About the TV license potentially being extended to streaming services?

[Haruka]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/01/28/netflix-users-could-forced-pay-licence-fee/

I already pay enough for the services themselves. I don't watch live TV and especially not the BBC. I am fed up with this potentially becoming a lack of choice; it feels like extortion and yet another tax.

I know that in other countries any device capable of receiving live TV and/ or radio needs a licence (including car radios, laptops, iPads and smartphones), but in this day and age it's taking the piss potentially having to pay for a service I don't even use, just to get access to things that I do.

AIBU to take a very dim view of these proposals?

I'm surprised I haven't seen any other threads on this yet, but maybe I'm blinded by fury 😆

If there is a show about Lithuanian folk dance on Netflix I guarantee it wasn’t commissioned by them.

It will either have been directly funded by a Lithuanian PSB or got independent funding through sources that will very likely include tax payer arts funds - some of which will be administered by the PSB, just as the BBC does in this country.

I get it, you don’t use the BBC so you think it has no value, but this isn’t a subjective issue - it very much does have value, both qualitative and quantitative to this country and its worldwide standing.

And that value would be decimated were it to cease to be publicly funded.

I hope they do make it part of the tax spend - get rid of all this nonsense once and for all.

I knew that when they first went to requiring one to just watch iplayer, that really, they wanted it for any streaming service at all, they just couldn't justify it back then, I mean they still can't justify it reasonably. Even though I currently pay it, I'll be telling them to fuck off and cancelling it, if they ever went htrough with anything like that.

I don't shop at Shien or Temu but nothing is going to stop me having Youtube as my main source of viewing. 😁

so there aren't enough viewers to make it commercially viable? what do you think that says about it?
I have no "hate" for the BBC. it's just an entertainment service but i will be fuming if I have to poay for it when I don't watch it

That (as I’ve said already, several times) it provides content for niche audiences and tells stories that don’t have worldwide appeal.

Viewing figures are not the only indicator of quality or cultural importance.

In fact, many commercial channels will commission for audience and separately commission for awards - because they know they aren’t always the same thing.

Documentaries have never and will never draw the same audiences as shiny floor or celebrity-led pieces.

Welsh or Gaelic language programming will never compete for viewing figures with the Kardashians.

Deaf and disabled focussed shows will never steal viewers from TOWIE.

It is about retaining variety and choice, and making sure all voices can be heard.

Seriously, we’ve been over this already. So. Many. Times.

Fair enough. But I hope you don’t watch content stolen from other channels.

I am personally happy to pay the licence fee. I loathe adverts. Not keen on streaming everything either.

The number of times I read on MN that people are suffering buffering whilst trying to watch something.

@Feelslikewinter accounts get shut down all the time on YouTube for this because the original content creators report it to YouTube but there are some creators who are happy for people to repost what they post.
It's not like shein or Temu at all lol.

Yeah, YT are pretty good about shutting stuff down but there’s still plenty of content up there that’s being shared without permission

And the reference to Temu & Shien was because there is a lot of stuff being made to poor standards or unsafely. I’m sure there is also a lot of decent stuff on Temu & Shein, but how can you tell what is made in a sweatshop and what isn’t?

youtube are very on the ball at removing content that shouldn't be on here for whatever reason
You won't find "stolen" content

You will and you do.

They are very good but there are plenty of ways round it - slowing down the playback enough to fool the auto checks etc.

If you can’t tell already, I actually know what I’m talking about in this thread 😂

no, I can't tell already that you know what you're talking about; sorry.

Yeah, that tracks.

??
Sorry again, don't understand what you're trying to say there but that may be because I'm becoming progressively more stupid due to a lack of masterchef and mrs. brown's boys

Now one thing we can all agree on is the Mrs Brown’s Boys is fucking awful.

Just a part of the world class programming which is the envy of the world and gives us so much soft power .
Actually, you hate Mrs. Brown's boys, yes?
How would you feel if lots of people decided it was great and you had to contribute to it as it's quality stuff and better than anything else you could watch?
would you be happy with that?

youtube are very on the ball at removing content that shouldn't be on here for whatever reason
You won't find "stolen" content

That's not even slightly true. Yesterday for example when I was doing CNY at school I googled a clip that's from 'let's celebrate', a bbc programme and I had to to on to the second page of google before I found the clip directly from the BBC. The whole first page was YouTube.

That will be because BBC puts a lot of content on youtube including
BBC news
BBc teach
BBC world service
BBC select......

i was talking about so called "stolen " content

I pay my licence fee, so I already do contribute to the production of that utter shite.

You seem very caught up on some notion that I am judging what you choose to watch - I don’t have any opinion on what you choose to watch. I am championing choice, not restriction.

I don’t think I’ve got better taste than you. I don’t even really watch much BBC stuff. I just realise it holds a value much greater than it’s worth to me personally.

So is she. She’s saying that the clip she wanted was on lots of non-BBC pages.

You seem very caught up on some notion that I am judging what you choose to watch - I don’t have any opinion on what you choose to watch. I am championing choice, not restriction.
maybe I think you are judging what I choose to watch as you commented that you wholeheartedly agreed with this:

The BBC's remit to inform and educate as well as entertain leads to a diverse mix of programmes that obviously will be 95% irrelevant to any given individual because you aren't like 95% of the population. Claiming that there's nothing there for you just makes you look ignorant and ill-informed and captured by the profit-focussed marketing ego-massage of whatever biassed source of media you are favouring instead.

So you very much agreed with the pp that not watching the BBC makes a person look ignorant and I'll informed.
Is that your opinion? If thetesnothing I like on BBC them I'm ignorant and I'll informed. Seems like you're judging what I watch there

I think you're misunderstanding. The BBC put content on YouTube which is why they may have come up first as opposed to from the bbc site. That does not mean it's there ilegally

I don’t think I am.

I read that post as meaning that the clip had been shared on non-BBC accounts that were showing up ahead of the official BBC YT account.

But I’m sure @CaptainCaaaavemaan will clarify

How do you tell?