. Others, however, such as the experts at the Flat Earth Society, say this is nonsense and the Earth cannot be round because we’d all roll off.

Therefore in our latest report on the flat/round Earth debate we decided to ask random people in Lincolnshire, far away from metropolitan bias. They maintained that for them the earth is very flat indeed and therefore the whole planet must be the same.

Naturally both sides have accused us of bias.

Flat earthers believe we are in the pay of scientists, who in turn are bribed by NASA – an allegation we take very seriously. Meanwhile ‘Rounders’ insist the BBC should side with them, often in very strong terms such as “Oh for f*ck’s sake!”.

All of which goes to show – we must be doing something right!

So, taking all points of view into account, which is it? Is the Earth flat or round?

As ever in these matters, the truth lies somewhere in between. In all probability the Earth is both flat and round, like a squashed orange.

 

https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/environment/the-earth-is-it-flat-or-round-an-unbiased-bbc-report-20190808188058

[Andy]

BBC News is utter dog turd. I used to believe that the Beeb should be funded through a tax but not any more, we should be allowed to choose whether we want it or not therefore I fully believe the licence fee should be scrapped.

Is it a tax?

You can choose not to pay the TV license - just means you can't watch or listen to the BBC.

[BobOnATank]

Is it a tax?

You can choose not to pay the TV license - just means you can't watch or listen to the BBC.

Not correct. If you have a device (TV, laptop, smartphone etc) capable of receiving a BBC broadcast you need a licence.

Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk

[eddymunster]

Not correct. If you have a device (TV, laptop, smartphone etc) capable of receiving a BBC broadcast you need a licence.

Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk

That's not strictly true. You don't if you don't watch live TV or Iplayer.

How you prove that is anyones guess.

[Nobby Reserve]

After years of giving a broadly impartial (if rather Establishment-friendly) news editorial, since 2010 it's been increasingly a mouthpiece for the government.

And although I don't know if it's deliberate, they have given a platform for generally right-wing opinions, justifying this with a claim of 'representing both sides'. I'm thinking primarily of Brexit and climate change, where the loons and 'anti-' fundamentalists have been allowed to peddle their bullshit, largely unchallenged.

Yet people from 'the left' are never/rarely given the opportunity to challenge the right-wing/corporate-capitalist economic hegemony, for instance.


But saying that, the BBC make some great TV away from the abjectly poor and biased news coverage, and I'd rather the licence system was retained

[Elmo!]

That's not strictly true. You don't if you don't watch live TV or Iplayer.

How you prove that is anyones guess.

You fill out a form saying you don't watch live TV or IPlayer. You don't have to provide any more evidence than that.

[eddymunster]

You fill out a form saying you don't watch live TV or IPlayer. You don't have to provide any more evidence than that.

Ye I just had a mare trying to claim mine back when I cancelled mine when I got rid of my tv. They just don’t respond.

[idontknow]

Not correct. If you have a device (TV, laptop, smartphone etc) capable of receiving a BBC broadcast you need a licence.

Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk

Totally wrong.

If you watch tv as it is broadcast, including satellite - and/or bbc iplayer - you need a license.

That's it.
You can have as many devices as you want that 'may' be able to receive broadcasts. If you don't use them to receive a broadcast, you do not need a license.

That's it.
You do not need to tell them, you do not need to fill in a form, you do not need to visit their website, you do not need to let them in.

That's it.
That's the law.
Anything else is NOT on the BBC's own website.
If it was the law, it would be CLEARLY stated there.
It isn't .Because it is not the law.

And you do NOT need a license to listen to the radio.

All of the above is the law.
Anything else anyone else tells you or implies to you or suggests you had better do, you can ignore because it is not necessary.

Tv Licensing Laid Bare, free pdf, 2019
https://tv-licensing.blogspot.com/p/free-book.html?m=1


(We can talk about the Detector Vans, all 14 or so of them, another time. Let's just say, they can't be used against you, because they can't be verified by a defence counsel, because they are top secret. Which is annoying ( ) to every engineer, scientist in the world, as none of them have ever been able to do what John Noakes in a van can, apparently.)

https://tv-licensing.blogspot.com/2011/04/bbc-confirm-detector-vans-never-used-in.html?m=1

[Jiminy Cricket]

Totally wrong.

If you watch tv as it is broadcast, including satellite - and/or bbc iplayer - you need a license.

Or if you possess a device for recording the broadcast for later viewing. Basically, as I understand it, anything which contains a receiver capable of picking up TV or radio broadcasts. I believe it even applies to receivers in a state of disrepair (though, I might be misrepresenting that).

Unless, of course, the rules have changed in more recent years.

[Jiminy Cricket]

It seems that things have changed. I found the Wiki page more illuminating (and convenient) than that Google Docs PDF.

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

It is a dogs dinner of regulation.

[thejbs]

BBC News is utter dog turd. I used to believe that the Beeb should be funded through a tax but not any more, we should be allowed to choose whether we want it or not therefore I fully believe the licence fee should be scrapped.

The people who work there are representative of a certain portion of society as well. They seem to think all black people look alike after their LeBron James and Kobe Bryant mix up.

[/b]

Your conclusion is as lazy as their mistake. Clearly they do not think all Black people look alike. What is more likely is that whoever was quickly compiling the montage didn’t know anything about Kobe or basketball and made an honest error. Furthermore, a lot of photos of lebron beating Kobe’s record are meta tagged with Kobe’s name.

[killer-heels]

[/b]

Your conclusion is as lazy as their mistake. Clearly they do not think all Black people look alike. What is more likely is that whoever was quickly compiling the montage didn’t know anything about Kobe or basketball and made an honest error. Furthermore, a lot of photos of lebron beating Kobe’s record are meta tagged with Kobe’s name.

Maybe, but the idea that they clearly dont think that is odd. They very well may do. Usually in these situations its generally the black stars and people that get interchanged with each other.

[idontknow]

Or if you possess a device for recording the broadcast for later viewing. Basically, as I understand it, anything which contains a receiver capable of picking up TV or radio broadcasts. I believe it even applies to receivers in a state of disrepair (though, I might be misrepresenting that).

Unless, of course, the rules have changed in more recent years.

No, you understand it wrong.

Do you not think their website would make it absolutely clear if that was the case?
Of course it would.
It doesn't, because it isn't.

I accept there is a lot of 'implication' in what they say, but that's because they want people who do not need a license to pay for one.

On the video, yeah, you're correct, but that is to do with 'as it is being broadcast', NOT the capability of any equipment you have to receive a broadcast.

And no, apart from iplayer, the law has not changed recently, it is as it was decades ago. (I think radio licenses went in the late 60s, 70s).

And 'disrepair' is irrelevant, you can have 20 fully functional tvs in your home; if you are not receiving, (or recording  ) tv or satellite as it is broadcast you do not need a license, and you are under no obligation to contact the BBC, to let them inspect, or to give them your name.

It is very simple.

And the first couple of paragraphs of your subsequent post's Wikipedia links state this, 'as it is being broadcast'.

BBC tv licensing webpage is masterclass of implication by ommission. Well, it seems to be, the amount of intelligent people who look for what it definitely does not state as a proof of what it means.

And then they send their legion of thugs to bully the most vulnerable people in the country to buy a license they do not legally require, because oh, you've got a phone, oh, you've got a laptop lying dead in the corner. 

Maybe you don't think that happens, maybe you think everyone watches tv.

[idontknow]

ABC News in Australia, their reporting of the fires, is the example the BBC should follow.
Report, report. Ditch the opinions, ditch the slants. Ditch all the snarky political asides.
Get rid of all the Rod Liddles - fuck knows where he is anyway.
Fuck off all the neo-Humphreys.

Start all over again.
Bin the 50 year old soaps.
Find the Patrick Moore of climate change.

Ditch all tge phone-ins, talk shows, opinion shit.
No more shows where half the time is someone spooning something in their gob and chomping.
No more Pop idol, X idol, Dim Idol.

No more dramas where most of it is smooch smack lip sound kiss. I'm eating toast, it's off-putting.

No more shitty game shows.

No more crappy Panorama obviously-bollocks boys who can't get on a bus because of gangs but we have to pixellate everything.

Trouble is there's not much left, apart from Tony Harrison V repeats, and that Auden train thingie.
I did like Coast though, that was good. Bloke's probably bald now.

Why not just give it back to Marconis?
Oh, hang on, mmm.
Poor old Dame Nellie, she neve stood a chance.
 

[thejbs]

Maybe, but the idea that they clearly dont think that is odd. They very well may do. Usually in these situations its generally the black stars and people that get interchanged with each other.

Usually?  The last one I remember was when they put up Steve Punt thinking it was Eric Idle. What other examples of mixing up two black celebrities/stars have you seen on BBC? Mostly the mistakes they make are why the wrong pic is loaded to an article, so you get Peppa Pig on a WWII article or (tragically) Grenfell tower on an article about Big Ben repairs.

[Andy @ Allerton!]

I must be honest. For years the BBC was my go to site for news.

It was impartial, honest, objective and usually correct.

I don't even bother thesedays.

It's just a wank station for that inbred fucking c*nt of a titwank bastard fucking smelly bag of shite Cummings thesedays.


So I don't bother any more.

[Mutton Geoff]

I must be honest. For years the BBC was my go to site for news.

It was impartial, honest, objective and usually correct.

I don't even bother thesedays.

It's just a wank station for that inbred fucking c*nt of a titwank bastard fucking smelly bag of shite Cummings thesedays.


So I don't bother any more.

not a fan then😄

[Zeb]

Thought this was good from the BBC Press Office. They seem punchy at the moment and aware of the danger they're in with this current government.



Biggest new thing they're doing which is worth really praising is the Local Democracy Reporting scheme. Gets journalists into local papers to report on local stories. If you ever get to chance to go through some of what they've been doing, it's hugely impressive. Although not so much praise from some of the local councils and councillors who've had their muck ups and misdeeds reported.

[jason67]

All went downhill when they got rid of Ceefax...

[Red-Soldier]

I was please that they have decided to postpone the scrapping on the Red Button service.

I used it everyday to read the news and sport.  I enjoy sitting there in silence and reading things for myself, as opposed to someone telling me about them all the time.

It's also really handy when you are staying in places without any internet connection.

[aussie_ox]

Aussie citizen here.


Australia had a license fee until the late 1960's when everyone refused to pay it and it was abolished.    ABC (equivalent of BBC) then become taxpayer funded.



I've always thought TV license to be unenforceable.   To catch you TVL must need you to admit an offence or be let into your premises and catch you watching a broadcast surely.   What's to stop anyone just not letting them into your property?   TV detectors are absolute nonsense to me. 

[M(oaning) B(ecomes) E(mbarrassing)]

Not only keep it but up the cost is my opinion.  it's much cheaper as it is than the alternatives available and jeopardising the current service does no one any favours. 

[idontknow]

Zeb, that looks a very good move forward. High-quality local reporting has all but died over the last 30 years, encouraging a regrowth of that can only be of future benefit.

jason67
Ceefax, now that was a good one. Maybe we should a 60-word maximum on posts, and then depend on likes as to whether more can be added by the poster. 

As an aside, my favourite ever Ceefax was a report on the taking-down in Russia of an armed group. The leader despaired of American poetry overtaking Russian as the world's best, so he had gathered adherents who he forced to write  lines and sonnets and tercets and so forth every day. This clearly not working, he had turned to guns.
 

aussie_ox
Interesting about Australia, and how you got rid of the license.
And as I understand, they are the service telling Australia honestly what is happening.

You're right about TVL, problem is they are commission paid and people are unaware of their rights. And they target the vulnerable.
Strangely enough, they don't like knocking on doors in L8 demanding money.
And from years ago, for some unfathomable reason  Derry was a bit of a No Knock area too.

And the vans' is inadmissible in court, since doing so would allow the Defence the right to check that the gear was properly calibrated and in working order. Bit of a problem when it is so Top Secret that Marconi engineers used set themselves the impossible puzzle how it could possibly, within known scientific parameters, achieve what it says on the tin.
Plus, the vans are mostly seen parked up in supermarket carparks. One helluva range they have.

Andy, Andy, Andy ... I wish you could have met my dear departed friend Sean. He wielded the lexical headword 'c*nt' with unsurpassable and ungainsayable grammatical dexterity. Pure shock and awe to any recipient. 

[killer-heels]

Times reporting that the BBC licence fee is to be scrapped and moved to a subscription model.

5 years ago I would care. Now, not at all.

[jillcwhomever]

Times reporting that the BBC licence fee is to be scrapped and moved to a subscription model.

5 years ago I would care. Now, not at all.

More fool you then. The Government can bugger off.

[Jiminy Cricket]

Really bad news. The BBC needs fixing, not turning into another Sky or whatnot. A unique institution going down the drain for no good reason. There are going to be all sorts of things lost (perhaps forever) over the next 5-10 years in the UK.