Inform, Educate, Entertain What has the BBC ever done for us?

[sidcow]

52 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

You can criticise it and it has very much been ‘touched’ the last few years with the license fee frozen, the cost of pensioners licenses absorbed by the BBC, whole channels appearing and disappearing etc..

Local radio is being stripped, and laughably, much local radio is now shared content with lots of other local radio from other places. Minority language programming, arts and sports sponsorships, charity work and fundraisers, all sorts of things are shifting to accommodate budgets and goals.

But the narrative, as always, has to be condensed down for people that want to know all about a vast industry, but in 7 seconds. So it’s either BBC is wonderful I remember Christmas specials by the Two Ronnies. Or BBC rubbish, £200 to watch stuff I can see on twitter for free. 

Our current crop of politicians like stuff to be binary and tribal, so you can vote preserve, or you can vote dismantle. In the culture war there is no room for big picture / soft power / innovation / employment statistics stuff. 

When Netflix are doing regional programming and regional news and supplying the good people of Leicester with new Asian sounds and raising money for charity and sponsoring some northern Irish football league and putting tutorials online for GCSE students and funding S4C, then I guess we can compare price points.

Personally, I don’t use the vast majority of BBC services. Just like I’ve not had much call for gynaecology from the NHS or the road bridges across the Humber, or secondary schools in Croydon. But I do understand why I pay towards them for the societal cohesion they bring. Should they all be improved? Hell yes. Will scrapping them improve life for people? Hell no. 

[ml1dch]

2 minutes ago, bickster said:

You shouldn't have a state broadcaster endorsing products by running adverts for them.

Also, at the point that the precursor to the license fee was introduced via The Wireless Telegraphy Act 1904, TV advertising was, unsurprisingly not something that they'd considered. 

[Seat68]

I think if tomorrow all BBC services were encrypted and there was a price to pay to open that up, even though I would, without even thinking, I know a great deal wouldn't. You have those that say they don't really use it, and then you have those that want to bring an end to the BBC, Taxpayers Alliance type people. I think that a number of the non users would realise fairly early on that they perhaps do use the BBC. I also think if the BBC was to go, or had its remit and delivery changed, we would feel the pain in arts and culture in the short and long term. 

9pm tonight across their services

BBC1 The drama Shetland.

BBC2 drama, The Mayfair Witches

BBC3 a Charlotte Crosby vehicle (BBC3 is a channel aimed at a younger audience)

BBC4 How to see a blackhole, The universes greatest mystery.

BBC News The context, a panel discussion on international news

BBC Alba Mach a Seo, in search of the northern lights

BBC Radio 1 Radio 1's Future Artists

BBC Radio 1 Xtra DJ Edu, Destination Africa

BBC Radio 2 The folk show

BBC Radio 3 In concert with the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra

BBC Radio 4 When it hits the fan, a discussion on PR

BBC 4 Extra Stewart Lee and Dave Haslam discuss their good reads.

BBC Radio 5 Live Commentary of the Villa and Man City game

BBC 5 Sports Extra Commentary of the Man United game

BBC 6 Music Shygirl in residency

BBC Asian Network DJ Limelight

BBC World Service News Hour

That's without taking in the absolutely decimated local radio, iPlayer and BBC Sounds, the podcasts etc. The breadth of coverage. I challenge anyone to tell me where outside of the BBC an artist from Asian network, the folk show, an afro beats tune that's not in the chart, where these would get national exposure. Take the BBC away, that initial rung has gone, the second step is gone. Bauer and Global, they aren't going to play any of that, TV and radio would become sanitised, where only the most popular would get coverage, it would be Oasis and Ed Sheeran, Alan Carr and Ant and Dec. No light and shade, no risks, nothing edgy, nothing experimental, but most of all, the tories would have won. They would finally have got it closed down.

[Mic09]

The only question that needs asking is 'how would the BBC perform on the private market'.

If you believe there is a need for the BBC, and it provides valuable service, why wouldn't you want to get it out in the open and see how it performs? 

If it survives the test of fire, great. If not, maybe it isn't as valuable as we believe it is.

 

Arguing for seeing animals in Africa for £15 a month is not a strong one in my opinion. 

The principle of paying Micah Richards and Garry Lineker to talk shit about football simply to have access to ITV is also, at best, faulty.

TV is dying either way. If you think FOX vs CNN will become true in the UK, just look at the numbers of independent news channels vs how many people watch prime time CNN shows. It's all happening on YouTube, and propping up BBC in it's current model is trying to bring back a dead man. 

TV has lost already, so if people want a BBC, give them a choice by putting it up against others. 

Another (and I believe a stronger) argument often put forward was raised by a previous poster.

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doing regional programming and regional news and supplying the good people of Leicester with new Asian sounds and raising money for charity and sponsoring some northern Irish football league and putting tutorials online for GCSE students and funding S4C

Let me put it this way - if this service is indeed valuable (I believe so) how about providing that service by advert revenue?  

And does this service even need to be offered by a TV broadcaster? Could it not be taken over by some other independent gov body?  

I can certainly envisage some sort of a descendant of BBC that prides itself by providing these services, while also taking £2m a year from Coca Cola to be standing on the table during MOTD. And maybe rather than paying Lineker a gazillion £££, how about getting a show with up and coming solid Football Journalists who look to get the exposure to have YouTube as their source of revenue? 

Heck, you could even make that into a show - 'The Big Football Talk' where 20 people go head to head to become the next leading face of MOTD. I know that their insight will be significantly greater than what we get now.  

[blandy]

20 hours ago, Demitri_C said:

As i said in the other bbc thread i think a streaming service for those that want it would be better. Thats the way it seems to be doing these days. The 'netflix' way

It'll probably end up like that, but not for a good while, because until all of society is completely computered up, and TVs are all "smart" so that Over the air transmission isn't necessary, you can't take away the telly of all the elderly or poor who have older TVs without a log-in function for the internet streaming.

Secondly, what happens to radio? Same thing, but even harder to deal with - car radios have no log in facility, and they rely on OTA reception.

Then there's the national and local emergency type stuff - getting info to people that there's a flood alert, or fire, or terror, or pandemic or whatever. People watching catch up, or not logged in - they don't get to hear messages of national importance.

The license fee is not ideal, but there's no better way at the moment.

[Nicho]

18 minutes ago, Mic09 said:

The only question that needs asking is 'how would the BBC perform on the private market'.

If you believe there is a need for the BBC, and it provides valuable service, why wouldn't you want to get it out in the open and see how it performs? 

If it survives the test of fire, great. If not, maybe it isn't as valuable as we believe it is.

 

 

I really dont think this is the point. As stated they broadcast across lots of different mediums in genres to suit everyone and everything. The question for me is could you now create a "free" thinking organisation that has its hand in producing new tv, shows, artists musicians and culture that it does, the simple answer is no. The value of something is not always in the profit it makes and the BBC does and has had an immeasurable positive impact on the UK. 

The attacks they receive is due to the tories when the BBC says something true and they dont like it, even though they give more than enough time to people like Kussenberg and Question time to spoute positive spin for them. 

Everything is not about profit and your point about performing in a private market is perfect conservatism. Close the care homes, the youth and after school clubs, remove benefits because they dont make profit. When in fact they impact positiviely much further down the line as does the BBC everyday.

Saying that the BBC obviously has its flaws but it is idolised all over the world for what it achieves. 

[Demitri_C]

13 minutes ago, blandy said:

It'll probably end up like that, but not for a good while, because until all of society is completely computered up, and TVs are all "smart" so that Over the air transmission isn't necessary, you can't take away the telly of all the elderly or poor who have older TVs without a log-in function for the internet streaming.

Secondly, what happens to radio? Same thing, but even harder to deal with - car radios have no log in facility, and they rely on OTA reception.

Then there's the national and local emergency type stuff - getting info to people that there's a flood alert, or fire, or terror, or pandemic or whatever. People watching catch up, or not logged in - they don't get to hear messages of national importance.

The license fee is not ideal, but there's no better way at the moment.

I dont listen to bbc radio do they need have adverts on that platform? Maybe having that for the radio side of things.

I mean with elderly surely there is only a small pool of that generation living? My pops is pretty usless with technology but even if he has learned about the basic things with computers.

If it were to happen it will be in next 10 years i would imagine

[blandy]

1 hour ago, Demitri_C said:

Yeah i get that but how comes it was designed like this and not like how itv c4 and c5 were they make money through adverts?

When it started, there was only the BBC broadcasting this new fangled (black & White) TV. So they set up the license fee for people with a TV to pay to fund the BBC TV broadcasts. A direct charge for a service, basically.

Obviously, when ITV was set up, it was funded by advertising, people paid, still, for the BBC via the license, and ITV via ad revenue. But if you'd stopped the license fee and funded the BBC via ads, too, then they'd have taken the vast majority of the ad revenue over the new start up ITV, and ITV would have fallen by the wayside. SO it stayed as BBC - License. ITV - ads.

Then along comes Channel 4, which had a public service remit, too and that was (I think) given some money at the time from the license fee/Gov't to cover that requirement for them to do stuff that wasn't being done by the BBC (or ITV). I don't believe it gets any state fun ding any longer.

Then came channel 5, and that followed the ITV model.

And then the internet was discovered and Sky and a proliferation of other "providers" and the license fee looks like an anachronism in the modern world.

So if you concentrate only on where the money comes from, or how each "provider" is funded, the license fee looks outdated.

But that's to miss the bigger picture. From the license fee, the BBC doesn't just provide a broadly equivalent service to Netflix or Sky or Apple TV. It provides school educational programmes, pre-school stuff for kids, local TV, local Radio, National Radio, a universal availability of FIFA World Cup and UEFA International final games, Wimbledon, Some other major sporting events... and absolutely loads more stuff which directly or indirectly benefits the nation one way or another.

On the flip side, the BBC perceiving (rightly) that it has to demonstrate "value for money" went down the route of perhaps over stepping its core purpose and started the website stuff which probably should have been left to others (not iPlayer, but News website, Sports website etc.). But they'd argue by doing that they were serving "non-traditional" (younger) users of media, who would otherwise have been lost. But if they bin off that side of it now, then they'll never ne ready for a subscription type model, because they'll have been left far behind.

The BBC is also beneficial internationally, via soft influence of other nations consuming BBC programmes (for which they mostly pay, and which help with funding).

[Seat68]

The BBC as it is will remain, until at least 2027. There is a review of the charter next year, but the charter is in place until 2027. Its now too late to scrap the license fee so as a minimum it would potentially be closer to 2040 before anything is scrapped. Not saying anything is definite but I see the royal charter being renewed.

[Mic09]

22 minutes ago, Nicho said:

I really dont think this is the point. As stated they broadcast across lots of different mediums in genres to suit everyone and everything. The question for me is could you now create a "free" thinking organisation that has its hand in producing new tv, shows, artists musicians and culture that it does, the simple answer is no. The value of something is not always in the profit it makes and the BBC does and has had an immeasurable positive impact on the UK. 

The attacks they receive is due to the tories when the BBC says something true and they dont like it, even though they give more than enough time to people like Kussenberg and Question time to spoute positive spin for them. 

Everything is not about profit and your point about performing in a private market is perfect conservatism. Close the care homes, the youth and after school clubs, remove benefits because they dont make profit. When in fact they impact positiviely much further down the line as does the BBC everyday.

Saying that the BBC obviously has its flaws but it is idolised all over the world for what it achieves. 

I might argue that keeping up a service in the way it has been run for yours is the very definition of conservatism. 

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commitment to traditional values and ideas with opposition to change or innovation

I fully appreciate everything is not for profit. But it's not a hospital or a police force. It's entertainment (and news) and things you arguably don't need.

You could think of a million things run by government policy, but some would be silly and could be better provided by a private investor.

Radio, podcasts, MOTD, Top Gear, I believe are some of those things.

Heck, look at top gear as a prime (no pun intended) example. It survived the test of fire by going to Amazon. Some people don't have amazon. But some might have it if they weren't made to pay £15 a month either way. 

I fully appreciate the service BBC provides to people. I just feel it doesn't have to be run the way it is, and vast majority of it could be privatised. 

[OutByEaster?]

3 hours ago, villa4europe said:

Same as all things British, it's a cash sink hole, way behind the timed, desperately needs reform, modernising and stream lining... But it's tradition so you can't criticise or touch it

Talksport, twitter and private medical insurance for the win yay!

[luckyeddie]

1 hour ago, bickster said:

You pay tax when you go shopping at Tesco or Morrisons, you don't complain where it goes, it doesn't go to Tesco or Morrisons, the tax goes into the general taxation pot

You pay a tax to watch live TV (or stream on iPlayer). That the money goes to fund the BBC isn't that relevant, apart from you know where the money goes

You pay a tax to drive a car, it does not go to fix the roads, it goes into a general taxation pot

If the TV Licence didn't go directly to the BBC and went into the general taxation pot this line of argument wouldn't exist.

Taxation goes to run the country, in theory for the benefit of all (yes lol), you and I only get to (sort of) say where it gets spent when we vote for people at a general election

You using the BBC isn't relevant here, I presume you aren't unfortunate enough to be homeless, a very small part of your taxation goes to fund help for those people, maybe you shouldn't have to pay that because you aren't homeless.

A fully functioning democracy really should have an independent state broadcaster, whether you choose to use it or not is up to you but you do need it to exist for the sake of the democracy that you live in. WIthout it..... well, look across the Atlantic.

Again, it is not a con, there is no confidence trick here, apart from you fooling yourself that you don't need the BBC

This is not a tax, which I have no objection to paying. It is a licence fee charged to use other products the BBC have no investment in. It is closer to a protection racket than a tax. If they decided to become a streaming service and charge a monthly fee in a competitive market, they would be extinct in a decade, which shows they are not value for money. 

[OutByEaster?]

1 hour ago, Mic09 said:

The only question that needs asking is 'how would the BBC perform on the private market'.

Maybe the question that needs asking is "If the output of the BBC is, in general, of a better quality and more appreciated and consumed by people than the output of those providers on the private market, then what other companies and services that currently sit within the private market could be be improved as a service for consumers by bringing them into state ownership?"

[Mic09]

8 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

Talksport, twitter and private medical insurance for the win yay!

Surely there is a middle road? 

[villa4europe]

3 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

Talksport, twitter and private medical insurance for the win yay!

i don't particularly like TS but the model they operate under is perfectly fine

and i live in a country with public and private health insurance...

FWIW i also live in a country that outright calls it a TV tax and the stations funded by it still have adverts and aren't neutral - I'm sorry but on the BBC funding, put adverts on like every other TV channel in the world, seriously who gives a ****

[Mic09]

Just now, OutByEaster? said:

Maybe the question that needs asking is "If the output of the BBC is, in general, of a better quality and more appreciated and consumed by people 

Maybe it is a better question - all I'm saying is let's test this theory. 

[OutByEaster?]

1 minute ago, Mic09 said:

Maybe it is a better question - all I'm saying is let's test this theory. 

I agree - lets start with water and rail.

[Mic09]

Just now, OutByEaster? said:

I agree - lets start with water and rail.

Or let's start with phone providers. Do you have an iPhone? Or a Samsung? Maybe a Nokia or an Oppo?

Then we can turn to cars. BMW? Seat? Tesla? Maybe a Fiat?

Or is it iGov and BWC (British Wide Cars) ? 

[OutByEaster?]

1 minute ago, Mic09 said:

Or let's start with phone providers. Do you have an iPhone? Or a Samsung? Maybe a Nokia or an Oppo?

Then we can turn to cars. BMW? Seat? Tesla? Maybe a Fiat?

Or is it iGov and BWC (British Wide Cars) ? 

A sort of national base of electric vehicles would be a great idea - owned by the nation and charged to consumers through a licence scheme - it'd reduce the number of cars on the road and allow for more opportunity for those who can't currently afford an electric vehicle. I like the idea that if I need to go visit a relative I can walk into town and pick up one of the BWC electric cars we all pay for - then drop it back when I don't need it so someone else can.

I'm not sure on handsets - but a national network provider that covered the whole country and we all connected to, paid through tax rather than as a for-profit enterprise doesn't seem a bad idea. So my iPhone/Samsung/Nokia or whatever would connect to UKE and I wouldn't pay a monthly fee - kinda taking the profit out of EE and putting it back into the nation, like BT used to be.

I'm immensely proud that the UK still has these institutions like the BBC and the NHS that offer some sort of resistance to the damage that modern feudalist free market thinking has on our societies - I get why the likes of Blackstone hate them, but I always feel a little bit sad when real, actual people want them taken away on some sort of idealogical grounds, it strikes me as strange.

 

[sidcow]

1 hour ago, Nicho said:

Saying that the BBC obviously has its flaws but it is idolised all over the world for what it achieves. 

Yep, I don't think people realise just how lucky we are with The BBC. 

I remember Whoopie Goldberg banging on about how important it was a few years ago. Hollywood people appreciating what it is yet here it's so easily dismissed. 

It also has a hand in a lot of commercial profit making projects that may not have been made without it.  You'll often see it in credits towards the end. 

Then of course you're got the world service and overseas operations that do a lot of good work all over the world.