Bbc license fee

iamtrev79

googler wrote: »

why? Because everyone prefers to watch on an iPad? You gotta be kidding.....

And, judging by the bigger and bigger sets in the retailers, nobody's told the manufacturers this yet...

Can you imagine having to have a telephone licence? Or a microwave licence? Or a computer licence? Just to pay for one particular manufacturer or service provider?

Imagine you had a phone contract with O2, had to pay an upfront free as well as a monthly sum, and STILL pay money for a phone licence to pay for, let's say a state subsidised Vodafone as an example. That would be utterly ridiculous.

Yes TVs are still sold and will be for some time. My point was, the world of technology has changed dramatically since the TV licence was introduced. People don't all sit around the same device at the same time, watching the same 2 TV stations with 30 million other people.

There are hundreds of TV channels that people watch that cater to all sorts of interests - these don't even need to be watched at the time of broadcast. You can stream them online, or rewind your TV broadcast. A lot of younger people don't even watch traditional TV all that much, they would rather watch short YouTube clips.

A TV licence with today's technology is absurd. Even then, the money gets wasted on expensive champagne, covering up sex offenders, and making increasingly poor quality programmes.

whiteside

How much do they spend on the endless stream of threatening letters they send out. These letters start out accusatory and then rapidly progress to insulting and threatening. All to keep the gravy flowing for the BBC fat cats.

In saying that the BBC did educate me via their gripping reality show Eastenders that the citizens of London are seemingly unable to have washing machines in their properties. Hence the need for all to visit the local launderette. :-)

Cornucopia

With the scandals in the BBC and now the Health Service, I am beginning to think that the people at the top of those organisations have completely forgotten what public service is about.

Before all else, must come: do no harm. That works as well for the BBC as it does for the Health Service. The notion that there are acceptable "downsides" to the public funding of celebrity is wrong. For celebrities, it should be a poorly paid honour to do work for the BBC.

Then we must have transparency. The public services must be doing the things that are directed by their remits, and being seen to do them well and do them efficiently. There must be no hiding from errors and complaints. The notion that TV licence enforcement relies on an uncertain and undisclosed mix of technical and legal voodoo is just ridiculous.

Then accountability. A service that serves the public and is paid for by the public, must be accountable to the public. The BBC should be fully regionalised, now that ITV is virtually a national service. This would allow the BBC to relate directly to a smaller population, and be more accountable to them.