All posts by MikeB
Below are all of MikeB's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.
MikeP: I was talking to a customer the other day who was looking at a new TV, but said that the smart features were a bit useless for him, since where he lived didn't have fibre, so everything was a bit sloooow.
Thats not unusual for my neck of the woods, since we get a lot of rural customers. Except that he lives in a reasonably new development about 2 miles from the city centre. The whole place has been built over the last 10 years, and apparently BT was required to connect the place up, but they only did copper (cheaper). Apparently fibre might happen sometime.....
I asked about Virgin. He said they had never put fibre in there at all, and it was unlikely that they would, which was really annoying, because he worked for Virgin!
Apparently, the US has a similar problem with companies taking the money for fibre rollout, and then not delivering Telecoms take HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS for national broadband, but don't want to deliver
I'm lucky, my local virgin fibre cabinet is pretty much opposite my house, but for many, its going to be a long time coming. And not everyone wants it, so what to do?
And by the look of it, most people still dont even timeshift their viewing, a good 30 years after most people got a VCR, so that paradigm shift in people's viewing habits might be a while as well.
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Briantist: Beebview...like it. Still doesn't have quite the snap of 'Skynet' though....
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Briantist: Alas, no. However, I suspect that someone from their Marketing depth might have flagged that one up as a no-no. It's a shame, because it would have confirmed so many suspicions...!
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Briantist: Is it possible that part of your PLC scenario might diverge, with the BBC4/Childrens TV and Radio 3/4 not either dumped or made a premium service, but instead lumped together as some sort of PBS/NPR style service?
This would try to buy off the more disgruntled viewers (look, you still have 'Book of the Week!'), but free up the lucrative bits for commercial exploitation. Of course this would require some government money, but would include the flotsam of BBC Alba, etc, which might continue for political reasons.
Having looked at PBS/NPR, you can see how Conservatives might chose to employ such a model, arguing that charity, community supporters, etc could largely pay for it.
The articles you have written so far are pretty chilling, and hopefully should concentrate the minds of those in the Westminster Village who might be tempted down such a route. Frankly, the more I think about it, the more policy towards the BBC resembles a mixture of 'Robocop' and 'They Live' - we dont need a real life version of either.
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Charles Stuart: I was going to write pretty much the same thing as MikeP - although most flat screen TV's have CI slots, no PVR's or set-top boxes do. Your starting from nothing if you want a universal encrypted system. And since few people are going buy new equipment just because its going to have a encryption capacity, you've got to introduce equipment with it built in from the start. Of course you could call it Beebbox!
Brianist: That book looks very interesting - I certainly am dubious that a certain MP thought up the whole idea by himself. BTW - Spinwatch is rather good, but I also find that Sourcewatch and its allied websites are very useful too - much of the spin/lobbying we get has its origins in the US.
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Martin Baines: When you use phrases like 'soft left editorial line' & ' do we want to fund what is basically a propaganda service from taxation', I think your ideological slip is showing. And that is perhaps the problem.
In all these discussions there is the idea that the BBC licence fee is 'archaic', 'undefensible' or ''unworkable'. However, looking at the alternatives, the licence fee actually ticks the most boxes, and once people take out the ideologicial hand-waving, for about the next decade, its perfectly workable.. Although the Westminster Villagers might see the end of the licence fee as inevitable, none of the alternatives you outline really work.
Advertising? Every single commercial broadcaster would fight tooth and nail to avoid this (even Sky gets £440m a year from adverts - perhaps the definition of chutzpah is charging people to watch adverts...). Its not going to happen. Niether, by the way, is the idea of Sky splitting production from distribution - they wont like it, although when you think about it, Sky is very largely a distributor of other peoples wares.
Suscription - fine, but when, how and how much? The Beebbox would cost (although if the Freeview channels were sensible, they'd all pitch in together), so if someone want this to happen, please provide a sensible long-term plan. I dont have a problem with the BBC becomeing subscription as a whole. Rather than 'old school', its the easiest and most straightforward system. Two tier system? Messy and probably unworkable. And how is subscription supposed to work for radio?
Speaking of subscription models, you mention HBO, AMC, etc. Often excellent product (and worth reminding Sky fans that Sky bought it in, since its an HBO production), but these are cable channels in a market where the overwhelming majority of viewing is done via cable (and consumers are not happy about the state of the cable market), which makes subscription not only easy, but allows broadcasting without adverts and grownup dramas which might not appeal to advertisers (does this sound familiar?). BTW, Much as I like The Wire, Mad Men and Breaking Bad, I also like Line of Duty, State of Play and Bluestone 42.
And if this subscription model you suggest was to have stuff that wasn't 'mass popular programming' or something that commercial channels could do, that would mean very little would be broadcast at all - no drama, comedy, light entertainment, childrens TV, etc. Strangley enough, the 'mass popular programming' you dont think the BBC needs to supply keeping trying to be copied by other channels (Sky's 'Gotta dance' , 'Dancing on Ice', etc) - so obviously someone things that the public wants to pay for such programmes.
Can we please get over the idea that draconian powers are granted to the BBC, and people who forget to pay their licence are banged up? I know that if you read anti TV licence websites you read phrases like 'Gestapo', 'Thugs' and 'Vermin', but if you look at the number of people prosecuted (185,000)), some 155,000 were found guilty. If you have TV, then just pay the fee (or charge, tax, whatever) and enjoy. Sky also has powers to prosecute, under the Copyright Act BBC News - Pirated Sky TV sold for £10 a month , which includes up to 10 years in prison and unlimited fines. And if you are a pub landlord not paying what you should to Sky, they can even try to take away your licence Fighting Fraud – Sky Business . So if its alright for Sky to ultimately send someone to prison for not paying back what they owe, why not the BBC?
As for news, you seem to have your own view of the market, but Al Jazzera seems to claim about 40m viewers 9and I actaully quite like the station), whereas BBC Arabic and Persian channels reckon they get 43m viewers - so hardly being beaten in the market. CNN is largely rubbish, and Sky is OK....ish. But I note that a load of overseas radio channels use the World Service feed, so they must be doing something right.
Personally, I understand if people who never use the BBC, or even any broadcast media at all dont want to pay. However, this is a vanishing small number of people, and I suspect that the bulk of the people who claim that they never use any BBC services are basically wrong (they are either forgetful or worse).
For most people, I suspect the question is 'how do I get the most for my money?' And if you are not in thrall to a uber free-market worldview, and are not hung up on 'THE LICENCE FEE IS A TAX' type thinking, then the current system works pretty well. Its not broke, but someone is seemingly doing its best to break it.
Brianist: Love 'Druid World'. Can I assume that this is the result of government wanting to privatise English Heritage as well? If they do, can they roof it over? I had to guide a load of Americans around it once in November, and its was raining and freezing...
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Rob: I was thinking along the same lines as far as SSD's are concerned (a liittle pricey at present), but I can see exactly why a Cloud system would be the last thing any broadcaster might want.
If you recorded something on subscription TV, and uploaded it to your cloud, there is nothing to stop anyone you give acces to watching it as well. Think 'Pirate Bay', and you'll understand why they dont want you to do that. Instead, you have ondemand, or pay-per-view. Makes much more sense for them.
Technology tends to move in fits and starts. In the early sixties they moved up to the 525 line system, and then colour came in 1967-8 (and new colout TV then was £350 - about £4500 now). LCD, plasma, LED, 4K and OLED are all panel tecnology, while the tuner has gone from analogue, to DVB-T, to DVB-T2. However, there is nothing to stop you using a TV you bought in 1964 right now, and possibly for the next decade, and long as you can find a DVB-T2 tuner to connect to it.
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James: I was going to reply to your post, but MikeP got there first with pretty much what I was going to say!
The problem with all these alternatives is that they are an attempt at an ideological solution to a problem that largely, in a practical sense, does not exist. Yes, the licence fee does not discrimminate on grounds of income or use, but neither does your phone's standing charge - its a flat rate, as is Sky's minimal package. If your over 75, you get it free, and frankly, its still a lot cheaper than any subscription package.
I can certainly see the advantage of the German system, as KMJ suggested, since pretty much everyone has a TV, radio or a PC, but there are exceptions, and so perhaps its better to leave it be.
Charles Stuart - Iplayer is about to be pay-per-view for certain things (like Netflix), it already on Itunes, and there is no reason at all that Iplayer should only be accessable via a code from your TV LIcence which you register (Now TV works in this way). If your using it, your paying for it.
One of the problems with the 'multi channel licence fee is old school' brigade is that they are only seeing things from their point of view. If you have a fast broadband connection, a Smart TV or Apple TV, etc then this 'download world' is normal, and thus subscription sounds both ideologically/politically attractive and technically possible. They are also the type of people who will rave about Breaking Bad, not Mrs Brown's Boys.
However, most people still watch TV live, many dont have HD and perhaps dont record at all, and have no idea if their TV have smart features, or how to use them. And a good percentage dont have broadband, a 3/4G phone, etc. They like Strictly, Meet the MIdwife, etc. They will also never write a column about why the licence fee is archaic, because they probably have never thought about it, and its something which works fine for them.
The licence fee works. Yes, there is evasion, but even Sky/Virgin suffers from that, and where there is evasion, people need to understand that that is not acceptable. Iplayer loopholes can be closed. The reason there is a 'crisis' is because the licence fee was frozen, and the BBC was expected to do more things with less money. We know that the BBC or licence fee isn't perfect, but FDR put it nicely in 1935 -
'It must, however, be recognized that when an enterprise of this character is extended over more than three thousand counties throughout the Nation, there may be occasional instances of inefficiency, bad management, or misuse of funds. When cases of this kind occur, there will be those, of course, who will try to tell you that the exceptional failure is characteristic of the entire endeavor. It should be remembered that in every big job there are some imperfections.'
Trevor Harris might keep insisting that the licence fee 'is not fit for purpose', but he has no empirical evidence to support that, only words.
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Sunday 23 March 2014 9:02PM
jb38: I can only agree with you and Ian Edge - the idea of the BBC being 'left wing' is one of those meme's which gets repeated over and over again, without any actual data.
The nearest thing to actual evidence was a 'study' which Charles Stuart mentioned. This assumed that because most senior BBC jobs are advertised in the Guardian, it must mean that all BBC employees are Guardian reading left wing types (there is an even more silly 'study' which concludes much the same thing on the grounds that the BBC orders slightly more copies of the Guardian than other broadsheets). There is a simple reason why such jobs are advertised in the Guardian - most media jobs are advertised in the Guardian.
Indeed, the Guardian has specialised in covering the media (and advertising to that sector) for over 30 years, well before the rest of the broadsheets. Its a bit like wondering why adverts for senior bankers are in the FT - its because they are the ones who read it. You could put an ad for BBC Head of Digital Services in Farmers Weekly, but I suspect there would be few takers...
On the other hand, actual emperical data points the other way. Actually analysing the amount of coverage given to government officials
Hard Evidence: how biased is the BBC?
shows a shift from when Labout was in power, far more minsters and less opposition. Likewise, looking at the guests on Questions Time shows a certain amount of favouritism A Very Public Sociologist: Is there Bias on BBC Question Time? . The fact that Nigel Farage has been on more times than all trade unionists combined does make you wonder (BTW - check out Mark Thomas's website about Farage - great fun!) Owen Jones It's the BBC's rightwing bias that is the threat to democracy and journalism | Owen Jones | Comment is free | The Guardian certainly makes a good case against the idea of left wing bias.
Is the BBC biased? This article in The Spectator says yes - and thats fine. Yes, of course the BBC is biased against you » Spectator Blogs . This must be the first Spectator article I've actually agreed with in a long time.
Of course there are people who see bias everywhere, such as the ones who think Sherlock is biased. And as for biasedbbc.org - the chap thinks the BBC was biased in a documentary about the EDL (a group their founder has left, saying it was too extreme), and his views about climate change are somewhat different from that of the Royal Society.
Richard E - anecdote is not data. Neither is ideological handwaving...
Tim: The Australians have had a public broadcaster funded by government, but there have been problems with budget cuts over the years, and political interference. As the Wiki page puts it 'Appointments to the ABC Board made by successive governments have often resulted in criticism of the appointees' political affiliation, background, and relative merit....From 2003 the Howard Government made several controversial appointments to the ABC Board'. The current government is certainly unhappy with ABC's coverage, and wants it to be far more supportive of the government line. 'He who pays the piper calls the tune' - I dont want the BBC having this sort of interference, nor the political control and placemen seen in Greece, Italy, etc. And independent income is a good way to ensure and independent broadcaster.
The idea of caring adverts is another tired meme - since there is only so much advertising revenue available | The Drum your just going to be slicing the pie for more players, even if there is an increase. And that is dependent on the economy.
The final thing I keep seeing is 'the licence fee is an Anachronism, now it must be subscription'. Fine - but how? When everything is via the net, thats easy, but since thats not for a decade at least, then how is it going to happen? Sky has a box, and a card, which cost money to supply, but their business model depends on it. Where are these boxes for the BBC? They dont exist. How are they to be supplied? If its part of the subscription, then it will make the subscription higher, because of the costs involved. People who talk about subscription never mention this, a bit like the cartoon of the scientist whose equation has a bit in the middle which says 'then a miracle occurs'.
The licence fee (for the present) is the worst system, apart from all the rest...