To think the BBC really should be shut down?

[Loeri]

After the child abuse scandals, and now this where BBC execs have been given payments far beyond anything they were required to be given, isn't it time that the BBC was just shut down? It can't really be said that it makes the best TV in the world anymore, the best TV programmes come from the US and have done for well over a decade now. I just don't see the purpose of the BBC in 2013. It is arrogant, bloated beyond belief and seems only to exist to provide cushy jobs for the Guardian set.

Sherlock - indisputably for adults. Brilliantly written and directed, what's not great about it?

Doctor Who and Merlin - crossover family entertainment, not purporting to be 'highbrow' drama, but innovative programming that gets massive ratings because of its extraordinarily wide appeal.

Methe thank you

Friday16 - Oversight could lead to political manipulation so should be treated with extreme caution. The BBC can publish stuff the government doesn't like. Have I got News for You would not be safe. Strong auditing would be better. I've no gripe about a big shake up.

Loeri - if there are not enough figures then the stuff will still get dropped. However the BBC can take risks like Bollywood Carmen which aren't worth it for commercial enterprises. Lots of people enjoy the Last Night of the Proms, but it isn't worth it commercially. However taking your argument at face value, why shouldn't someone watch Carmen even if they are housebound/not able to afford tickets/do not live in an area where Opera is available? People have a choice to try stuff, and enough people are choosing to break away from a mould and not try and conform to one 'culture'. Classic fm is growing. I would hate to watch any of the programmes that you have listed. I am sure I am not in isolation. I don't mind you watching them, why not let others have the same privilege.

Other UK channels have to compete with BBC, so you get the excellent documentaries on Channels 4 and 5, which are not produced in a vacuum. They are produced in a country where the broadcasting bar is set very high.

btw ITV, Channel 4 et al also get a cut of the licence fee, depending on viewing figures.

I'm not against a strong audit and clear guidelines. However it was the ability to tell clear guidelines to fuck off that gave the freedom to film 'Life on Earth'. They didn't have a clear layout at the start, they went to see what they could find. 'Life on Earth' made a massive impact and has been shown in many, many countries.

I do enjoy some USA programmes, and I utterly reject some BBC stuff, but to throw away the powerhouse that provides a lot of innovation and quality programming for such a wide cross section of the UK seems crazy.

"I have to say, the quality of the output from the US is (when taken in its entririty) pretty poor. The best of "their" stuff, is very very good."

You only have to watch the best of their stuff.

Shows like Dr Who and Merling are fine for family viewing but they don't hold up with top adult orientated drama like GoT and Homeland.

"Look at the BBC1 Saturday night schedule - hardly 'minority interest', is it? "

Before I start, I'm actually not in favour of the abolition of the BBC, although in my darker moments I think a subscription service which offered Radio 3, Radio 4 and BBC4 (called, perhaps "BBC Waitrose") would be something I'd rather pay £150 for than the current service.

But BBC1's primetime output is the worst possible argument for the existence of the BBC. It's indistinguishable from ITV, which manages to function happily (-ish) on advertising revenue.

The argument for the BBC is the programmes that can't be funded by mass-market advertising. The moral conundrum, see also the Arts Council, is whether it's acceptable to impose a mass tax in exchange for niche content. The BBC's response to that is to make some non-niche programmes, and trumpet that you can watch mass-market pap on BBC as well as on ITV. I think they'd be better off finding everyone a niche, so everyone can feel that they're getting something a little special for their license fee, but that's probably why I'm not a channel controller.

For people who watch mostly BBC1, they'd see very little change if the BBC became a commercial or subscription offer. The problem for people who, like me when I'm being wistful, want essentially a British HBO, is that a small percentage of the US population is larger than the same percentage of the UK population, and the costs of quality TV don't scale with audience size. If you imagine a UK-HBO, they would have less than a quarter of the money, all other things being equal, and could therefore either make a quarter of the programmes (ie, not enough to make people want to pay) or spend a quarter on each hour (ditto). BBC4 has so few viewers that as a subscription channel, it would be able to show little more than the test card and old episodes of Top of the Pops; it would, in fact, look like that post-apocalyptic game show on Mitchell and Webb, without the HD sheen. It's the difference between a country of 65m and a country of 250m.

The subscription model works well in very large populations (ie, HBO in the USA) or for things that are very popular (ie, football ). Sky works as a subscription channel as there are enough people willing to pay for Premiership football, and everything else rides on the back of that cash cow. It won't, sadly, work for niche programming in the UK.

I love the BBC and think it tries very hard to be transparent and learn from it's mistakes.

Loeri I've tried to engage with you in this thread being fair and taking on board what you and others like Friday and Ivy have said, some of which (particularly by the latter two) has been interesting and thought provoking, despite me having the opinion that overall the BBC is worth keeping.

But I'm finding your arguments increasingly sneery and you seem uninterested in an actual debate about the issue so I'll hide the thread and leave you to it.

Some of the good points made though have really got me thinking so thanks to Friday and Ivyfor getting me to consider how the BBC is run.

The payment that caused the most outrage was the highest payment of £949,000 given to former deputy director Mark Byford

That is more money than will ever see over a working lifetime triaging patients, calling ambulances etc

And it is my money going into his pocket.

I think the BBC TV has really lost its way. I hardly ever watch it, apart from the bake off and Sherlock was fab. It is trivial and patronising. It treats it's viewers with contempt most of the time.

In terms of news - well channel seems to do much better than BBC news by treating its audience as if it has s brain cell.

I still cannot get over a £949, 000 payoff. In what world is that justified??????????

"I love the BBC and think it tries very hard to be transparent and learn from it's mistakes."
Rubbish!

"But BBC1's primetime output is the worst possible argument for the existence of the BBC. It's indistinguishable from ITV, which manages to function happily (-ish) on advertising revenue. "
Doesn't the vast majority of the licence fee get spent on BBC1 primetime output?

As for a "British HBO" the population of Britain isn't a factor these days. Media is worldwide. Put it on the internet and let anyone in the world subscribe.

I meant Channel 4 news www.channel4.com/news/bbc-severance-pay-how-many-tv-licence-top-ten-payouts

"Have I got News for You would not be safe."

It's safe enough as it is. You don't seriously believe it's some sort of dangerous satire show that holds government to account? Please. Conservative MPs are forming a queue out of the door to appear on it, and it's about as politically dangerous as an episode of The Chuckle Brothers. Merton and Hislop giving what Spike Milligan would call carefully scripted ad libs, followed by a bit of To Me, To You, To Me, To You.

Hislop's as establishment as you can get, and HIGNFY functions as a court jester, to give the impression of political edge when in fact it's as conservative as you can imagine.

"Other UK channels have to compete with BBC, so you get the excellent documentaries on Channels 4 and 5, which are not produced in a vacuum."

It's nothing to do with competition. Both Channel 4 and Channel 5 have a Public Service Broadcasting Requirement, which legally obliges them to broadcast a certain quantum of news and current affairs (into which most of the documentaries fit). Given they have to broadcast them, they don't want to show stuff so toxic that no advertisers will go near it and the following hour is compromised as well, so they do a reasonable job. "Excellent" is pushing it, and the way that (for example) Time Team was killed shows how cynical the whole process is.

" ITV, Channel 4 et al also get a cut of the licence fee"

No they don't. Channel 4 gets a cut of ITV's advertising revenue on top of its own, and there's a deal by which the terrestrials are paid a small amount to be carried on the satellites (although that might be changing). But the license fee goes solely to the BBC. You can see the breakdown here:

www.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/insidethebbc/whoweare/licencefee/

And BBC on a Saturday night is a thing to wonder for it's shitness.

At least they've stopped rerunning frigging Dads Army onBBC 2 although that'll be dragged out the cupboard again for the Xmas schedule.

"That is more money than will ever see over a working lifetime triaging patients, calling ambulances etc

And it is my money going into his pocket. "

In Byford's case, the payout was supposedly compensation for not getting the job of DG. Apparently, not being promoted amounted to constructive dismissal, so he was compromised out of the organisation. Again, the near-million was signed off by pixies, as the BBC is now remarkably vague about how it came about. I think it should be taken directly from the pockets of the BBC employees who signed it off (if they want to have a very large whip round for someone's leaving present, they should bloody well pay it themselves) but, yet again, the BBC has mysteriously lost all the paperwork.

Loeri You can't (legally) just throw stuff on the internet and let everyone from all over the world subscribe. If you're airing something in the US, from the UK, you need to pay them licensing rights, whether it is shown on the internet or not. It's the reason that many US television "on-demand" sites like Hulu aren't available here. It's the same with music subscription services. Netflix was out for years in the States before it was introduced over here, in the same way that Spotify was available here years before they had it in the States.

You seem to think it's all so simple, and you clearly think you could do a better job running it, when, in actuality, your only arguments have been that you shouldn't have to pay because someone else likes highbrow entertainment when you only want your Game of Thrones, and that the BBC is bad at managing their money (old news).

No one has said that the BBC is perfect, and shouldn't change a thing, but you seem to think it's the downfall of society but have yet to propose a reasonable solution or alternative.

'But BBC1's primetime output is the worst possible argument for the existence of the BBC.'

Friday, I wasn't using the BBC's primetime programming as a justification for its existence: my point was that it isn't all 'minority interest' stuff, for 'poshos', as the OP would have it. FWIW, I agree that it's not all that different from ITV's output - but it's Saturday night entertainment, and has been like that since I can remember (Generation Game ).

"Loeri You can't (legally) just throw stuff on the internet and let everyone from all over the world subscribe. If you're airing something in the US, from the UK, you need to pay them licensing rights"

Yes you can. Assuming the BBC is making everything there would be no problem with it at all.

YANBU! I totally agree with you. It makes me so mad that this punitive tax exists. People who want to watch BBC channels should be forced to subscribe and the BBC can see if it can compete in the market place like all the other channels have to. I think the BBC is crap and since all the sex/financial scandals have come out I feel even more angry that my money is being misspent so badly.

It's like being forced to pay for for The Guardian even if they don't read it. It is time this anachronistic monolith was put to sleep.

"You can't (legally) just throw stuff on the internet and let everyone from all over the world subscribe."

You can if it's your own content, which it would be in the scenario of a UK-HBO producing house. And it's perfectly possible to do rights-issues opt-outs. For example, BBC Radio is available worldwide, but if you are outside the UK the Formula One coverage on Radio 5 is blocked, because the BBC don't have the rights for to stream even the commentary outside the UK.

Yes, you can get around this with a VPN, but that's not the point: broadcasters only have to make reasonable efforts. You can equally pick up German TV with a big enough aerial, but that doesn't mean that Germans rights holders are breaking their contracts.

friday16 Her idea was to start a BBC/HBO channel, and broadcast it worldwide. My point was, you would need to pay out the nose to have those broadcasting rights to air it in other countries, whether online or not, which is why very few sites legally exist in more than one country, so it's not actually a viable option at all.

After the child abuse scandals, and now this where BBC execs have been given payments far beyond anything they were required to be given, isn't it time that the BBC was just shut down?

NO

It can't really be said that it makes the best TV in the world anymore

It certainly can

the best TV programmes come from the US

Wrong. Some of the best programmes come from the US some come from other places including the BBC

and have done for well over a decade now

Again, wrong

I just don't see the purpose of the BBC in 2013

I don't think the rest of the country should be punished because you are ignorant dull and uninformed

It is arrogant, bloated beyond belief and seems only to exist to provide cushy jobs for the Guardian set.

Guardian Media Group is one of the interested parties continually stoking the flames of discontent about the BBC coming from the credulous and ignorant. It does this because it stands to gain (it has major radio interests) if the BBC loses funding. The Guardian Set are not 'well in' with the BBC as a consequence. Right wing dullards use 'the guardian set' as shorthand for 'people not like us'. The rest of us use the use of phrases such as 'the guardian set' as a handy indicator of right wing dullardry.

loeri

You've obviously got a major chip on your shoulder & have just come on here to broadcast that rather than discuss. You have the honour of being the first thread I'm going to hide.

TBH, don't care what you think. I like the BBC, I'm going to keep paying for it & guess what - so are you

You'd be surprised how much that cheers me up!!

No. But the people who think Doctor Who, Merlin and Sherlock are "great TV programmes" might be. The best TV for ADULTS comes from the US. I don't think anyone can seriously disagree with that.

I disagree with that.

A few exceptionally high quality TV series ? and we see the best of their dramas and comedies ? does not compare with the entire range and high quality of the BBC output for adults and I'm frankly astonished anyone could argue the best adult TV comes from the US.

While I agree that the BBC could do better - I do worry that all the attacks on it are coming not coming from a lets see how we can improve place but more a lets get rid off and make sure the plebs pay more money to commerical companies for a lot less and make those share get holders richer under guise of doing everyone with a TV favour.

HA comingalongnicely!!! Love it!

Loeri - just wanted to add that you don't actually have to pay the tv licence. You can watch most things on your pc as long as you are not watching them live. A lot of people are doing this and the BBC do not like it at all (they have refused to give out exact numbers in a Freedom of Information Request, presumably because it would attract negative publicity). It is also ridiculous that not paying the tax is considered a criminal offence. Just think of all the wasted taxpayers money prosecuting little old ladies and poor asylum seekers who have the audacity to own a telly.

Interesting comment upthread about the BBC's political neutrality and freedom.

I watched BBC Breakfast yesterday morning and there was an interview with IDS. Charlie Stayt asked difficult questions, forced IDS to try to defend his actions and refused to let IDS stick to his prepared script. I then watched Eamonn Holmes interview IDS on Sky News a few minutes later and it was embarassing, basically 5 minutes of ass kissing. Sky is Murdoch-controlled, isn't it?

The BBC's attitude is shown again on their other, excellent political programmes such as Newsnight, Question Time, Daily Politics and Andrew Marr. No matter what party the interviewee belongs to, they are never given an easy interview. If there were no BBC, would political and news coverage be reduced to the dreadful quality of Sky News?

Mind you, I'd pay my licence fee just to be able to watch Only Connect, Pointless, QI and University Challenge!

If people want to argue against the existence of the BBC, fine and dandy.

But for the love of God could you please apply a little bit of structure and logic to your arguments, so that we don't segue from a discussion of the quality of output to a discussion of governance in the same sodding post? And stop writing so ahistorically, as though people aren't perfectly well aware of the in-principle arguments against publicly-funded services?

It is Doing My Nut in. It's liked being locked in a small box with a pimply sixth former from a minor public school who gets a stiffie at the thought of a return to the halcyon days of the Victorians, when beards were bushy, taxes low, and people knew their place.