http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/2993206/People-who-prefer-watching-TV-in-black-and-white.html

they have to pay a fee to own a tv? or am i reading that wrong?

That last picture with the "60 year old telly" looks more like it was made in 1960.
Bill Cahill

Binatone Visionstar...? Make that 1980. No way is that a tube set.

ETA: Binatone celebrated 50 years in business in 2009 so the math doesn't work either.

I think they got the captions mixed up, maybe they meant that Bush TV was 60 years old?

I think so, it was the only 60 year old looking one there. Cool that they're still using those old sets:yes:

It sounds as though you need a license to own a TV WTF! Are there any limey's around to confirm this? (I'm 100% British American (back over 250 years though) so I figure this isn't rascist). I think antique radios has a few more overseas patrons. Maybe I'll try there.

they have to pay a fee to own a tv?
The license fees fund the BBC, and a b/w license is almost £100 cheaper than color. I believe the license entitles you to receive television broadcasts. No fee is owed for merely owning an inoperative TV or using a TV only to watch recorded content.

Phil Nelson

In Europe, license fees for owning a radio or TV pay for part of the programming. I'm not sure how it works in Britain, but in Germany and Switzerland there is a periodic fee or tax to be paid. If you don't pay it, someone can actually come and investigate whether you have a radio or TV.

Holy crap...the biggest shocker is that they need a license to watch television? Ill be waiting for that conformation too.

Then again that would make sense since television is state run in the UK.

Phil said the license fee is 100 pounds less for a B & W TV. That's like $200-$250 bucks less! to watch TV before the cable companies or service providers get invoved. I'm sure the europeans aren't just watching the homegrown BBC or whatever they have in the rest of europe. If I were in that position I'd be pirating everything under the sun. Sooner or later this will hit the US TV industry and Hollywood pretty big time unless they have already made deals with those european broadcasters. Maybe it already has.

Yes, you need a TV license in the UK. Fortunately, though, it is a "per household" license, not a per-set one, so collectors there are not going broke. Get the details at http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/

they have to pay a fee to own a tv? or am i reading that wrong?


No, that is correct, the UK has had a licence (British English spelling) fee for television since the beginning of television service, and used to have a licence fee just for radio.

It was established to fund the BBC.

It is interesting that only the UK is well known for its licensing program, when, in fact, the vast majority of countries in Europe and Africa have them


@pugs5061: You're showing your age (I, too, remember when a Pound was USD $2.40, which made a penny (then, 1/12th of a shilling) the same as America's "penny".

Today (30 May 2010), £100 less is only $144.71 less then colour.

The license fees fund the BBC

And it's the government that collects this fee, and then funds the broadcaster? Sounds like that broadcaster better not say nothin' bad about the government or else the government cuts off the funding. :scratch2: We in the USA would never tolerate that situation. We have laws that specifically forbid the government from broadcasting domestically (Voice of America is for foreign listeners, but we still can hear it spilling inside the USA, but almost nobody in the USA ever listens to shortwave anyway). We take our first amendment seriously. :yes:
---------------------------------------------
I'm pretty sure this doesn't violate the "no politics" rule, as everyone agrees that the first amendment is a good thing, conservatives, liberals, democrats, republicans.

I am showing my age. OK $144 less then. (I always use to use $2.50).:smoke: This is all new to me though. Glad things are different here:yes:

Hello,

yes, it is alright. British people have to pay a fee for owning a tv set and receiving public television.

In Germany, we also have to pay a fee of 5,76 € a month for owning a radio anmd listen to the radio program, and 12,22 € a month for owning a tv set and watching television. As a result, the public television program of the publich broadcast corporations is commercial-free, except the time between 6 and 8 o'clock in the evening. But there are no interuptions by commercials in movies, sports and so on. Since 1984, we also have private tv programs which are funded only by commercials, but the quality of these programs are not as well as the quality of the fee-funded public programs.

In Britain, b/w tv is cheaper than color tv. Here in Germany, there is no difference between color and b/w.

- Eckhard

...

I recall something along the lines that an area/house can be surveyed by an equipped vehicle that detects the local oscillator running inside your set. I imagine there's fines involved for operating illegally.

I recall something along the lines that an area/house can be surveyed by an equipped vehicle that detects the local oscillator running inside your set. I imagine there's fines involved for operating illegally.
Yep. And they used to go around at night & look for the tell-tale bluish glow of a telly operating...

And it's the government that collects this fee, and then funds the broadcaster? Sounds like that broadcaster better not say nothin' bad about the government or else the government cuts off the funding. :scratch2: We in the USA would never tolerate that situation. We have laws that specifically forbid the government from broadcasting domestically (Voice of America is for foreign listeners, but we still can hear it spilling inside the USA, but almost nobody in the USA ever listens to shortwave anyway). We take our first amendment seriously. :yes:

From what I've seen (and heard), the BBC is one of the most honest, straighforward and no-BS broadcasters on Earth.

once upon a time in pre TV days Canada had similar license scheme for radios...you'll see them pop up on Ebay every now and then,old radios with the last yearly govt license still stapled inside the cabinet

i was talking to an older friend just the other day who remembers this from the 30/40's.seems to me he said it was 11 bucks a year...not a fortune but not an insignificant sum in those days,apparently the local radio repair guy collected it[and likely got a small cut for his trouble]

The host of "Connections", James Burke, had a great line concerning the license.

"We didn't see anything wrong with taxation without representation. The BBC wouldn't exist without it!" :lmao:

At least it's not one per set, that would make it nearly impossible to collect tvs.

So are they broadcasting analog or digital now? I know they needed a converter to 405-lines to operate the old sets already, now another one for digital to analog too? I used to think how much better off we were here needing no converters, but now with the digital converter boxes and all my modulators I suppose I'm not really any better off. I know the Canadians still have it good, because I'm still getting their ch9 (but I don't think that will last for long either)

And it's the government that collects this fee, and then funds the broadcaster? Sounds like that broadcaster better not say nothin' bad about the government or else the government cuts off the funding. :scratch2: We in the USA would never tolerate that situation. We have laws that specifically forbid the government from broadcasting domestically (Voice of America is for foreign listeners, but we still can hear it spilling inside the USA, but almost nobody in the USA ever listens to shortwave anyway). We take our first amendment seriously. :yes:

As a few others have pointed out, the BBC is recognized worldwide as one of the most impartial news organizations around.

When I lived in Switzerland, I paid the TV license fee to an outfit called Billag. Seemed to be a private agency contracted to handle the collection of licensing fees. You can read a little about how it works here at the bottom of this page: http://switzerland.angloinfo.com/countries/switzerland/tv.asp

These fees are nothing new, and go back to the earliest days of radio broadcasting in Europe. Although some folks here find this a peculiar system, Europeans strongly prefer it, often making fun of how our TV shows are continually interrupted by commercials. They will even go so far as to say the American football is a game entirely built around the concept of continual interruption of the TV coverage. All the natural breaks in it work well for U.S.-style commercial TV.

I've got a number of old radios from Europe that have the PTT (post office - telephone - telegraph) license stickers on the back of them. In those days, you'd pay your fee and get a little stamp or sticker to put on the back of the radio itself. These days, with a fee per household instead of per unit, that system is no longer used.

And it's the government that collects this fee, and then funds the broadcaster? Sounds like that broadcaster better not say nothin' bad about the government or else the government cuts off the funding. :scratch2: We in the USA would never tolerate that situation. We have laws that specifically forbid the government from broadcasting domestically (Voice of America is for foreign listeners, but we still can hear it spilling inside the USA, but almost nobody in the USA ever listens to shortwave anyway). We take our first amendment seriously. :yes:
---------------------------------------------
I'm pretty sure this doesn't violate the "no politics" rule, as everyone agrees that the first amendment is a good thing, conservatives, liberals, democrats, republicans.

I posted this once before when somebody mentioned "rules"...
I must be missing something... A while back, I noticed that many posters on this forum will not use the term "eBay" or will use a disclaimer such as "I am not associated with this auction" when posting a link to an eBay auction... I went looking for a videokarma rule section, to find out what is permitted with respect to eBay links. I could not find any rules. I have always tried to use common sense in posting, and hope that I have not offended anyone, but if there are specific rules posted somewhere, please direct me to their location.
Thanks!
jr

I posted this once before when somebody mentioned "rules"...
I must be missing something... A while back, I noticed that many posters on this forum will not use the term "eBay" or will use a disclaimer such as "I am not associated with this auction" when posting a link to an eBay auction... I went looking for a videokarma rule section, to find out what is permitted with respect to eBay links. I could not find any rules. I have always tried to use common sense in posting, and hope that I have not offended anyone, but if there are specific rules posted somewhere, please direct me to their location.
Thanks!
jr

I've looked in the past and haven't found any rules either. A few of the forums like the classifieds have a sticky with rules, but they seem to be the exception.

John

I believe that the "Rules" are basically carried over from the Audiokarma side, as they would apply here.

You newbies to this site may not realize that Videokarma had split from the Audiokarma site to be more stand alone from the audio folks, but we are still under the same "umbrella".

Please correct me on this if I'm missing something here..

I have always tried to use common sense in posting
That's the best rule of all !

Here are the Audiokarma rules, for what they're worth: http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=301366 .

I don't know whether they officially apply here, but as long as you try to be a good neighbor and keep your sense of humor intact, I doubt you'll run into any trouble, in this forum or others.

Phil

I've continued to follow the AK conventions (though there is no rule against using the term "eBay," and I personally find it a bit silly to dance around it). It seemed the simplest way to keep on the right side of the staff.

First of all, sorry about the "rules" hijack, and also thanks to those that responded !

Back to the orig thread:
I think they got the captions mixed up, maybe they meant that Bush TV was 60 years old?

I don't think that there is a caption error:
"Great grandad Les White, 88, from Barnehurst, Kent, still uses the 12-inch Binatone Visionstar TV he bought 60 YEARS ago.
Retired sub-postmaster Les says: "I bought this in 1950 and it's just as good now as it was then. The sound is perfect.
"It was the first TV I bought for my first home with my wife Wendy. I didn't get a colour set when they were introduced. In fact it was not until the Seventies that I upgraded."

I suspect that he has a "false memory" of the event... over an extended time period the human brain often combines several related events and perhaps dreams as well, into one story that makes sense, even though the actual events may have actually occurred years apart.

jr

That.

The BBC exists in an unusual and subtle relationship with the UK government. It operates under a Royal Charter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_Charter at one remove from government. It is funded primarily by the licence fee, payable by every household that uses a TV to watch off-air broadcasts. http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one/ In the age of multichannel TV the licence has become increasingly controversial but nobody has yet devised a better method. The B&W licence is an anachronism and I suspect it will be abolished when digital switchover is complete in 2012.

The BBC frequently criticises the government and in turn the government criticicises the BBC about bias. Governments of all political hues usually want to bash the BBC but the British people usually trust the BBC rather more than their government.

BBC World and other non-UK services are funded either by advertising or by a direct grant from the government. The government specifies the extent of services (eg it can say "we want a service in Arabic") but the BBC has editorial independence. I suspect there is sometimes considerable tension between the BBC and government when there is news that the government doesn't like. The BBC won its reputation during WW2 by broadcasting bad news as well as good (this is a gross simplification) and has no wish to lose it, along with its global audience, by becoming a simple mouthpiece for the government.

Good day Gentlemen,

Here's the situation in France. We have several licence-funded government TV channels (France 2, France 3, France 4, France 5 + ARTE, the Franco-German common channel). Advertising is only between programs (no cuts) and recently has been totally banned in the evening hours, i.e. after 8PM.

Interestingly, the TV licence collection used to employ 3500 + IRS employees. The government changed the law 5 years ago decreeing that all households would receive the TV tax along with the residency tax which you weither you own or rent the house you live in. If you do not own a TV, you can write and ask for exemption, but checks can be done.
The 3500 IRS employees now made redundant wre re-assigned elsewhere.

The annual fee is 116 Euros and is one of the lowest in Europe, this is why our public channels still have some advertising, as the licence allocation is not enough by itself to ensure full funding. Compare this with UK £220.00/year in England (ppppenguin please correct the figure if i'm wrong).

Best Regards

jhalphen
Paris/France

Imagine, I learned about the UK television license fees on "The Young Ones:"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn1Y7nhB16U

More recently, I saw a segment on "Trigger Happy TV" where Dom Joly had some child's toy and used it as a detector to confront people he accused of having unlicensed tv sets. Funny stuff, IMO. Just wish I could find the Trigger Happy clip.

they have to pay a fee to own a tv? or am i reading that wrong?

Yes, and the fee for a B/W set is cheaper. Nothing wrong with that, you
have to pay a fee for owning a car, right?

And it's the government that collects this fee, and then funds the broadcaster? Sounds like that broadcaster better not say nothin' bad about the government or else the government cuts off the funding. :scratch2: We in the USA would never tolerate that situation. We have laws that specifically forbid the government from broadcasting domestically (Voice of America is for foreign listeners, but we still can hear it spilling inside the USA, but almost nobody in the USA ever listens to shortwave anyway). We take our first amendment seriously. :yes:
---------------------------------------------
I'm pretty sure this doesn't violate the "no politics" rule, as everyone agrees that the first amendment is a good thing, conservatives, liberals, democrats, republicans.

As long as the Government has no power to change the fee, or divert
the funds to uses other than BBC funding, I think the BBC can be said
to be independent from the government, and this fact is generally
agreed on. Regards.

Yes, and the fee for a B/W set is cheaper. Nothing wrong with that, you
have to pay a fee for owning a car, right?

Never thought of it that way, reg fees for cars pay for roads like the reg fees for tv's pays for the broadcast.....fair enough i guess.

...

One of the advantages of a licence fee is that the beeb's programming is free from the disruption of adverts (though they are starting to adopt those annoying pop-ups that tell you whats on next grrr). Whilst the Government does initially get their grubby hands on the money before passing a portion of it on to the beeb, the beeb is free to criticise the government - any interference would cause an outcry.

I went back to a B&W licence a few years back now, when my modern colour set went seriously kaput. I relied upon a mid 60's dual standard B&W set, but because it wasn't a throw-away piece of junk I only switched it on when there was something I particularly wanted to watch. Most weeks I was down to <2 hours a week !

My mistake was buying a DVD player for elderly parent - the licence people saw the purchase (big brother!) and sent me a letter saying "You seem to have recently purchased a colour television ... " (followed by some carefully worded text that thinly disguised that they'd be sending the lads round to break my legs). Anyhow I contacted them but let slip that I had a VHS recorder. Since I could record from a colour terrestrial signal I had to have a colour licence, and as I needed a VHS recorded to modulate the set top box to UHF for ye olde telly, well, I went back to a modern colour (not monster flatscreen - shame on anyone who has one of those monstrosities)(Hi Jeffrey :nono::D:D).

Anyhow, the UK TV licence was introduced when the service resumed in 1946 (there was already a radio licence), but people who still had a current radio licence at that time could use their telly until that radio licence expired, so it was not until 1947 that licence figures truly reflected the number of sets in use (well, in theory!).

As for the "60 year old" 1980's Binatone, thats just owner's memory fade, however it is indicative of the lack of proper reserach that goes into reporting in general these days - certainly most of the newspapers are not to be considered reliable sources of information any more, but the beeb is considered reasonably good in this respect (though getting worse I'm afraid).

TTFN,
Jon

PS : @jhalphen, colour licence is currently £145.50

Digital TV is a little different over there.

I sure hope so - if your digital TV is as bad as ours then you have my sympathies!

Based on ancient MPEG2 technology, it started as a commercial pay-for service (OnDigital). The transmisisons were scrambled and there was a monthly subscription - I was one of the first! The picture quality was pretty good.

They went bust but were bought up by ITV ("ITV digital"), still pay-for. Went bust.

After maybe 6 months it arose pheonix-like as Freeview which is the current system. Its called "Free"view because only some of the channels are pay-to-view (such as UK Gold, which broadcasts a lot of the classic BBC programmes my licence fee paid for but now I'd have to pay even more to see :rant:). The bit-rate has dropped and dropped as more channels have been crammed in (stations need to pay their own licence fee which ultimately ends up in the government coffers), and now that "HD" is being broadcast they've robbed the standard def channels of even more bandwidth, to such an extent that some channels are barely watchable - seriously, massive artifacts in fast moving scenes. But at least HD is MPEG4 and I wouldn't be shocked if in a few year the SD channels changed so people will have to buy new equipment yet again. Having said that, I've seen BBC HD and was not impressed - lacking detail and with different parts of a stationary scene changing position relative to each other all symptomatic of poor bitrate/encoder. Yet HD is being pushed when we aren't even getting the quality of SD; some channels transmit the picture as 540x576 (which stretches to widescreen) ... if you do the maths, even if the transmission were uncompressed then the bandwidth would be about the same as the 1936 405-line signal ! Now add a lot of compression on top of that and, well, you get the gist.

Sis + parent in Bristol (southern England) are now digital only, whilst here in Birmingham (central england) we are dual analogue digital but switchover is pending. This is accompanied by many propaganda adverts, how "digital is easier", accompanied by some old footage (50's?) of TV sets on a production line being set up by a boffin. However, my ma could tune an old telly - you turned the little dial til you saw the picture you want - but just can't cope with the multi-menu techy digital stuff which needs regular re-tuning as they keep fiddling with the channels - drives her mad as this usually means BBC1 switches to the Welsh language version!

Digital radio is also messed up, using an antiquated technology (MP2). The bandwidth has dropped and dropped (64Kb/s for rock music - and remember MP2 is no where near as good as MP3). In fact, to get a decent digital radio quality you have to pick it up on via Freeview which also receives some digital radio stations. For example BBC Radio 7, which broadcasts a lot of radio comedy, is 80Kb/s mono on radio but 256kb/s stereo on the TV set top box. Bizarre.

TTFN,
Jon (http://www.thevalvepage.com/jon_tv/jon_tv.htm)

In the US we still have analog radio, both AM and FM. It is my understanding that there are no plans to change this. We also have digital radio. I have a digital radio, but to my ears it sounds just like FM.

I had heard that the UK is changing to all digital radio, but recently read that this is being re-considered due to all the analog radios in automobiles.

Well the BBC and others that charge for licensing fees probably relize that TV can rot your brain. hehe. but thats my opinion. people that cant afford to get a license, probably need not to be watching TV anyway, and find something more constructive to do with themselves. But again, thats my 2 cents.

Electroking said "Yes, and the fee for a B/W set is cheaper. Nothing wrong with that, you have to pay a fee for owning a car, right?"

In the US. we do not have to pay a fee to own a car. If any politician ever put it this way he'd be out so fast it is not even funny. We pay a registration to drive our cars on public roads. If I paid to own vehicles I'd be broke. I don't drive them on public roads.

The reason people stay away from using the word ebay is simple. Audiokarma has very very strict rules about trying to sell items on their forum. If you sell items on ebay and are talking about similar items on the forum you avoid the word ebay to make sure that there is no conflict of interest or misunderstanding whatsoever. Another reason is that personally I hate that f@**@*@ company even though so much of what I do is tied to it.

Imagine, I learned about the UK television license fees on "The Young Ones:"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn1Y7nhB16U

More recently, I saw a segment on "Trigger Happy TV" where Dom Joly had some child's toy and used it as a detector to confront people he accused of having unlicensed tv sets. Funny stuff, IMO. Just wish I could find the Trigger Happy clip.

That "Young Ones" episode is the first thing that came to my mind :D

Electroking said "Yes, and the fee for a B/W set is cheaper. Nothing wrong with that, you have to pay a fee for owning a car, right?"

In the US. we do not have to pay a fee to own a car. If any politician ever put it this way he'd be out so fast it is not even funny. We pay a registration to drive our cars on public roads. If I paid to own vehicles I'd be broke. I don't drive them on public roads.

The reason people stay away from using the word ebay is simple. Audiokarma has very very strict rules about trying to sell items on their forum. If you sell items on ebay and are talking about similar items on the forum you avoid the word ebay to make sure that there is no conflict of interest or misunderstanding whatsoever. Another reason is that personally I hate that f@**@*@ company even though so much of what I do is tied to it.

I'm sure you pay property taxes on those cars.

Just to clarify.

In the UK we do not have to pay anything to OWN a car or TV. We do have to pay to USE one. You can have as many cars as you like and if they are not on the public roads you don't have to pay a bean. In a nice gesture to the classic car folk, all vehicles earlier than 1973 are free to use on the road.

The problem with TVs is that the licensing authorities tend to assume you have a TV and send threatening letters if you don't have a licence. If you genuinely don't have TV it can be quite hard to get them off your back. The ultimate method would be to tell the to £$%$ off and let them take you to court.

The history of the licence fee is long and controversial. Originally the govenment took a hefty slice. This grdually reduced until now when the BBC gets the lot except for the cost of collection. We are now close to the point in a multichannel age where the licence fee is untenable as a means of funding the BBC. Unfortunately nobody has come up with a beter way. Maybe it's a bit like democracy - it's the worst possible system, except for all the others that have been tried.

Talking of democracy, Tom Lehrer wrote this in the 1960s.
http://www.stlyrics.com/songs/t/tomlehrer3903/sendthemarines185498.html

The only property taxes I have are for land or real estate. Other parts of the US may be different but no other property tax. Now if I make money on any property(including cars) I am liable for an income tax. In the US this income is exempt on the primary home though up to a limit.

Back to the point of the thread, ppenguin said what I was trying to elude to earlier. BBC is not the only game in town for channels in the UK. Is it fair for them to get the entire license fee when most people pay for dozens or hundreds of other channels just as they do in the US through private companies? The days of licensing this way are probably numbered if the government looks at it realistically(this is sometimes quite rare). The UK will probably go to a system more like the US where taxes are paid on the service that gives you the channels. Either cable, satelite, internet or whatever. The broadcast over the airwaves could be left in the dust? It really depends on how much they value the BBC going over the airwaves. MHO only, I'd like to hear what others think.

...

In the UK there is a strong feeling against the US PBS model or any other scheme that would turn the BBC from a universal broadcaster into a "high brow" ghetto. Equally funding the BBC directly from government is disliked and we like our programmes without commercial breaks. That's why the licence fee lives on.

As for transmission methods, I'll be a bit controversial here and say that digital terrestrial is a complete waste of time and money. With a slightly longer changeover period we could have gone to satellite and cable as the only means of distribution with the internet coming up fast behind. No expensive transmitter re-engineering, no electricity bill for running them. The old folks with analogue TVs could be left happy as they are and will diminish in numbers anyway with time.

Our COFDM terrestrial TX system is a better engineering solution than the US one. It's inherently resistant to multipath though it does need more complex TX and RX. When the TX power is boosted after analogue switch off it should give pretty reliable reception. The source coding systems are another matter, as is how much you compress the signals to fit more in.

I would be willing to pay a license fee if I never had to see some of the embarrassing and irritating commercials again - or if they at least brought back the television code of standards.

You can probably get BBC World on satellite. Unfortunately it carries ads.

...

Wow. I am stunned to see how many of my "fellow Americans" WANT to start paying another intrusive BS government tax. :no:

I wish all the people trying to turn the US into Europe would realize they are free to return to the land their ancestors left, likely because of an intrusive government!

"I don't like commercials, boo-hoo!!!" Government save me! :thumbsdn:

My cousin moved to Manchester and told me she couldn't stand the TV over there BECAUSE IT WAS FILLED WITH CRAPPY US RE-RUNS OF "FRIENDS". We got to watch that crap for free a decade ago!

Oh yeah, here's a shot of me watching British TV for free! lol

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v619/Chromacolor2/TVs/SU1HMDA4OTYuanBn-1.jpg

Well, I was being sarcastic. Except the part about the TV code. We don't even try to watch CBS/NBC/ABC in prime time when my stepdaughter is home. Thank goodness for the VCR.

And thank goodness for Louis Quatorze armoires: Disney flicks on the shelf, porno in the locked drawer.

...

Here in Italy we have to pay a 109-euro fee for the OWNERSHIP of a TV set, luckily once you pay that fee you're free to own as many sets as you want.
It doesn't matter whether the set is analog or digital, color or B/W, working or broken, hooked up or stored in your basement or used only to watch only DVDs or VHS tapes, you have to pay as long as you own it.

We also had a cheaper B/W fee but it was removed in about 1993

What sucks is that we pay a TV fee but since about 10 years, we have to watch tons of commercials breaks too!

We also pay for car ownership, we have to pay for each car we own including collectable cars (although there's a discount on 25+ years old vintage cars)
That's why you don't see many car collectors with large fleets here.

There's still a fair number of B/W sets in use here as i still find them from time to time, mostly in mountanous fringe areas where it's quite difficul to get color TV to work properly

I'm going to have analog TV until 2012 here although it's already been switched off in favour of DTV in most large cities like Rome, Milan and Naples.

They need to find a way to have LESS commercials on ALL television distribution systems. Last night I relized why people steal cable. There is 10 minutes of actual programming and the rest is stupid,de-grading,"E.D." drugs, tampons,make-up,car lots, "Late night one-night stands", and whatever else you can think of to fill it in. $100 for the service which is full of 20 minutes out of 30 minute shows full of interuptions and worthless programming. Its not worth it. Why pay for it when there is more than enough commercials to pay for itself? Then they cry and say "networks" want more money? GET REAL! If it were OTA broadcasts then thats fine, But cable or sat.? No, Don't think so. What happened to standards? Ethics? Decensey? I just watch the news on OTA and the rest is on VCR or dvd.

They need to find a way to have LESS commercials on ALL television distribution systems. Last night I relized why people steal cable. There is 10 minutes of actual programming and the rest is stupid,de-grading,"E.D." drugs, tampons,make-up,car lots, "Late night one-night stands", and whatever else you can think of to fill it in. $100 for the service which is full of 20 minutes out of 30 minute shows full of interuptions and worthless programming. Its not worth it. Why pay for it when there is more than enough commercials to pay for itself? Then they cry and say "networks" want more money?

I agree with this. The state of television here is abysmal, and that's not even commenting on the actual content :/ Why is it we have become complacent paying $100 a month for 40 minutes per hour of actual content and the rest commercials. It seems the people creating the content are lower on the chain than the ones that just deliver it. This doesn't make much sense to me. It's pretty easy to see why Comcast and the rest are as flush with cash as they are when they are double dipping, charging the advertisers and the viewers. At least the BBC isn't doing that.

Fully agree with the two prior posters.

I'd also have to agree.
Knology is charging broadcasters for advertising, plus, advertising their own wares.
Yet, most of the program content is simply abysmal....
I hardly turn tv on anymore. I may end up canceling cable.
The main networks certainly aren't worth watching anymore, either....
This is truly sad.... :tears:
Bill Cahill

When my Mother finishes her house in a couple of months and she and my Brother leave, I will drop the cable service. My wife and I agreed that the very few things we actually watch on cable can be purchased on DVD. You can buy a lot of viewing time on DVD with $75 a month.

When my Mother finishes her house in a couple of months and she and my Brother leave, I will drop the cable service. My wife and I agreed that the very few things we actually watch on cable can be purchased on DVD. You can buy a lot of viewing time on DVD with $75 a month.

This is the market, properly at work, without any help from Uncle Sam. When the SOBs realize no one is watching anymore, they'll be forced to scale back the ads, the cable rates, and/or improve the content.

As long as you keep paying for shit, they'll keep selling it to you. Waiting for the government to impose "standards", or start their own rival network is simply a horrific use of power. Think of it this way... most of the rest of the world lost out on the "fun" of independent, local UHF because it would have stolen viewers from their own channels... Only cable and satellite put an end to this government monopoly.

You know, the infomercials started out (at least around here) on independent UHF stations. Then you started seeing them on cable networks. Now, in 2010, so many cable stations are running infomercials after midnight that I can not understand how any of them are making money. I mean, who sits there and chooses from 50 long-form commercials? We even have one local OTA station who has fitted a 30 minute infomercial into the 5-7 p.m. block of programming!

I saw, on New York City OTA network TV no less, one of those "But wait, there's more..." TV commercials during the prime time nightly international and national news show. Mind you, this isn't the local crap news show (even in NYC it's always rapes, murders and fires) but the real news. :thumbsdn:

With all the Gen-Y crap the networks are putting on to please "The Dumbest Generation", it's no wonder we puke our guts out watching commercial TV.
I haven't had cable in two years now, and I can honestly say I am using my time "better" than when I would sit in front of the (plasma) tube.

I am saddened and scared with what fills the heads of our youth. Now that the dumbing-down of our educational system is in high gear, we can only hope the Know-Nothings that dominate our media don't start having people arrested for putting intelligent, no, how about cogent thought on tv.

And I thought the ageist, complaining BS was bad at AK.

Please don't dish the the Gen Yers or any of those generations younger than 30 please. I am 45 with a 14 year old son and here is my opinion. These generations are not watching TV. They are probably better educated and give more in both time and percentage of income to others than any other generations in years. The programming you are complaining about is probably being done by GenXers or even maybe still Baby Boomers. These kids don't watch TV! Probably because of the hideous programming you are complaining about!