Blocking iPlayer Live Streams

Cornucopia

This was announced in Parliament today (to be confirmed in the Budget on Wednesday)...

The detail appears to be:-

- BBC to take on Over-75s licences - being phased-in over a period of time between 2018/9 & 2020/1.

- The Licence Fee will be extended to cover "catch-up services for public service broadcasters". I take this to mean BBC1 & 2, ITV1, C4 and Five. Although this makes a certain amount of sense from a regulatory viewpoint, in practice it is a hugely messy compromise which could see C4 programs requiring a Licence and E4 programs not (who knows what will happen to programs that appear on the main channel and are repeated on a non-PSB offshoot channel).

- The government "could" allow the BBC to charge for iPlayer services

- Decriminalising non-payment of the licence fee will be "carefully considered" by the government

- Subject to charter renewal, the Licence Fee to rise in line with CPI inflation over the next charter period.

VisionMan

Cornucopia wrote: »

This was announced in Parliament today (to be confirmed in the Budget on Wednesday)...

The detail appears to be:-

- BBC to take on Over-75s licences - being phased-in over a period of time between 2018/9 & 2020/1.

- The Licence Fee will be extended to cover "catch-up services for public service broadcasters". I take this to mean BBC1 & 2, ITV1, C4 and Five.

Actually no. I said the BBC wanted to extend the licence fee to make the iPlayer chargeable but these proposals extend even further than than that. Ofcom have shall we say been for quite some time slightly pee'd off with the commercial PSBs for putting their extra HD channels behind subscription pay-walls, so they are going to give them full PSB status (CH5 HD being a particular bugbear). So this change may extend to they. But I don't know if that will happen, of course.

Cornucopia

Err.... what?

gjchester

Cornucopia wrote: »

- The Licence Fee will be extended to cover "catch-up services for public service broadcasters". I take this to mean BBC1 & 2, ITV1, C4 and Five. Although this makes a certain amount of sense from a regulatory viewpoint, in practice it is a hugely messy compromise which could see C4 programs requiring a Licence and E4 programs not (who knows what will happen to programs that appear on the main channel and are repeated on a non-PSB offshoot channel).

- The government "could" allow the BBC to charge for iPlayer services.

Actually I think it probably makes it a lot less messy, but the devil will be in the details.


If you have a system capable of watching or recording live or catch-up TV then you will need a licence under these proposals. That means if you have a TV or any electronic device in the house that CAN do either then you are liable. CAN not DO being the keyword,..


I suspect the outcome will be everyone under 75 will need a licence, as I doubt there are many household who do not have at least 1 device that could receive live or catch up TV.

Cornucopia

That's not how I see it.

Nor how it's written on the BBC website.

There is an issue of over-simplification in some versions.

This is the quote from the BBC...

Mr Whittingdale also confirmed plans to bring forward legislation to modernise the licence fee next year "to cover public service broadcast catch-up TV".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33414693

Swipe

Cornucopia wrote: »

That's not how I see it.

Nor how it's written on the BBC website.

There is an issue of over-simplification in some versions.

This is the quote from the BBC...



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33414693

I think it will just be BBC iPlayer otherwise it will get too messy to enforce and will be depriving ITV and Ch5 of ad revenue if it results in less people using their catchup services

VisionMan

gjchester wrote: »

Actually I think it probably makes it a lot less messy, but the devil will be in the details.


If you have a system capable of watching or recording live or catch-up TV then you will need a licence under these proposals. That means if you have a TV or any electronic device in the house that CAN do either then you are liable. CAN not DO being the keyword,.

I don't agree. these proposals will extend to all the PSBs catch up services. On my system, YouView, the ITV Player encapsulates ITV 1, 2, 3 & 4. So such a change makes sense. Theres been a relative explosion of internet content consumption in the last two years (smart TVs, Netflix, etc), so this change makes sense in regard to PSBs.

Cornucopia

I think it's open to debate whether it means that or not.

Even if it does, there's always Netflix...

and Amazon Prime...

and Now TV incorporating offerings from Sky, Discovery, Comedy Central, etc....

and other non-broadcast/non-PSB offerings yet to be made available.

VisionMan

Cornucopia wrote: »

I think it's open to debate whether it means that or not.

No not really. It will include all of them. They do get a slice of the pie as well you know (well I know you know). But I highly doubt (as in zero) this proposal will be extended to general internet on demand consumption. That would be highly controversial given the govts stance on wanting to push people and networks towards fibre. Which is 70% coverage of the UK's population at the last count.

Marktheshark

Saying someone has to pay the BBC because they have a computer which can / might / could be used to receive I-player has the same logic as charging a Dulux tax to people that own a paintbrush as they might / could/ can use Dulux paint with that brush.

So they must pay Dulux tax !