to not have a television licence if we don't watch live television?

[Meggymoodle]

Some of our friends think we're unreasonable not to have a television licence. We don't have a television but we do watch things on BBC iplayer and itvplayer. We also listen to the radio.

In some ways, I can see the argument, we are not breaking the law - it states on the BBC licence pages that as long as you are not watching things through the internet as they are being shown on television, which we never do, you do not require a licence. However, are we being like Starbucks with the whole tax thing - not acting illegally but a bit morally suspect? (On a far lesser scale obviously!).

I'm not saying if everyone here thinks we ABU I will rush and get a licence but I'd be interested to see what the general consensus is.

It's legal, blondie. Take it up with the BBC

I've got a smart tv so Iplayer is up there on the big screen. Its fab, as is lovefilm and netflix. We don't use the main tv, no arial and no sky or cable. So we could get away with no licence, although we have still got one.

YANBU.

We don't have one either, our landlords choice (we rent a room) and tbh between all five of us we probably watch 5 hours of TV on catch up each week, normally less (an hour of QI a week for landlords, an hour or two of Heston for me!).

No point paying for a license for a few hours! It's not against the law and it's not cheeky either. You are allowed to watch things as long as you do not watch it live.

Despicable? Kicking dogs is despicable; not buying a tv licence because you don't need one is common sense.

And for the record, I do have one. And only watch QT and HIGNFY on iPlayer.

Some people obviously have a low vomit threshold....

blondie

It's completely legal, not even bending the rules slightly. If you don't want to pay your licence you don't have to and you too can watch I player on line. Why the anger on behalf of the BBC who are perfectly fine with it?

Thanks. (previous post advised you I was a bit of a luddite )

I was just curious as like to know my options.

However, not having a TV in our house would never be an option. DH loves his TV and I'm terribly shortsighted so like the huge screens!!

Also TV Licensing are a lot less aggressive than they used to be. We have a detuned TV for watching DVDs and no license, and we hear from them about once every two years.

We maybe watch 1 programme on iplayer a week, and sometimes a short radio programme. Often not at all. Why would I pay the license fee for that? That's a lot of money for not very much.

If we could pay a small fee to BBC for the programmes we do watch, then I'd probably do that. If it changed so you had to pay the full license fee for iplayer then I'd simply stop using it.

But right now you don't. And it makes no economical sense to pay for something I barely ever use. And we did for a while, then realised we could go weeks and weeks without watching anything and were just pissing the money away.

We don't have a TV. We don't watch live TV on the iPlayer. We don't have a TV license.

Well, watching the programs on the iplayer (and the like) isn't quite the same though is it?
First of all you can't watch it live (eg for the Olympics).
Then if your internet isn't great or at ties of great demand, watching the program can involve a lot of stops and weird things happening (such as the image and the voices not matching up).
If you watch anything else than the BBC, you still have to watch the adverts
And well it's just different, much closer to watching a videos.

What is happening here is that the vast majority of people prefer to watch TV and watch program live (eg, the X factor, Dancing on ice etc...) rather tan wait the day after. See it would spoil the suspense when you arrive at the office and everyone tells you the results before you had time to watch said program.

So, as I am (with the OP and a few others ion this thread) in a very small minority, there isno point (yet) to change the rules.

There might be a point though in changing the rules for another reason. The licence had been set up at a time when there was no private channels (such as ITV, channel 4 etc... or things like sky). People who never watch the BBC and only watch any other channels, still have to pay for the TV licence ...

To those who are saying iPlayer asks if you have a licence - you only get asked if you try to watch something on iPlayer that is currently being broadcast - sometimes the BBC do put stuff up 'live' - for example if you go on there now and click on Escape to the Country, you get the warning, if you click on Sports Personality, you don't.

Great. Wankers like you don't pay so the rest of us who do pay do so for you to have lovely programmes at your disposal.People who do things like this make me sick. Despicable.

Over reaction much? Get a grip. The OP is doing nothing wrong. Morally or legally.

Here's a question, if you knew someone who didn't own a TV (one with an aerial anyway), and they occasionally got a friend to tape things off the TV for them, would you find that disgraceful too? How about if someone didn't own a TV but sometimes went round a friend's house to watch their TV, is that wrong too?

After all in both those scenarios they aren't paying the license fee but are getting to watch the programmes.

I live abroad and can't get iPlayer because I don't pay a licence fee. I do listen to podcasts and love British TV when I can get to see it. If you can afford it easily, I would prefer you paid the licence fee.

A bit like the NHS, you have no idea how wonderful the BBC is until it is gone. People complain about the licence fee expense but you can pay $100s here for utter shit with adverts every 5 seconds.

murder people like that should be shot immediately. Crafty buggers trying to scam the system.

perfectly legal, although a TV licence is cheaper and a lot less faff than unlimited broadband.

of course if too many people did this it would all fall apart. You have to have spent time abroad with unregulated ads to appreciate the BBC. Ghastly memories of programmes where the ad breaks get longer and longer and it appears to be impossible ever to reach the end. Also news bulletins which aren't laid out properly - again, until you watch BBC news afterwards you don't appreciate it.

ok, there is a lot of crap on it now: endless reality shows, waste-of-oxygen celebrities, screaming sitcoms etc etc, but there is also a lot of good stuff that you won't get anywhere else.

Wow, some people are quite annoyed about this.

Thing is - it is entirely legal, and something the BBC is aware of. If they were very concerned about people watching the iplayer without a license, they'd change the law and require it.

"perfectly legal, although a TV licence is cheaper and a lot less faff than unlimited broadband."

If you only use your broadband for watching TV then it would make more sense to just pay the license fee. However I find the cost of broadband is better value for money than the license fee as I use the internet for almost everything, and there's usually fuck all of interest/worth on BBC.

Meh.

Licence fee is outdated and would be better coming out of general taxation in any case.
But then you wouldn't have TV licence threads.

I don't have a TV, I don't use iPlayer, I don't live in the UK, I don't have a license but I do watch old stuff (Eastenders episodes, QI, cooking programmes etc.) on YouTube maybe once or twice a week. Does this make anyone want to vomit?

Copiously Furry

I mean, Eastenders, really??

We don't have a license either, but we have a TV that we use to watch DVDs only (we can't get live transmissions at all. Plug our TV into the aerial and the only broadcast you get is the building's CCTV camera). We tend to just watch a lot of Seinfeld, How I Met and Futurama which, as far as I'm aware, the BBC does not cater for.

Is this also making people throw up?

TV is shit.nothing worth watching on there anyway.

YANBU. The BBC don't mind if you watch iPlayer without a licence, so I don't see why anyone else would

I don't have a TV Licence, or even a TV. But I do download and listen to BBC podcasts. I also listen to BBC radio. Should I be shot by the morality police??