As my partner commented quoting Dr Fox’s ill advised autocue reading on Brass Eye “There’s no scientific proof for it but it is fact” .
The BBC slightly blurring the line between news and fiction when listed under the most read items of the day.
Glanced at the headline announcing the BBC’s new DG and did a quick double take as I thought it said they’d appointed Terry Hall as Director General. Mind you if they had I bet he still wouldn’t have looked happy about it.
Image by DerekL under this creative commons licence
Politics is a grubby business. BBC Television centre, that purpose built home of the BBC and instantly recognisable icon has finally been sold to *spit* property developers. All in the name of appeasing politicians and opponents who count the value of everything and appreciate the value of nothing very much at all. A sad day.
Image by strollerdos under this creative commons licence
I was flipping radio channels this morning (a radio with a remote control is just encouraging my short attention span) when I caught a short announcement before an archived edition of the light comedy Mind Your Own Business which dated from 1987. The announcer warned:
“we head back to 1987 when, unfortunately, racial stereotyping was still pretty common”
I wonder what warnings, if any, will be placed in front of current media when it is reheated for the consumpion of future generations.
The BBC unveil the revamped interface for the iPlayer on TV’s and set top boxes. Launching first on Sony’s PS3 it should filter through soon for compatible TV’s, set top boxes (Freesat?) and suitably equiped DVD and Blu Ray players.
Image by andrewhallpics via Flickr
BBC Radio2 remixed its schedule with a one day event they almost amusingly (I said almost) called 2Day. So for one day only the usual DJ/host was not in their usual slot but paired with somebody else from the station (or guesting for the day) at an entirely different time.
This was the radio equaivalent of changing the layout in a supermarket in order to get people to wander into aisles they’d seldom linger. Why?
Apparently Radio2 listeners whilst large in number are somewhat creatures of habit and so this one-off mixing up of the schedule was designed to ensnare new listeners who may have tuned in at a certain time of day just out of habit and who then got to enjoy/endure a different programme or maybe it was an experiment in how to manage change with your loyal listeners by either preparing them for change or letting them know the station is headhunting a different listener demographic.
Image by James Cridland via Flickr
The perennial argument over the television licence fee was brought to mind again recently after a friend was dithering over whether to pay the £145 for a TV licence. They are from the Ukraine which doesn’t have a TV licence so it seems like an extra payment too far. And that’s the main bone of contention with the TV licence in that it’s a very visible ‘tax’ (in the minds of many).
Now that are many taxes that we have no opt out over. We can’t dictate how our taxes are spent. National Insurance is paid in case we fall ill and need free medical attention even if we rarely use the service. If the government instead payed the BBC out of general taxation then maybe it would feel less like a tax we could opt out of but would give the government of the day much greater control over the withdrawl of funds. At the moment the licence fee money goes straight to the public service broadcasters and isn’t handled by government. Would such a move quell the licence fee carpers?
Another option would be to allow the opt out of the licence fee for those that genuinely do not watched the stations funded by it. I include radio stations in this arrangement. This leaves the need for a complicated way of blocking the reception of public service stations on Freeview, Freesat, satellite and cable boxes unless you can key in some kind of authorisation code gleened from your payment of the licence fee. Another solution that reduces the income to the BBC and pushes the price up for those that opt in. A divisive and petty solution?
Others have argued for a tax/levy on television sets sold. Well we don’t buy a TV set every year and if we take 2009 as an example of recent peak TV sales then around 10 million sets were sold during that year. What sort of levy would provide an equivalent sum to that currently provided by the current licence revenues? Surely that would require a considerable levy unless we merely used a token sum to help lower the current yearly fee to more politically acceptable level.
Perhaps a licence fee and government grant hybrid would be a compromise. Slash the visible fee to say £65/£70 and make up the rest from direct government support or take the controls off the profits that offshoots like BBC Worldwide can make in order to help subsidise the reduced income from the collected licence.
There is an argument for just cutting back on the digital channels. BBC Four is accused of an output similar to the old BBC2 whilst the latter has somewhat diluted its identity.
The BBC has also considered the unthinkable by suggesting they decimate their local radio presence by syndicating radio 5Live and retaining only local options for breakfast and drive slots. Maybe they could be sacrificed to local media and commercial radio who constantly complain that they can’t compete.
I’m all for reducing round the clock broadcasting. I remember the days when some hours of the day were merely filled with the testcard. Many digital stations only start at 7pm. Do we really need so much daytime programming especially if all we’re going to do is fill so much of it with so much property obsessed programming.
The Uk certainly does not have the highest TV licence fee in Europe. Germany has a higher TV licence fee than the UK but has concessions for the very poorest and and the availability of a radio only licence. Food for thought.
I’m old enough to remember the days when TV content wasn’t always available and the testcard filled the screen. Maybe its time to embrace the less is more mantra. These are times of austerity.
