A Conversation for The BBC

having the cake and eating it

Post 1

Zebedee (still Pool God after all these years)

Good ol' Auntie Beeb has put a few noses out of joint in telly's commercial sectors in recent years - when it first started selling videos and such-like it was pointed out that having a £3bn headstart using public capital to make a profit was a bit unfair. So now the Beeb has all these "independent" satellite concerns like Flextech that sell its programmes. And it still can't make enough money to buy any decent sport. Footie and F1 fans are hardly a minority and they fork out there £100 like everyone else. Not that I'm bitter or anything.....


having the cake and eating it

Post 2

DickieP

The sport issue is a funny one. It seems to me that, at least part of the time, the beeb refuses to bid for some of the sporting events like live footy as the bidding war that would ensue would just line the pockets of the already rich premier clubs, and cause the price to spiral up year after year. Why should the beeb spend that level of cash on sport, which attracts a relatively small amount of viewers-per-pound, when they can invest in minority programming, online services and good quality drama?
Still, I agree that the sale of videos does look odd for a non-commercial organisation, but it could be simply a way of getting the corporation geared up for going commercial if we get another round of beeb-bashing like the last government.


having the cake and eating it

Post 3

*!&%%! Hippie

For items of truly national interest, the Government should stump up some cash - the next World Cup for example - which apparently is going to cost a fortune in 2002...


having the cake and eating it

Post 4

Zebedee (still Pool God after all these years)

Until now, the Beeb and ITV have picked up World Cup writes for £3.6m between them (well, that was 1998, and less before that). Fifa has decided that participating nations should no longer have an automatic right to live access (i.e. at an affordable price), and have sold the global TV rights to a German media magnate (Leo Kirch, I believe) for a reputed £750m. Only the semis, final and matches involving the home sides (Japan and S Korea in 2002) will have unrestricted (or reasonable) access. Everything else is going to end up on pay-per-view, though the government might still be able to insist that whoever has the rights (Sky or ONDigital perhaps) will have to screen England games for free (as part of their agreed broadcast licence) - this is why the recent England-Scotland game was on terrestrial, but Scotland-England wasn't (well, live anyway) - Scotland don't have the same agreement. But I don't know when it expires.


having the cake and eating it

Post 5

Wand'rin star

As all the national sports teams (sweeping generalization) are playing at such a rock bottom level I would begrudge the Beeb spending any of my licence fee on them. Or have I got it the wrong way round? If there was a huge domestic audience would they all play better?


having the cake and eating it

Post 6

Is mise Duncan

(1) I think I paid the license fee
(2) The BBC is by far the richest television company in the UK
(3) The World cup holds the record TV audience ever

Now, given this, I think it should have bid for the World Cup, Premiership etc. Which is more, the license fee is (indirect) taxation yet there is no "representation". I think the Americans had a good way of dealing with that.

Still, the BBC is not as mad as RTE which is both license funced _and_ carries adverts....but that's for a different rant.


having the cake and eating it

Post 7

Researcher 33337

For someone who isn't a sports fan (Well, American football lends itself toa d breaks well. F1 with ads is rediculous. "Well, you've just been watching half an hour of cars buzzing round the track with nothing happening but over teh ad break the lead has changed three times and tehr have been two spectaculour crashes. It may as well not be shown live) Anyway, back to my point. I am not a sports fan (No real interest in football) I do like my SF. Teh BBC has alot of sf. Now I knwo Football gets good ratings, but canceling sf for the indoor bowls championship. Come on.


having the cake and eating it

Post 8

Zebedee (still Pool God after all these years)

Schedulers will always prioritise live events over prerecorded programmes, especially when it's one of the few sports they still have live rights to.

American Football - the stop-start structure has been exacerbated by the American Networks who spend increasing hundreds of millions on the broadcast rights and depend on ad revenue to pay for this. Monday night games are a separate contract in the States (I believe) and go for an enormous sum.

F1 had no other choice - in most countries it was on commercial television, and having got used to it breaks are no trouble - at least you know you WON'T miss anything if you grab a beer because it will be replayed. As much as I love the sport, very little happens over the two hours anyway, these days.
Bernie actually gave the rights to ITV without allowing the Beeb to counterbid - I believe this is because he didn't think the Beeb would be able to accommodate his digital plans for the sport as quickly as a commercial interest (with profit driven reasons to find the funding for the technology) would. I mean he was right - ONDigital are giving away set-top boxes for free, and Sky are upgrading existing subscribers just to get the digital audiences in place so they can charge for stuff. There's no way the Beeb can or will commit to getting a digital audience in place at cost to them.


having the cake and eating it

Post 9

Is mise Duncan

The push to digital is very largely driven by the government so that they can sell the freed up analogue bandwith...therefore the BBC should be given this extra money and be able to pump it into digital chanels.
Plus, if the BBC got one years premiership football, Sky Sports would be wiped out and the next years bidding would (probably) be less expensive.

But as I said before, its not just about sport or no sport - it's about someone who spends a substantial sum of my money not even making a half-hearted attempt to find out what I want them to spend it on...and my not being able take my custom elsewhere if they don't provide what I want. A monopoly supported by criminal law? Madness!


having the cake and eating it

Post 10

Wand'rin star

a) A hundred quid is not a substantial amount of_ your_ money. You are on record on another thread as being "very well paid".
b) I never suggested that I was paying the licence. "would" is a marker of a conditional sentence. I'll rephrase it: Were I to be paying the licence fee and were the Beeb to be spending any of it on English cricket, I would be royally p****d off
c)Are there any taxes for which you _do_ have any say in the spending? Road fund?




having the cake and eating it

Post 11

Is mise Duncan

I have a lot more control over my taxes than I do over my license fee:
I have voted twice at national level and twice at regional level in my life, have lobied my MP about IR35 etc.

My problem is that there is no alternative to the license fee. Even if (as an avid football fan) I buy all 3 sky sports chanels, and promise not to watch BBC, I have to pay.

Also, the BBC is a commercial concern, albeit with a government subsidy, but not paying your TV license is a _criminal_ offence, not a civil offence.

..and lastly, though it irks lots of commentators, the fact is that football is _the_ most thing there is in the UK.


Key: Complain about this post