Endless Repeats

[KWILParticipant @kwil]

Out of interest, the BBC does not operate or maintain the TV transmitters etc Company called Arqiva does but that was looking to be sold earlier this year.

[Steve PaveyParticipant @stevepavey65865]

The BBC, under the guise of TV Licensing, are guilty of harassment and demanding money with menaces. And I’m not joking either. If an insurance company, for example, sent out letters telling people who are not their customers that they risk fines if they drive without insurance cover, or telling those same people that they are ‘under investigation’ there would rightly be uproar. At the very least the ASA would be having strong words with them. But the BBC do this routinely. I have a stack of threatening letters from them. Some of them even resort to ambiguous or misleading statements which imply that owning a tv or an aerial necessitates a licence, which of course it does not.

Attempting to tell them that you do not want their services means divulging your personal details to them, which I am loathe to do. So I have to put up with a letter every 2-4 weeks, and threats of a visit, not from a salesman but from an ‘enforcement officer’. If one ever appears on my doorstep I may not be responsible for the resulting language.

[KWILParticipant @kwil]

Of course it's not the BBC that collects, it is Capita under the guise of TV Licencing Agency.

Capita is one of those "Service" companies that get involved in as many money making pies as they can.

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

Capita? surely there's an R missing somewhere?

Our government seems to have a compulsion to get C*****a to undertake things that should be done by the public service, make a hash of it then get paid even more to screw something else up.

Deciding who qualifies for benefits, army recruitment, electronic tagging, need I go on? Trouble is the worse they get the more work seems to go their way.

[Tony Pratt 1Participant @tonypratt1]

Posted by duncan webster on 28/12/2021 19:06:49:

Capita? surely there's an R missing somewhere?

Our government seems to have a compulsion to get C*****a to undertake things that should be done by the public service, make a hash of it then get paid even more to screw something else up.

Deciding who qualifies for benefits, army recruitment, electronic tagging, need I go on? Trouble is the worse they get the more work seems to go their way.

Obviously the salesman are a bit brighter than the procurement dept.If it was their own money they would be a bit more careful!!

Tony

Edited By Tony Pratt 1 on 28/12/2021 19:51:20

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Posted by Steve Pavey on 28/12/2021 13:15:00:

So I have to put up with a letter every 2-4 weeks,

As I don't get a newspaper I find these come in handy, and I get them in pairs owing to some house naming mix up. Delivered free too.

For lighting the woodburner of course, what were you thinking.

[John Doe 2Participant @johndoe2]

My 2p:

Anyone who has watched television in the USA will know what total rubbish television can become when it is all funded purely by advertising. So many adverts that a 1 hour program has only about 10 mins of actual content, and 50 mins of adverts, trailers, recaps on the program etc. It is banal and unwatchable.

The BBC is far from perfect right now, and needs a really good shake up. In our household we pay our licence fee and watch only Freeview, and most of the good drama is on ITV: Foyles War, Vera, Endeavour, Morse, Poirot, Marple, etc. (and has almost no swearing, sex or violence).

The BBC receives the licence fee, the commercial channels receive the advertising revenue. If the licence fee was abolished and the BBC had to take advertising, all the channels would suffer because the advertisers would want to be on the Beeb, so the advertising revenue would be reduced for everyone.

The BBC sets a technical and content standard, which the advertising funded stations match (or exceed). If the BBC disappeared, the other stations would not necessarily need to keep that standard up, witness television in the USA.

The BBC lost out when sport decided it could make millions out of television rights and subscription television. The BBC cannot compete with subscription services such as Sky and BT. Now if you want a lot of sport you have to pay an expensive subscription, so everybody has lost out, except the SKY, BT and sport club executives.

Many say the licence fee is a tax. It could be taken out of our income tax, but you could argue that the BBC are being honest and open by declaring it. People moan about £150 a year but spend much more than that on mobile phones, satellite subscriptions, car loans, gym membership etc etc. Having said that, most presenter salaries are frankly ludicrous and offensive. Engineering staff at the BBC used to earn about half what you could earn by going to ITV, but only the BBC trained the engineers.

The BBC has a World wide network of journalists, stringers and other news gathering facilities. The BBC and its authority is/was one thing that makes our country different to others. Most other countries know who the BBC are. Like the monarchy – very far from perfect in recent years, but it helps make our country what it is.

As SoD says, be careful what you wish for. The BBC used to be great – think about our childhoods. I personally would rather we kept the BBC and fixed it, rather than getting rid of it.

The licence fee has just been frozen for the next two years, and the Government has said the next licence fee review will be its last.

 

Edited By John Doe 2 on 18/01/2022 10:29:58

Edited By John Doe 2 on 18/01/2022 10:33:04

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

The BBC

…….

Apart from that the BBC is fine

Edited By Ady1 on 18/01/2022 11:07:39

[pgk pgkParticipant @pgkpgk17461]

I do agree with the terrible state of TV in some other countries where advertising is intrusive to the program, often to the point where ads take up more of the screen than the subject matter. However, the BBC has also changed.

Recollection through youth and rose-tinted memory is such that one had belief in the integrity and truthfulness of BBC news and opinion and program content in well articulated 'Queen's English' and a moral message.

Those days have gone with competition and inclusiveness and every subset of nation and ethnicity wanting their own views and voice, giving the BBC an impossible task to fulfil. That, and claims of journalistic independence and a company that follows its own agenda lead to claims (rightly or wrongly) of bias. And certainly to poorer journalistic standards, with rarely a day free of grammatical errors on the BBC news website

The BBC has lost its place as the vice of honest government and the country has lost any suggestion of the latter such that i contend that it no longer justifies the right to charge in the way that it does.

If we are in the era of 'choice' then I have chosen not to have a TV licence, not to have subscriptions to sky and the like and find my entertainment elsewhere.

pgk

Note the embarrassment of criticising BBC grammar and seeding my own post with typos…which i hope I just corrected

 

Edited By pgk pgk on 18/01/2022 11:03:16

[Frances IoMParticipant @francesiom58905]

I liked “BBC has lost its place as the vice of honest government ” – pity as it should squeeze the truth out of all.

[CirclipParticipant @circlip]

Queens English disappeared when Lady Isobel Barnett and Silvia Peters etc. were retired. One the Beeb haven't repeated is "The Potters Wheel", essential viewing back in the day. Agree about the 10pm repeats on ITV3 though.

Regards Ian.

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Posted by pgk pgk on 18/01/2022 11:00:41:

I do agree with the terrible state of TV in some other countries where advertising is intrusive to the program, often to the point where ads take up more of the screen than the subject matter. However, the BBC has also changed.

…

Well, I think it's pretty close to what's happening here with commercial channels – it's why at least some of them are offering an ad-free service – of course for extra money!

I think the most serious risk associated with the huge variety of channels available now is fragmentation of culture. To some extent the limited number of channels in the 50s to 70s took the place of regular churchgoing, in that they provided a measure of common experience that members of a community could share and discuss on following days.

Now, with the huge variety of (generally speaking) low-grade programming distributing attention in such a dispersed manner, once you've sorted the weather, there's potentially nowt left to talk about to anyone not in your own interest group.

However we might change the BBC, I think we absolutely need a common cultural anchor or some sort.

Edited By Mick B1 on 18/01/2022 11:53:14

[CirclipParticipant @circlip]

Not a political rant but if I remember, 24hr TV seemed to start in the days of Mrs Thatchers reign. Something to entertain the unemployed section of the great unwashed.

When installing Danish high end TVs my mantra was "You can pay £10,000 to watch 99 channels of cr*p or £200 and watch the same"

Plus of course TV Tax.

Are TV shops still obliged to inform the Beebs mafia you've capitulated and become a lemming?

Regards Ian.

Edited By Circlip on 18/01/2022 12:01:24

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Posted by Dave Halford on 26/12/2021 12:44:43:

…

To be honest the last time I was at work and attended a meeting with food provided I had no idea that I was in fact at a party.

Was there wine, music and dancing till the early hours?

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

I don’t know where this lies on the continuum between Amusement and Irritation; so let’s just note that whilst the forum is busy whingeing … there has been precious-little interest shown in Benoit Mandelbrot.

There is probably a joke to be made about ‘Chaos’ but I honestly can’t be bothered.

MichaelG.

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Poor old Auntie Beeb being duffed up again, but is she really guilty?

MediaFactCheck is a North Carolina Company unlikely to be influenced by UK partisan input, either right or left.. Their methodology described on their website. It is not a front organisation for any particular political viewpoint.

For example:

• CNN are rated closer to Left than Left Centre
• Fox are between Right and Extreme Right
• Reuters are in the middle 'least biased'

They rate the BBC slightly left of 'least biased', almost in the centre and score it's reporting as factually HIGH. In the comment section discussing bias, they conclude 'In fact, both sides of the political agenda have accused the BBC of having a liberal or conservative bias.'

The Royal Charter decided the BBC would be funded by license in order to be free of advertising and independent of shareholder and political interests. I understand why that upsets Corbynistas and Tory-Fanboys alike but surely an independent broadcaster is better for the majority than the alternative? Thinking folk want to know what's going on.

Is it sensible to put broadcasting in the hands of any group that can't bear criticism? Democracy requires governments to be held accountable for abuses which is difficult when reporting is controlled by Spin Doctors, Politicians, and Apologists. We have more than enough Fake News as it is.

Removing the Licence Fee may have unexpected consequences for older viewers. Freeview and Freesat are both part funded by the Licence Fee. I suggest removing the licence fee will hasten the end of conventional TV broadcasting: it's already on the way out because advertising isn't pulling enough money in any more. Viewers will have to switch to watching online streaming services instead.

Apart from the learning challenge, there are some new costs: paying for a Firestick/WiFi/Media Server and many online services are subscription only.

Dose of culture shock too – streaming services operate rather differently from broadcast telly. So instead of watching BBC News giving the government's latest mishap balanced reportage, voters will be watching CNN, Al Jazeera, CGTN, or any of several other News Channels allegiances unknown, and usually not British.

Don't forget, comedians telling jokes about politics never changed anything!

Dave

[vic neweyParticipant @vicnewey60017]

The BBC is a s guilty as hell! it wastes a discusting amount of licence payers money, I worked on BBC scenery for 18 years so know what goes on. Should the licence payers pay for the food & drink of staff members via subsidised canteens etc.?

All food and drink on location is provided free to everyone on site from dawn to dusk, and it's not egg & chips and burgers either as it's all gourmet food. After filming ends they throw a big champagne party to celebrate.

Hundreds of thousands of pounds on taxi's and hotel bookings that were never used. hundreds of thousands on flowers for the TV centre foyer and exec offices etc.

At least they got stopped from paying ludicrous salaries to such people as Anne Robinson and her weakest link who got 18 million for a three year contract!

[Michael CallaghanParticipant @michaelcallaghan68621]

Posted by Nigel Taylor 2 on 25/12/2021 19:43:47:

As regular viewers of the Queen's Christmas Broadcast should realise, it is produced in alternate years by the BBC, ITV and Sky.

Although it is possible to avoid paying for the BBC by avoiding paying the licence fee, it is not possible to avoid paying for any of the other channels unless one stops buying from a company that advertises on or sponsors a programme on one of those channels.

Not true. You can own a tv and watch anything without a license bar live tv. You can watch any channel bar bbc, but not any live tv. I have not had a tv license for three years now, and don’t miss it one bit. However as I write this I am watching a very good war film on Amazon prime.

[RMAParticipant @rma]

It's high time the BBC was held to account.

The license fee was originally put in place to actually pay for the service and allow the license payer to legally receive live transmissions, and at the start was just a radio license. The BBC has gradually morphed into this mammoth organisation that seems to do what it likes and spend our money just as wants, without any accountability. So-called celebrities have come and gone, made a fortune from the BBC and influenced it's policy. Billy Cotton; Wogan, Attenborough etc etc had/have far too much power in this organisation, and did very well out of it! Nepotism was/and still is rife in the BBC!

I remember (just) Alvar Lidell who delivered the news without any speculation or own opinion, and I doubt he got the equivalent of half a million a year to do it! Sports reporters did just that. There wasn't a team of presenters paid millions a year for a few hours work each week. Do we need a couple of presenters reading alternate lines from an autocue on breakfast and daytime TV?

Is it right that the license payer should foot the bill for all the free world service the BBC continues to put out , and at the same time a license payer cannot even access the iPlayer or receive BBC via the internet when abroad?

Adverts have paid quite a large part in this discussion. Do you consider the continual promotion of future and existing BBC programmes adverts or not? It might not be consumer products or services, but it is IMO still advertising and consumes a lot of air time.

Definitely a time for change!

[Mick B1Participant @mickb1]

Posted by RMA on 18/01/2022 16:57:57:

It's high time the BBC was held to account.

…

Definitely a time for change!

 

Maybe but fix it, don't trash it. I thought the same of the EU, but unlike the EU, the Beeb is Britain's to fix.

Edited By Mick B1 on 18/01/2022 17:29:38

[Author]

Posts