The BBC Licence Fee

[Lyris]

BBC is hardly wonderful at catering to niche and leftfield tastes though, is it? I always considered Channel 4 (Big Brother notwithstanding) to be the channel to go to for actual thought-provoking stuff.

[Malc]

Like Channel 4's shows that are 'part of Channel 4's GROUND BREAKING Documentaries'.

When all it is, is a man having surgery live on TV. No thanks.

[saif]

BBC Two used to be good for that. Now it is parts of TWO and most of FOUR. They do still do some good stuff but they spread it more thinly due, in part, to market forces. Which, ironically, makes me use iplayer more as I can no longer have a "go-to" channel.

[saif]

Smurf, in the story I posted about, he wants Tories to be specifically introduced to the news.
Aside from the fact he is demonstrably false about a left lean in news, he also used as an example, Marr saying that they had an innate liberal bias. As Marr is British, and was talking to a British person, he used the word liberal as you would expect a British media person to do. Shadow "Culture" Secretary thought he was talking yank and meant in a political fashion.

Not sure what political leanings there can be outside of political coverage. Clarkson and his proud underlings are obviously Tory, where is the left swing? I'd say the Apprentice shows a pretty unflinchingly "Conservative" pro-business slant.

[Lyris]

I dunno Malc, that's still more interesting to me than anything BBC is airing.

[Malc]

If you're going on current shows that are airing then what about Last Chance to See with Stephen Fry? Or the one where they are looking for new species of animals? They have been much more interesting programmes than anything Channel 4 have shown.

It seems like Channel 4 just go for the morbid fascination/shocking type documentaries whereas the BBC go for actual interesting documentaries that are also filmed beautifully (even if you don't have BBC HD like me).

[Dogg Thang]

Oh you people and your BBC license fees. Here in Ireland, we pay a stupidly high license fee that is eaten up by a waste of a bloated state-run yet union-ruled broadcaster fairly incapable of making anything decent. And here's the kicker - they run as many ads as any other channel so they're milking in the ad revenue too.

Now, in recent years, it's actually got a little better as some of the license fee is syphoned off to support the industry in other ways but it's still pants compared with your mighty BBC and its wonderful Dragon's Den.

Oh, actually we've an Irish version of that too but it's rubbish.

But on the Channel 4/BBC thing, I find myself leaning towards Malc's view here. Many years ago, I wouldn't have and Channel 4 seemed to have so much that I found interesting and certainly different. Now, it's Big Brother. And some of those shock documentaries that Malc mentions. Is it that I once viewed similar content as worthwhile and I'm just getting older or is it that Channel 4 just aren't what they once were.

Quite possibly the former but I do find myself enjoying more and more of the BBC content.

[prinnysquad]

BBC is hardly wonderful at catering to niche and leftfield tastes though, is it? I always considered Channel 4 (Big Brother notwithstanding) to be the channel to go to for actual thought-provoking stuff.

There's loads of niche stuff, you just have to know where to look. BBCs 3 and 4 for starters.

[Lyris]

BBC 3? Young Mums?

[Daniel]

As someone who left the uk and has to tolerate commercial usa tv and news for god sake never get rid of the bbc.

If politicians want rid, it's because they know the bbc was there before them, will be there after them, is more trusted than them, and has the clout to call them up on stupid ****. ITV wants rid because they over-reached and now they can't compete, while reading about newscorp complain of BBC market share and broad expansion. God. Just wiki newscorp to see how broad one company's influence and interests can get. Didn't hear these ****ers complain a few years ago when ad revenue was running along nicely.

If the BBC goes it will be a race to the bottom among the remaining providers because there will be nobody around to maintain high standards. The cheapest reality shows, the crappest writing, happy news and partisan news coverage (just like usa), no reliable talent farm for comedians, writers, producers, constant commercial interruptions and corporate influence/censorship, no minority shows just relentless deluge of populist ****e aiming to please the widest range of people and satisfying none of them.

I very very very strongly recommend visiting...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/thefuture/video_fry.shtml