Bbc Ranting

[spyguy]

I have a fair amount of affection for the BBC.

Firstly, I won't pay for any of Murdoch's channels, so I won't have Sky again.

We had it once, years ago, with that crappy set top box that crashed all the time, crap terrestrial picture quality, no broadband network so had to rely on BT - what a joke, had to be connected to a phone line so it could report on us, didn't even work properly so you had to ring up to "order" a film, there was no "on demand" - so, so very far behind Virgin Media, which we did have when we moved to somewhere cabled.

But even then, we didn't watch the other channels. Hundreds of channels of real crap. Apart from "The Simpsons". Great in small doses. Then you've seen them all. And lots of American crap for people who are incredibly easily pleased with overplayed religious emotional sentiment, and canned laughter in comedies to help you recognise which bits to laugh at. Oh, please.

Years later when I got a demand from a debt collection agency for £80 which turned out to be because the box wasn't connected to the phone line - which didn't work because it could barely even manage dial up internet and was left disconnected by the Sky 'engineer' - but that "fee" would be waived "if we came back to Sky" I saw the fraud and vowed never to deal with them again. And told the collection agency to get stuffed.

Only the BBC was worth watching. Now I don't have access to Sky these days, I do have access to streaming services, and they're all crap as well. There's so little on them that is worth watching. That people want 'something for nothing' - entertainment is free, innit - P2P and illegal methods of accessing content are free, so why pay? Do go away.

These days I flip through the on screen TV guide, follow the BBC channels across the evening, set the box to series record stuff, maybe look at C4 and E4 and do the same and give only a cursory glance at the other channels.

I am not convinced that the BBC should be doing news (potential for bias abounds), I don't watch it, nor sport - that has gone so far up it's own **** that I'd rather leave the people who want to watch it to pay the football player's fees in their ever-increasing Sky contributions.

This is just a re-has of 'The NHS is great, the American system is terrible' left wing rant.

Narrowing the choice to: BBC or Murdoch.

How about *I* select the programmes I want to watch.

I do not need the bunch of smug fckers at the BBC to decided that I'll like some ethnic bint doing the football, or some drivel like Strictly. Neither do I need Murdoch to do that task.

A studio makes a popular series.

Sticks it on Netflix/AMazon/DVD box set.

People buy it/rent it.

Studio gets its money.

BBC makes, oh, grossly expensive Jamica Inn and screws up the audio.

No one watches.

BBC does not get money + goes bust.

Simple things markets.

They don'y need a collection of cntu like Alan Yentob hob-nobbing with Blair and the like to do the job.

[DTMark]

This is just a re-has of 'The NHS is great, the American system is terrible' left wing rant.

Narrowing the choice to: BBC or Murdoch.

How about *I* select the programmes I want to watch.

I do not need the bunch of smug fckers at the BBC to decided that I'll like some ethnic bint doing the football, or some drivel like Strictly. Neither do I need Murdoch to do that task.

A studio makes a popular series.

Sticks it on Netflix/AMazon/DVD box set.

People buy it/rent it.

Studio gets its money.

BBC makes, oh, grossly expensive Jamica Inn and screws up the audio.

No one watches.

BBC does not get money + goes bust.

Simple things markets.

They don'y need a collection of cntu like Alan Yentob hob-nobbing with Blair and the like to do the job.

The idea that you could simply pick what you wanted to watch on demand is a great one. Except that nobody has really done it.

There are a stack of disparate platforms offering different content, but the 'Pay for what I want' option doesn't seem to exist because the filler channels are used to make up 'packages' to seem to add value and secure a monthly cash stream. Actually, there was one called AceTrax on our TV where you just paid to see what you wanted. It went bust.

Netflix, for instance - it's about six quid a month. It has one or two anchor programmes like Breaking Bad and is 95% filler material, the sort of stuff you see for two quid in bargain basement buckets. The service just isn't expensive enough - there isn't enough pie to go around for everyone. Amazon Prime - not available standalone, you have to take the whole package including the Amazon bonuses like delivery and e-books.

Sky and VM have 'bundles' knowing full well that if people could just pick what they wanted, they would have to up the price of just those things because there is no longer a cash cow from all the bundles people buy, like people paying for some kids package in its entity just so as to get the Disney Channel (we used to do exactly that just to watch 'Untalkative Bunny')

As cable services developed I always imagined that one day the entire back catalogue of every movie and TV programme ever made must be coming soon, and I could just buy what I wanted, a bit like iTunes. Except on that you can't just buy one track sometimes, you have to buy the whole album.

The main problem is that people expect something for nothing and it only seems to work in some great socialised pot where millions of people pay in so the sports fans can get the football. If the packages were split up, the football fans would be priced out.

Which is a model I'd love to see, but nobody has made this business model work.

[Executive Sadman]

Seems the BBC troll the internet for the most moonbat leftist they can find...and cant tell the real ones from the fake ones. Regardless, I don't know why TV is still relevant in the age of the internet.

[Guest TheBlueCat]

TV has changed full stop. Huge audiences are a thing of the past. Few shows ever make it to 10M viewers these days.

Something as banale as Blind Date got axed when it started to slip down towards 10M. The days of 20M people tuning in to see the big EastEnders reveal on Chrisymas day will never return.

I think that's spot on. What's really interesting is to speculate on the long term effects of that. Anyone born before about 2000 will almost automatically have a collection of shared childhood experiences simply as a result of watching television whereas those born more recently won't. I wonder what they'll talk about in the old people's home?

[spyguy]

I think that's spot on. What's really interesting is to speculate on the long term effects of that. Anyone born before about 2000 will almost automatically have a collection of shared childhood experiences simply as a result of watching television whereas those born more recently won't. I wonder what they'll talk about in the old people's home?

How expensive housing was when they grew up?

[Guest TheBlueCat]

The idea that you could simply pick what you wanted to watch on demand is a great one. Except that nobody has really done it.

Apple TV has a huge range of stuff on demand. It would be very pricey if you were a heavy user but for the occasional film and Top Gear (whilst it still existed) it costs me about $10 CAD a month.

[frozen_out]

I think that's spot on. What's really interesting is to speculate on the long term effects of that. Anyone born before about 2000 will almost automatically have a collection of shared childhood experiences simply as a result of watching television whereas those born more recently won't. I wonder what they'll talk about in the old people's home?

Having young kids I know they all talk about YouTube videos. The idea of a program being on at a set time on a set day just seems mental to them.

When I was at school the morning after Quantum Leap or X-files, all people talked about was Quantum Leap or X-Files.

[SNACR]

Kid at our school talked about Quantum Leap the whole time but we saw through it and realised that Sam Beckett had leapt into his body to promote his TV show.

[DTMark]

Apple TV has a huge range of stuff on demand. It would be very pricey if you were a heavy user but for the occasional film and Top Gear (whilst it still existed) it costs me about $10 CAD a month.

I haven't fired ours [Apple TV box] up for about six months after getting the turntable sorted, that has kept me distracted.

Though I do recall it had quite a wide choice. We did watch a couple of films on it, picture quality in HD was very good.

Looking now, and immediately drawn to the "BBC" category, it does have a few things I'd like to see.

Though to be honest I'd order the DVD, since it's the same price or cheaper.

I get the impression that rights holders just aren't that keen on people buying stuff online, be it films or music, the latter changed first, though still only CD quality stuff is available in the mainstream, rather than high resolution stuff. Though even that's changing. Very, very slowly. The music industry seems to offer people what they want about ten years after they started wanting/pirating it.

Coming back to my earlier point, I suspect that there's still enough money to be made in the durable hard copies (e.g. box sets) to mean that whole swathes of things I'd like the chance to view "on demand" (and in some cases I'm going back decades) still aren't available to stream/buy.

But then they're on YouTube for free. Most of them. The situation is a bit insane.

[19 year mortgage 8itch]

Kid at our school talked about Quantum Leap the whole time but we saw through it and realised that Sam Beckett had leapt into his body to promote his TV show.

I didn't think you were young enough to tell that sort of anecdote truthfully.

[davidg]

But then they're on YouTube for free. Most of them. The situation is a bit insane.

I agree with your earlier point about "packages", so you end up having to pay for a few packages to see the few shows you want to watch. Not paying a flat rate license fee would certainly put people off watching non-stop drivel on the gogglebox.

I guess the studios will take so long to get around to making Pay Per View acceptable that piracy will eat their lunch. I have already had to torrent films I could play from DVD because of the stupid "anti piracy" stuff making the DVD unplayable in my computer.

[Frank Hovis]

I haven't fired ours [Apple TV box] up for about six months after getting the turntable sorted, that has kept me distracted.

Though I do recall it had quite a wide choice. We did watch a couple of films on it, picture quality in HD was very good.

Looking now, and immediately drawn to the "BBC" category, it does have a few things I'd like to see.

Though to be honest I'd order the DVD, since it's the same price or cheaper.

I get the impression that rights holders just aren't that keen on people buying stuff online, be it films or music, the latter changed first, though still only CD quality stuff is available in the mainstream, rather than high resolution stuff. Though even that's changing. Very, very slowly. The music industry seems to offer people what they want about ten years after they started wanting/pirating it.

Coming back to my earlier point, I suspect that there's still enough money to be made in the durable hard copies (e.g. box sets) to mean that whole swathes of things I'd like the chance to view "on demand" (and in some cases I'm going back decades) still aren't available to stream/buy.

But then they're on YouTube for free. Most of them. The situation is a bit insane.

I've heard TV transmissions described as tasters for series boxsets (real or virtual); we pass DVDs around at work and I've seen a lot of Breaking Bad on those. All totally legal.

It looks like TV programmes are going the way of music. Anybody who want to hear a particular track can (record labels put them out on Youtube for free) and the money is made from sales of CDs or downloads plus touring; the latter being something TV shows can also do - Top Gear Live for example.

The scheduled transmission model, especially paid for, is to my mind dead in the water with the exception of sport. People will pay for on demand stuff or for live sport. But paying to watch scheduled transmissions - nah, can't see that lasting long; bad news for Auntie Beeb.

[SNACR]

I didn't think you were young enough to tell that sort of anecdote truthfully.

Ziggy says there's a 75% probability I made that story up.

[frozen_out]

Ziggy says there's a 75% probability I made that story up.

One of the few occasions I wish there was a 'like' button on HPC.