Sky has been on-air since 1989 (I think). I read somewhere (Broadcast?) that, in all that time, its flagship channel, Sky1, seldom gets a viewer share of over 1%. Sky's audiences still prefer the legacy channels for their entertainment (BBC1 through to Channel 5) over Sky's utterly dreary offerings. Legacy channels which Sky clearly cannot do without. The marvel is that anyone would pay £100s per year for Sky. Unless you are a sports addict or watch only mainstream Hollywood movies, who'd bother?
In fairness, I'd re-jig the BBC, split it into four autonomous national divisions and drop the TV licence fee (in England at least). I'd fund ad-free public service TV and Radio from a very small slice of existing VAT receipts. Seems apt since people pay for ITV et al through the cost of their shopping - a portion of which is there to pay for the ads on all those 'free' channels. It would have the added bonus of being able to put the BBC on the same footing as Channel 4 and keep meddling and ruinous politicians at bay.
Monday 9 December 2013 10:41PM
Sky has been on-air since 1989 (I think). I read somewhere (Broadcast?) that, in all that time, its flagship channel, Sky1, seldom gets a viewer share of over 1%. Sky's audiences still prefer the legacy channels for their entertainment (BBC1 through to Channel 5) over Sky's utterly dreary offerings. Legacy channels which Sky clearly cannot do without. The marvel is that anyone would pay £100s per year for Sky. Unless you are a sports addict or watch only mainstream Hollywood movies, who'd bother?
In fairness, I'd re-jig the BBC, split it into four autonomous national divisions and drop the TV licence fee (in England at least). I'd fund ad-free public service TV and Radio from a very small slice of existing VAT receipts. Seems apt since people pay for ITV et al through the cost of their shopping - a portion of which is there to pay for the ads on all those 'free' channels. It would have the added bonus of being able to put the BBC on the same footing as Channel 4 and keep meddling and ruinous politicians at bay.