Utopia Talk / Politics / UK-A license for TV?!!!

Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 03:39:48 http://www...,catch%20up%20or%20on%20demand Overview You must have a TV Licence if you: watch or record programmes on a TV, computer or other device as they’re broadcast download or watch BBC programmes on iPlayer – live, catch up or on demand A TV Licence costs £159 (£53.50 for black and white TV sets) for both homes and businesses. ------ No comment.....
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Jun 17 03:47:26 They turned it into a tax in Sweden, so now you can’t cheat. I have to compensate by cheating on the deduction. I am not paying for this shit.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 04:05:12 In the US they just occasionally beg for money with pledge drives. Also they"gift" you streaming upgrades for $5/month you get unlimited PBS. But for tax/legal purposes you didn't buy a subscription, even though thats what you did. Basic streaming is free though.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 04:07:25 They use to not have commercials, but They do now. Also they make money with a deal from HBO where the first 6 months of a Sesame Street show are exclusive to HBO, then free on PBS.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 05:11:07 Yeah - it's how we fund public sector broadcasting, including bbc.co.uk & bbc.com - the most visited news website in the world. I suspect having a stronger PSB news presence with statutory requirements to impartiality helps limit the progression towards hyper-partisanship you see in the US.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 05:21:23 You need a license to watch TV. Younshould realize how amusing that is to normal people. Also, Brita seem to bitch about it alot on Twitter. Many claim they stopped paying and nothing haooened but angry letters, so they just stopped.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 05:22:42 Also, NPR in the US is terrible. I'll grsnt you that. C-Span is probably the most respected news channel. But it lacks entertainment, so fewer views.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 05:50:39 No, you need a license to own a TV. "Brita seem to bitch about it alot on Twitter" That is an interesting sign about you being targeted by an influence network.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 05:52:16 Obviously not as an individual - just that you are tagged somewhere as having a target profile. You see it a lot - bot networks where you have loads of people in the US that suddenly start tweeting about Boris Johnson party gate and turning up in brits profile.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 05:54:57 RE "how amuzing that is to normal people" - I think you mean "people living in the minority of countries that have never had a TV license". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licence
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Jun 17 05:59:05 There is no impartiality in news reporting, the moment you choose what to report, you are no longer impartial.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 06:18:06 I think you are not using impartiality in the technical sense here. No such thing as wholly objective neutrality for the reason you say, but impartiality isn't that. http://www...five-due-impartiality-accuracy
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 06:19:22 Having enforceable rules on impartiality in this sense provides an anchor where it is hard to prevent an extremely distorted perspective to a target audience.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 06:32:03 Seb, Still most democratic/republican governments don't require them. Its wierd.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 06:33:36 Perhaps they all are bots. Pretty odd notion. I think I had found you on Twitter a while ago.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 06:53:16 16 out of 38 OECD countries - odd to link it "democracy" or "republican" as though it was in some way related at a principle level. I don't think you can really say it is weird. You just live in a country that doesn't have them and very little understand or experience of the rest of the world. "Perhaps they all are bots." It isn't really a touchpoint issue you see lots of people complaining about - however conservative politicians have an obsession about it, because the Murdoch press have an obsession about it, and the Murdoch press have an obsession about it because it is a competitor. If you have lots of brits in your circle banging on about the TV license (I have lots of left and right wing brits in my twitter feed) that seems unusual. Either you are getting a very precise cut of very strongly opinionated tory voters; or an astroturf campaign. Bot nets firms tend to re-use accounts in a silly way sometimes: e.g. "Oh yes, I am sure Bob from Utah who joined twitter three years ago and some of his close contacts all organically have strong views on the expansion of London's ULEZ zone that they feel the need to tweet about it several times a week at 4am in Utah, just in times for brits taking their morning coffee break". The way they do it is they use one set of sock-puppets to target and follow accounts of users with the right profile they are targeting; a fraction will follow back - so they build their target networks that way. Then they have the sock puppet accounts that post the content, which they have the first set of sock puppet follow and retweet - and then they can get the posts of the first lot to turn up in the feed of the target groups. And you can see how this works when you see people come up with weirdly strong opinions about relatively obscure things in foreign countries. For example a lot of Trump supporters in the US have a weird disproportionate obsession with Sadiq Khan following the London mayoral elections a few years ago that was close to some US election because they re-used the network.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 06:56:35 Also, if you have wondered why you get random follows from accounts with a picture of a young woman in a hot pose and lots of flirtatious posts etc, the idea is you follow back, and then later they re-skin the account into something that looks more organic, and it's one of those feeder account types for a botnet.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Jun 17 07:05:53 I am using impartial exactly as it is worded in that document. The "sides" are not just the sides in 1 story, but all the stories that don't make the news at all. I don't know what you mean with "neutrality", but what you choose and choose not to amplify is one way in which bias manifests.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Jun 17 07:17:08 I also work for an independent third party so impartiality is The Word that rules my world. It's very easy for me to be impartial because my world isn't inherently structured where time and timing is of the essence, like news is. It's not the BBCs fault, that is how news and current affairs work. It's a pie in the sky, I won't go as far as to say impossible, but nearly impossible for news to be impartial, it will ultimately be people who are picking this thing over all the other things.
OsamaIsDaWorstPresid Member	Fri Jun 17 07:25:41 wot do 2 xpect from da britesh "Window Tax in the UK The tax was repealed in 1851. the tax—a kind of predecessor of the modern property tax—was levied on dwellings with the tax liability based on the number of windows. The tax led to efforts to reduce tax bills through such measures as the boarding up of windows and the construction of houses with very few windows"
TheChildren Member	Fri Jun 17 07:30:31 ya a shithole.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 07:48:45 Nim: Well, in that case, you are wrong - impartiality can exist because you can force an organisation to account to a regulator on it's choice of coverage. In any case the point is a regulated PSB organisation providing high quality news makes it much harder for nakedly partisan channels affiliate with particular parties to flourish because it immediately contrasts with the PSB. Cf. GB news vs Fox News
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Jun 17 08:02:52 You can force any organisation to do anything with regulation, they don't need to be state sponsored for that. So you are not even wrong. Anyway you are welcome to believe any fantasy you want as long as you pay for it yourself is my point.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 08:14:38 Nim: You can indeed, but removing subscription and advertising funding helps enormously. Newspapers end up with political affiliation because catering to particular demographics helps them tailor content in a way that makes them more likely to be bought by that segment and more importantly, more valuable to advertisers as they understand more about the audience they are likely to reach. So it is the two bits that are effective: removing financial incentives, and regulation. But sure, you can believe "there is no impartiality in news broadcasting" if you like.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Jun 17 08:48:13 I don't think it "helps" one way or another, there are other news sources who do just as good or poor of a job as the BBC while running ads and/or having subs. You can get pretty far with more detailed regulation around ownership and transparency. No one would dream about starting a state owned news media in the UK today. Because there is not a shred of evidence to support the enterprise based on qualitative difference. The sentimentality is just based on tradition. You have the BBC, so why not keep having the BBC. It's just easier that way. But know this, there is nothing the BBC is doing that wouldn't exist if BBC News ceased to exist as a state sponsored organization, with the same quality.
jergul large member	Fri Jun 17 09:22:43 The main reason for license funding instead of tax funding is for greater independence. State media can effectively bite the hand that feeds it in the licensing case. Pursestring control is limited. Why State run at all? Well, broadcasting is important civil defence. Promotes language and culture Less agenda driven than commercial tv. Cheaper, with a more transparent cost.
Sam Adams Member	Fri Jun 17 09:33:18 "you need a license to own a TV." Rofl. Of course you do.
OsamaIsDaWorstPresid Member	Fri Jun 17 09:47:35 rofl u ned a tv license 2 watch stuf on ure xbox or laptop or mobile fone http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one The law says you need to be covered by a TV Licence to: * watch or stream programmes live on an online TV service (such as ITV Hub, All 4, YouTube, Amazon Prime Video, Now TV, Sky Go, etc.) * download or watch any BBC programmes This applies to any device you use, including a TV, desktop computer, laptop, mobile phone, tablet, games console, digital box or DVD/VHS recorder.
Seb Member	Fri Jun 17 10:01:49 jergul: "Why State run at all?" News and culture are a public good.
Habebe Member	Fri Jun 17 13:02:20 "16 out of 38 OECD countries - odd to link it "democracy" or "republican" as though it was in some way related at a principle level." Free societies(democracies and Republics) tend not to make you have a license to watch TV. Sam's expression says it all. I said governments including 50 US states.
Sam Adams Member	Fri Jun 17 14:16:30 "News and culture are a public good." This is a useful excuse for having state control of the news.
Seb Member	Sat Jun 18 09:22:08 Habebe: Free societies do tend to. Between two fifths and a half of the ones in the oecd , for example. If you are going to count us states as units, you need to count the UK as at least 10 (Scotland, England, Wales, Northern Ireland, British overseas territories, isle of mann, gurnsey, jersey, Gibraltar, Falklands, probably a bunch more) France as god knows how many (all those overseas territories) Denmark is a bit like that too. Obviously all of Germany's Lander count. Basically no, you are just hopelessly ignorant about the rest of the world and assume the features of US society (hopeless limited view of public services) is some kind of democratic norm. Its not a mark of democracy/ liberty. Its just a convenient means of funding PSB. Just like the US lack of public healthcare isn't a mark of a lack of democracy, just a mark of a lack of social development.
Seb Member	Sat Jun 18 09:32:03 Sam: Public funding isn't the same as state control. That's why it's a license fee rather than tax.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sat Jun 18 10:49:29 Jergul "Well, broadcasting is important civil defence. Promotes language and culture Less agenda driven than commercial tv. Cheaper, with a more transparent cost." The PBS of Sweden and the UK has run far far past any emergency broadcasting system. For sure they have no business in culture and language is already promoted by the greater linguistic culture. Let me remind everyone who the cultural powerhouse is and how they got there without the state being involved very much, or at all, beyond regulatory framework. It sounds great on paper this agenda free news, it just simply doesn't exist and certainly not in the Swedish PBS (SVT). I can give you a never ending stream of incidents and examples, that all squarely fall within what you would expect of an organisation where 80% of the people who work there vote green or red, as per opinion polls. The BBC is better than SVT, I will concede that at the door.
Sam Adams Member	Sat Jun 18 11:18:43 "Public funding isn't the same as state control." Nonsense. He who controls the money has the power.
Sam Adams Member	Sat Jun 18 11:19:14 Now it is possible to use your power benevolently.
Habebe Member	Sat Jun 18 12:15:09 seb, Your being absurd. Sweden is a major government, and Florida is just a peice of one major government, its silly.
Habebe Member	Sat Jun 18 12:15:29 Should we count boroughs next?
jergul large member	Sat Jun 18 12:39:43 The whole point of a license regime is that no one controls the money. Though your logic stands in terms of corporate American pushing its agenda through your airwaves of course.
Habebe Member	Sat Jun 18 12:53:17 Corporate America actually does offer one great product in the sphere of neutral just the facts reporting. C-span. It may be boring, but is infinitely more fair reporting than anything from NPR/PBS. PBS/NPR as far as news content are in the realm of MSNBC.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sat Jun 18 13:06:25 As we all have eyes and can see, qualitative news, culture and entertainment is produced with private funding, with ads and also for free as a hobby. No state involved. You are telling us we are getting something for the money that we couldn't get elsewhere. What is that? I will tell you, a displacement effect on the market. Anyone producing news and culture is competing with a bloated organisation and their 1 billion Euro budget backed by a regulatory framework where everyone who owns the hardware is forced to subscribe to the service. Of course that would have decimated the Swedish media landscape, so the state decided to made *ALL* the news dependent on their titty. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Press_support We are very mindful of what kinds of information people consume, it may lead to them having their own ideas. You tell people, without telling them which country it is, they think you are talking about China or Iran. None of this money is doled out without strings attached, none of it.
jergul large member	Sat Jun 18 17:22:56 It is not doled out. It is a licence fee transferred to the broadcaster. Usually. If you dig into the Swedish financing model, you will probably find it robustly protected against political interference. There are strings attached of course. The BBC, STV, NRK, FTV etc have mandates they follow.
jergul large member	Sat Jun 18 17:27:52 Nimi That was a link to Norway. Of course it has a displacement effect on the market. As if that is a bad thing. Only someone completely brainwashed by decades of corporate media consumption would say wah market displacement effect as if that were the great shaitan of the age. Media diversity has inherent values well worth government subsidy.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sat Jun 18 17:57:32 Jergul Yes, money is doled out as press stöd, which is the same in Sweden as in Norway, that is the english. Alot of money is doled in as cultural grants and subsidies stuff like that. "robustly protected against political interference." There are other things to worry about than direct political influence, as has been explained in the thread. "As if that is a bad thing." Yes as a bad thing, you displace bad actors with regulation, being one of the actors is in this case not a good thing, you are promising a service you can't deliver. "Only someone completely brainwashed by decades of corporate media consumption would say wah market displacement effect as if that were the great shaitan of the age." Did you know that satellite dishes were banned in Swden until the mid 80's? The only other place I had heard of that controlled the information people got by banning satellite dishes is Iran. Brainwashed you said? Baaaaa baaaaaaa.
jergul large member	Sat Jun 18 22:33:37 You are pretty easily brainwashed nimi, there is that argument in favour of Swedes and Iranian indoctrination. How goes the bitcoin saga? :D
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 06:05:09 I don’t expect you to change your mind, boomer :) just know that everything I am saying, is out of love for Sweden and Scandinavia. This whole public service thing will see itself to the grave. Like I predicted that the larger Swedish discourse around immigration and crime stats would return to sanity, and has. The peak being ministers literally saying they were naive, also implicit between the word, that they were/are incompetent, but the constituency of sheep has given them a pass. For now. It will all come to end, the writting is all over the walls. Even the BBC is increasingly being questioned on their impartiality, waking up can be a painful and slow process. The era of grand centralized narratives is over, or as the SVT guidance calls it ”provide a common world view” LOL :). It’s straight out of 1984 this stuff, but people will celebrate it because in this time and place, you won a lottery and proceed to draw false conclusions and keep navel gazing. Did you buy the top or what? I am viewing the crypto saga as a decade long project. I will get back to you on my 51st birthday and we can see how the saga has played out :)
Seb Member	Sun Jun 19 06:58:17 Sam: "He who controls the money has the power" Do keep up. Yes, that's why it's a license fee that goes direct to the BBC from the fee payer, which the BBC can enforce independently. That keeps the govt hands off the funding.
Seb Member	Sun Jun 19 07:00:59 Habebe: Of course it's absurd, that's the point. You were the one that said: "I said governments including 50 US states"
Seb Member	Sun Jun 19 07:03:49 Nim: Advertising funded models have incentives as described above. The point about the BBC is to not be so incentivised.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 08:49:56 There is nothing the BBC is providing that isn't provided by a private actor with the same quality. Your theoretical concern is not validated by reality as there are many outlets that do just as good or a better job than the BBC even when operating under those incentives. You can regulate ownership structure, transparency. Of course then there is the real demand for qualitative news and culture where actors are incentivized to have integrity. We are not getting any more value for the money and it certainly has not stopped Sweden nor the UK to become more fragmented politically and socially, if you wish to take the "guardians of democracy" angle. There are plenty of left wing news organization out there, the state has no business providing their own version of left wing news and culture. Make no mistake, they are a magnet for leftist activist. I am not going to bore people with decades of this stuff, but SVT was admonished and reprimanded several times, by the very authority put in place to audit them, for their coverage of metoo alone. I don't think they notice it themselves, it's not out of malice, but that his how group think works. When 80% of the people in a room think roughly the same about the big political issues, ideas and conversation will not even emerge, or some brave soul raises it, they will gain no traction. We all understand how bias and group think works. The agenda emerges "organically" and in consensus. Here is another, SVT coverage of the Trump election, another thing they were struck for. But a less known fact is that people were walking inside the SVT office with "Dump Trump" t-shirts the day after. Mildly inappropriate for a place that has daily visitors from all over the world and prides itself as impartial and better than everyone else, don't you think?
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 11:46:08 Nimi What change my mind? You think I find State run broadcasting objective? It provides diversity and vital services in 3 Norwegian languages, not objectivity. Blockchain tech is fine. Attempts to monetize crypto through various schemes are just that. The main value I see besides rescuing stranded assets is tax evasion.
Seb Member	Sun Jun 19 12:52:54 Nim: "There is nothing the BBC is providing that isn't provided by a private actor with the same quality" The Proms? Regional newsrooms? There are also a long list of shows that only the BBC would fund, and then after theh became successful got copied.
Seb Member	Sun Jun 19 12:54:07 I'm not really interested in this case enough to play the game where you make statements having done no research to substantiate, and then I have to debunk them.
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 13:08:39 Welsh broadcasting?
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 16:30:09 You are seriously suggesting no one would make TV shows and musical concerts unless the BBC funds them? You can have regional news and emergency broad casting as per previous. I would be totally OK with that, provided the newsrooms are actually regional and employed by people from the region.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 16:44:32 Jergul "It provides diversity" Very vague statement, but there is a lot of diversity on the internet most of which goes unwatched. More and more choices is not some end in itself. People are more than welcome to create culture as a hobby, most artists do this. It's not a right to have your hobby financed by others if you can't make a living on it. Again you are making a giant assumption that without the state media there would be a void, while conceding there is a displacement effect. If you eat the cake, there is less cake. If you want obscure stuff, pay for it yourself and do it for the love. "vital services in 3 Norwegian languages" Well we have strayed very very far with the current iteration of SVT from the translation service you are talking about. Though I find it unlikely that Norway has sizable groups that do not comprehend the Norwegian language. A lot of grasping after straws here fellas.
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 16:51:21 Not grasping at straws at all, though I would have no problem with public broadcasting being funding directly through broadcast license revenue collected from commercial broadcasters. I frankly see huge disadvantages to having corporate interests dominate the broadcasting space. The public has a great interesting in widespread public broadcasting.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 16:53:41 I just remembered in Sweden a privat company was running local tv news (TV4), but so was public service and the market was not big enough so the privat company ended their broadcasting. So it is unclear if the UK couldn't with a far larger population. So I am uncertain, even about local news, you set up this system that has rooted itself even in the local news, which is a smaller audience. You create the problem and call it the solution, basically.
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 17:02:12 The airways (in its widest sense) belong to the public. Allowing private corporate access is ok for as long as they pay for it. Frankly, part of the problem is likely undercharging for the use of a public good.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 17:02:14 Jergul As long as public service stays out of children's shows and news, I will forgive the rest.
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 17:09:12 No.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 17:09:40 Ok boomer :)
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 17:14:29 Your faith in corporations is stunningly naive. But sure, if you want sugar financed children's broadcasting, then be my guest. I have nothing against private broadcasting and suspect I am a paid subscriber to more media outlets than you are. But allowing corporate interests to dominate the airwaves is crazy. They have agendas that seldom overlap with the public good.
Habebe Member	Sun Jun 19 17:17:16 In all fairness, I grew up non Mr. Rogers neighborhood, publicly funded. Now they would probably consider him alt-right.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Sun Jun 19 17:25:15 "Your faith in corporations is stunningly naive." I trust the corporation less that you trust the state. I see the biases in both, you wave them away from you hobby projects. You are being a bit infantile. "I have nothing against private broadcasting and suspect I am a paid subscriber to more media outlets than you are" And no one forced you to sub to them. You are trying really hard to not understand what I am saying. Just call me a social darwinist and go to bed.
jergul large member	Sun Jun 19 18:46:15 Nimi You are not hard to understand. Your unwillingness to pay taxes is known. Like I said, I would be equally as happy with a licensing fee targeting commercial broadcasters instead of recievers as the case is many places for historical reasons.
Seb Member	Mon Jun 20 01:07:23 Nim: I think you need to look at the content of the shows. Netflix paus David Attenborough for nature documentaries. For years nobody would make them on the grounds they thought they cost too much and gained too free viewers. BBC made them popular enough for the likes of blue planet. But I think you know that and it sounds like you are looking fora reductionist ding dong "nobody would make shows!". Yeah, whatever - either you aren't in good faith, or you aren't willing to do the basic legwork to enter the debate.
Habebe Member	Mon Jun 20 02:30:24 There are pros and cons. Free from the need for profit, some great content can be made that otherwise wouldn't.It offers a flexibility to try new things as well. However, in the US like most of regular media it has become bluntly super partisan to the point of conspiracy theories without evidence, even when challenged they double down on. Its sort of like Tenure for broadcasters. Many shows that wouldn't have worked with the old school profit model though could probably work now on Rumble and YouTube.So mabey its outlived its use.
Habebe Member	Mon Jun 20 02:31:27 Ironically, Americans can watch the BBC for free on PBS.
Seb Member	Mon Jun 20 02:36:02 Habebe: YouTube it's like ads on steroids in terms of incentives on content.
Habebe Member	Mon Jun 20 02:49:44 Seb, Yes, but it actually does a better job at providing niche content. In the 70s no corporate channel would have broadcast Bob Ross painting for an hour. But on PBS they could. On YT thats also possible because you no longer need a major broadcaster to approve a time slot, you can just post your videos.
Habebe Member	Mon Jun 20 02:55:52 There is literally a podcast called by the minute or something like that which makes a 30-45 minute long show disecting one minute of the show the dark crystal age of resistance at a time. Even on a PBS you couldnt get THAT niche
Seb Member	Mon Jun 20 03:05:07 Habebe: But not at getting niche content to mainstream audiences. The key mission of the BBC and Reithean principles: inform/educate/entertain PSB aims to aggregate audience and diversify content. Commercial broadcasters aims to sort audience into marketable buckets (based on time/channel) using the most cost effective programming to get them in the bucket. Social media content aims to understand *individuals* and tag them, using incredibly granular content as the filter to do so, and hold their attention while sending them adds. Niche content is lovely, but will mostly only be seen by the people most likely to want to pay for it anyway. So the effect on society tends mostly to he polarising rather than unifying or enriching.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Mon Jun 20 06:07:57 "For years nobody would make them on the grounds they thought they cost too much and gained too free viewers. BBC made them popular enough for the likes of blue planet." I am not going to list all the privately funded nature documentaries, just to debunk this next shit you fabricate. It takes you 5 seconds to make up new shit and 5 minutes for me to debunk it. "Yeah, whatever - either you aren't in good faith, or you aren't willing to do the basic legwork to enter the debate." There we go the classic projection at the end of his wits. Good bye and good riddance.
Seb Member	Mon Jun 20 09:21:31 Nim - go and take a look on any list of the best nature documentaries made or most watched and you will find it disproportionately filled with BBC productions. Why: because high quality ones cost a fuckin fortune and make a loss in terms of returns. And it is true, for years nobody was big into making nature documentaries. The demand for them today (and often they do end up being made in public/private partnership, because the production companies with the retained expertise are uh, public sector ones) it is because of the enduring positive reception of the public funded ones thorughout the 80's and 90's, and public interest in nature etc. which is to a consequence of why they were funded in the first place: to inform and entertain.
Seb Member	Mon Jun 20 09:30:30 Even the recentish netflix one "Our Planet" is the same production team that did the BBC Attenborough shows *that did well on netflix* and gave them the data and confidence to commission Our Planet and My Octopus Teacher. You go back to the 80's and 90's, very few privately commissioned documentary series with the scale and scope of the public sector broadcasting ones. The dominance of the Beeb here is not because they crowded out the market, it is because at the time the market was churning out cheap game shows and light entertainment shows to get the audience in and the ad slots sold. For a long time, they were driving drama too, and experimental comedy. These things go in cycles. It seems to me you are obsessing about a theoretical problem. Public sector broadcasting has a proven track record and a perfectly reasonable thing.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Mon Jun 20 10:02:39 "you will find it disproportionately filled with BBC productions." Middle age architechture is disproportionately filled Catholic productions. In fact not just buildings, but science and pretty much EVERYTHING was funded by the church. "If the church had not existed, there would be no buildings, science or really much of anything" -Friar seb, crica 1400 AD You have a habit of unwittingly re-using Christian appologetic arguments. That is usually a sign of how bad things are going.´Do you have anything besides emergency broadcast service? Beacuse that is actually something I want the government to have and maintain.
jergul large member	Mon Jun 20 12:21:50 Are you fine with the public funding commercial content? Because you can barely find a show without a Georgian peach or whatever.
Seb Member	Mon Jun 20 14:54:30 Nim: "Middle age architechture is disproportionately filled Catholic productions. In fact not just buildings, but science and pretty much EVERYTHING was funded by the church." So, in this analogy, you are suggesting that there was no commercial funding of programming in the 80's and 90's? It just sprang into existence with netflix? I'm pretty sure there were indeed large commercial TV organisations globally and in the UK with comparable, if not larger, budgets than the BBC. I think the question is - if your contention is that *anyone* can build large, beautiful monumental buildings that are public amenities; and it is a demonstrable fact that these organisations that rivalled the "catholic church" existed at the time, why it happens to be that only the "catholic church" built these ornate, beautiful, large stone buildings. Maybe you want to rethink this analogy as I'm sure you are about to start whining that I'm making you look stupid by ... er ... using your analogy in precisely the way you are.
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 03:03:02 I still remain baffled by this. Nim's analogy appears to be implying that - like the catholic church in the early middle ages - only BBC had any funding in the 1980's and 1990's and thus it is unsurprising that they built up such a legacy. I guess private media companies and production studios like e.g. American cable networks just ... didn't exist?
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Tue Jun 21 05:34:31 Seb I am explaining that there is a dicplacement effect, the size varies. The elephant called BBC plunges in the pool and water is pushed out. Look you say, without the BBC there would be much less water in the pool. We need the BBC! And then Jergul comes and says, that water was 80% pee. I can hear benny hill music in the background. Anyway it is just too much work communicating with you, I am reminded of a recent incident when you confused analog with metaphore. Jergul I tried to be pragmatic and reasonable, I said stay out of childrens shows and news. In principle I think culture should be free and people on wellfare, are not free. It is completely false that the money they hand out to different cultural project is without agenda, there is a very very clear leftist/woke agenda. Here is a fun fact. Do you know who appoints the board of the organization (Granskningsnämnden) that audits Swedish Public service? Well the gubmint of course :) So to call that agenda free and not politically influenced, is like calling Iran a democracy because they have elections. We are omitting some important facts about the curated process the tidies things up and makes it all look neat and uniform. Maybe in the next post we can dive into how SVT/SR own board is appointed? SPOILER: "Styrelsen för Förvaltningsstiftelsen består (2015) av en politiskt oberoende ordförande och tolv ledamöter som nomineras av riksdagspartierna och utses av regeringen" The balls to say that in one sentence, when the board president and majority of the board members can be replaced by the... gubmint. Once you reach a level of power (wonderful scandinavian word "maktfullkomlig"), you stop caring about trying to hide all the shit. Thankfully, this country is not longer made up of 50% homogenous social democratic blob. However the "deep social democracy" is allowing the party to punch above it's weight class. It will take time.
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 06:02:55 Nim: "I am explaining that there is a dicplacement effect," No, subtly different. You are asserting that a displacement effect exists. It could quite easily be the other way around: the commercial sector does not enter a segment, it is under served, it's the core PSB mission to fill that - it becomes succesful, and commercial providers start to take over. And I'm suggesting the facts are more consistent with the second in this case: The BBC is not an elephant compared to the English speaking TV production in the 80's and 90's and yet it disproportionately fills the list of best nature documentaries that includes US output. And it is not hard to understand why: they are incredibly expensive to make compared to their draw and so very cost ineffective from an investment cost vs revenue perspective. And we do indeed see that in recent years they have indeed spurred commercial providers to move into that sector.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Tue Jun 21 09:42:38 "It could quite easily be the other way around" Yeaaa, we have this country to the west and they managed to come up with something like National Geographic, a non profit organization. People are making nature documentaries funded by indiegogo and the likes, even seen people do it for free on youtube. The future of nature documentaries is native biologist showing us their backyard, not British people traveling around the world, no offence to Sir Attenborough, but times change! By all means, keep talking about that award winning church architecture. You keep looking back while I look forward :)
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Tue Jun 21 09:43:46 "It could quite easily be the other way around" Yeaaa, we have this country to the west and they managed to come up with something like National Geographic, a non profit organization. People are making nature documentaries funded by indiegogo and the likes, even seen people do it for free on youtube. The future of nature documentaries is native biologist showing us their backyard, not British people traveling around the world, no offence to Sir Attenborough, but times change! By all means, keep talking about that award winning church architecture. You keep looking back while I look forward :)
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 10:02:16 Nim: "Yeaaa, we have this country to the west and they managed to come up with something like National Geographic" Indeed - National Geographic TV station founded in 2001 I wonder where they established the basis of the market? "People are making nature documentaries funded by indiegogo and the likes, even seen people do it for free on youtube" Indeed they are, and as I outlined Netflix got in on the act. The point I am making it was that the BBC in particular did the bulk of the work in funding, creating and establishing the format and defining market for such content when commercial providers weren't funding it. And indeed to a great degree the current *market* now - as in people interested in content - is partly created by the work that PSBs did to popularise nature content with the expressed intent of informing and educating the population about the natural world and environmental issues - and many of the viewers of this content are people that were first exposed to this kind of show via PSB. I.e. this is an example of exactly why PSB is important (which is why I used it as an example). The reason the BBC has such a track record, and has done much to nurture the current talent making shows for private sector commissioners is because if you go back to the 80's and 90's commercial stations were commissioning nothing as ambitious as what the Beeb in particular (and there are equivalent in Sweden, a good friend of mine is related to your equivalent of David Attenborough) were funding. And far from "crowding out" commercial providers, what they were expressly doing was entering an area where they felt the market was under-served with an intent to "educate, inform and entertain" - and they have been so successful in doing that that it has created a commercial opportunity where one did not exist before. Mimetic investment, if you will.
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 10:04:06 Basically you are making the tired old top down handwavey arguments against public sector broadcasting based on a dogmatic idea of what that market should do vs the public sector - with absolutely no regard to the actual facts and evidence.
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 10:08:26 "The future of nature documentaries is native biologist showing us their backyard, not British people traveling around the world, no offence to Sir Attenborough, but times change!" I mean sure, Netflix commissioned Attenborough and his production team to produce one of their most globally viewed shows in 2019. What do they know?
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 10:13:53 Oh, they commissioned a second season airing later this year. $61m budget for 6 episodes - $10m an episode vs $2.5m for a drama. It's not hard to see why ad funded models spent a long time not really doing nature docs on this scale and ambition. Subscription models will, but in part that is because PSB has shown there are viewers.
jergul large member	Tue Jun 21 10:52:29 You will still find Attenburough's season to be heavily subsidized by the public. Just read the credits. The problem as it relates to for me is the thought that airwaves should be freely given to commercial interests. The waters muddied slightly by broadcasting fees being put on recievers instead of broadcasters for historical and practical reasons. The reason broadcasting fees fund public broadcasters in some cases is to avoid pursestring control of public broadcasters. Airwaves (in their widest sense) are not something that should be given commercial interests for free.
jergul large member	Tue Jun 21 10:53:52 Nimi Are you against public subsidy of content?
Seb Member	Tue Jun 21 12:03:10 Jergul: Yup - its the same production crew. Mentioned it above. The format, expertise and market basically only exists because the BBC created it. Generally the BBC will pull back from sectors when they feel that the commercial sector is better placed to commission content. Commercial providers need to bid for spectrum in most jurisdictions.
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