I was in the thread about 4chan being reported on BBC news, and I got to thinking how much I like the BBC and what they do, and despite being on a tight budget, thinking I've got a pretty good deal compared with cable and satellite. I often see the BBC getting bashed for various things, and rarely any praise. I've cut n pasted a chunk of my post over here, slightly edited:
I was more commenting on the BBC specifically, as many of the newspaper media owners also have large interests in satellite, cable or other TV stations, and would very much like to see the BBC put out of business, or at least the licence fee killed off (which I think would kill the BBC, or at least reduce to the level of another ITV, being forced to make mediocre 'lowest common denominator' stuff to appease advertisers.
I read a wonderful quote recently that sums up the BBC wonderfully:
'The BBC is not a taxi service, you don't get to demand exactly what you want, what happens is you get on and it shows you everything, and you can get on and off where you like, but don't complain because we drive thru some areas you don't like, you don't have to get off there.'
Personally I'd like it more if they stopped trying to please the mythical 'average viewer even more, and left the ratings battles to ITV and channel 4 and 5, but, sadly they've been dragged into ratings battles to prove 'value for money'.
Another thing is I believe the BBC news is one of the most balanced news services out there, and while not perfect, less biased than most. In fact usually the only time I hear it called biased, it's generally followed by 'and they've hired another bloody darkie to read it too, can't understand a word' and other such educated reasonings.
I'm not the most positive person on here I know, but I do think the BBC is one of the few things remaining Britain can be proud of, and we'll feel the loss if it's broken down for scrap. for me, Mock the Week and QI are worth the £12 a month or so that I pay. Anything else is a bonus.
What I will criticise them for is the godawful people they have working for the TV licencing dept. They're rude, borderline fraudsters, intimidating, will do their best to con you, and regularly lie to people to get money from them. If I could change anything, I'd change that area.
However, I'm going to put those people aside and keep it just to the idea of 'the BBC, is it worth the £150 a year to you, and if not , how would you fund it?' Note that losing the licence fee would lose the unbiased news, the websites, the radio stations, as well as the TV.
I do think they could cut back on some things and work on making more profit worldwide from their shows, both in selling to other channels and the DVDs.
For instance, if they put their archives online as downloadable for £1 per 30 mins or part of, there's not the risk of pressing DVDs that may not sell, and it's free money essentially. There's a lot of niche interests that wouldn't sell loads but would sell the few thousand or so needed to make it worth the effort. I know I download a lot of old comedy purely because it's not available in any form.
I'd also be interested in non-Brit views here, if you've seen BBC shows, do you think they'd be worth paying for?
I was more commenting on the BBC specifically, as many of the newspaper media owners also have large interests in satellite, cable or other TV stations, and would very much like to see the BBC put out of business, or at least the licence fee killed off (which I think would kill the BBC, or at least reduce to the level of another ITV, being forced to make mediocre 'lowest common denominator' stuff to appease advertisers.
I read a wonderful quote recently that sums up the BBC wonderfully:
'The BBC is not a taxi service, you don't get to demand exactly what you want, what happens is you get on and it shows you everything, and you can get on and off where you like, but don't complain because we drive thru some areas you don't like, you don't have to get off there.'
Personally I'd like it more if they stopped trying to please the mythical 'average viewer even more, and left the ratings battles to ITV and channel 4 and 5, but, sadly they've been dragged into ratings battles to prove 'value for money'.
Another thing is I believe the BBC news is one of the most balanced news services out there, and while not perfect, less biased than most. In fact usually the only time I hear it called biased, it's generally followed by 'and they've hired another bloody darkie to read it too, can't understand a word' and other such educated reasonings.
I'm not the most positive person on here I know, but I do think the BBC is one of the few things remaining Britain can be proud of, and we'll feel the loss if it's broken down for scrap. for me, Mock the Week and QI are worth the £12 a month or so that I pay. Anything else is a bonus.
What I will criticise them for is the godawful people they have working for the TV licencing dept. They're rude, borderline fraudsters, intimidating, will do their best to con you, and regularly lie to people to get money from them. If I could change anything, I'd change that area.
However, I'm going to put those people aside and keep it just to the idea of 'the BBC, is it worth the £150 a year to you, and if not , how would you fund it?' Note that losing the licence fee would lose the unbiased news, the websites, the radio stations, as well as the TV.
I do think they could cut back on some things and work on making more profit worldwide from their shows, both in selling to other channels and the DVDs.
For instance, if they put their archives online as downloadable for £1 per 30 mins or part of, there's not the risk of pressing DVDs that may not sell, and it's free money essentially. There's a lot of niche interests that wouldn't sell loads but would sell the few thousand or so needed to make it worth the effort. I know I download a lot of old comedy purely because it's not available in any form.
I'd also be interested in non-Brit views here, if you've seen BBC shows, do you think they'd be worth paying for?
), I'm perfectly happy with the BBC. There are plenty of exceedingly good quality shows on there - Coast, Mock The Week, QI, The One Show, BBC News (one of the few news outlets I actually trust aside from Reuters), Doctor Who, Sherlock, Spooks, Coming Of Age, Live At The Apollo, John Bishop's Britain, Michael McIntyre's Comedy Roadshow, Merlin, My Family, half the documentaries they show...
