Please use this thread for BBC-related comments and analysis. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not (and never has been) an invitation for general off-topic comments, rants or use as a chat forum. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.
Spencer | 02.10.07 – 1:11 pm
The actual issue was that BBC-W is indirectly subsidized by the BBC (through its trading on the BBC’s reputation, being an actual part of the BBC)
No it is not indirectly subsidized at all.
Your claim that there is a hidden subsidy rests upon the unwarranted assumption that calling itself ‘BBC Worldwide’ gives it a significant commercial advantage.
Actually, since most of its business isn’t done directly to a mass public, but rather to a few hundred key executives in media companies around the world, it wouldn’t really matter if BBC Worldwide called itself Wood Lane Holdings, or something like that.
Disney, for example, distributes through its subsidiary Buena Vista. Everyone in the trade knows BV is Disney.
So ‘brand value’ in such a market is low. Where the brand value exists, the BBC makes sure it gets paid for it.
A good example is in commercial book publishing. The majority shareholder in BBC Books is Random House. The name is licensed.
The revenue flows back to the BBC (who created such value as the right to sell under the BBC Books banner has in the first place).
I can’t see the problem myself……
Absolute bollocks Reith. The BBC reputation has cachet whether you’re selling to the general public or a few hundred extremely powerful media executives.
Even if you called it something else (Wood Lane Holdings or whatever), it would still be known, as you say, as the BBC, as it is a subsiduary of the BBC, just as Buena Vista is known as Disney. But that means that the BBC reputation — which is the important thing — would be in play.
(The earlier point someone made about about it being called “Islington Productions” envisaged a scenario where it wouldn’t be a part of the BBC at all, which is an entirely different matter).
There are also several other advantages BBC-W gets from being a part of the BBC, whose unprofitable activities can be subsidized by the license-payer.
The fact is that BBC-W gets a hefty leg-up from the BBC, and so an indirect leg-up from the license-payer.
Another good comment on the BBC on Coffee House:
carol42
October 2nd, 2007 12:32am
I would love a British version of Fox News. They may be slanted to the right but don’t pretend to be anything else. However they allow anyone from the left to state their views and give them a fair hearing which is a lot more than you can say for the BBC. I think it was the commentator, Charles Krauthammer, who said Rupert Murdoch found a gap in the market – half the American public. He certainly did. There is no need for the BBC financed by a compulsory poll tax now, let them stand on their own feet and compete in the market. If you don’t like ads. do as the German TV did when I lived there, adverts. only at the end of the programme.
Matthew
I guess the obvious thing to have done would have been to watch the film. But anyway… it was really interesting. I couldn’t quite see the point of starting out from the “would it work here? angle” but otherwise fascinating.
The “positive” (for want of a better word) points. Access to a form of “law” for more of the poor people with a fairly robust and common sense application by the judge that rarely took longer than an hour. People interviewed (including Christians in Hijabs) claiming things had improved with a reduction in alcohol abuse and prostitution. Classic punishments like amputation and stoning unlikely to be carried out. Apparently a very different system to that under the Taliban for example.
The “negatives” (once again for want of a better word). A woman’s evidence worth half that of a man. What that means for rape and other crimes against women. Amputation and stoning to death as punishments. Confusion over cases involving Christians and Muslims (although the example given did show things dragging on because of the traditional court system).
And in closing I have no interest in Sharia law being established in this country.
Spencer | 02.10.07 – 2:15 pm
Spencer, you still don’t get it do you? That’s probably why you are clutching at straws.
The BBC reputation has cachet whether you’re selling to the general public or a few hundred extremely powerful media executives.
Yeah, but cachet or even ‘reflected glory’ is a long way from subsidy.
If you are selling cars to Joe Public, then calling yourself BMW (UK) or Toyota (UK)is worth a lot. If you’re selling to businesses, it doesn’t much matter whether you call yourself Lex or Inchcape, just so long as the cars you’re selling have strong brands like BMW or Toyota.
BBC Worldwide sells some products with a BBC logo on them. The guy at WGBH Boston or HBO couldn’t give a rat’s arse whether the guy in London calls himself BBC Worldwide or WLH, just so long as the programmes he’s buying have BBC stamped on them.
In any case since the flow of money is exclusively FROM BBC Worldwide to the BBC, it’s wrong to talk about Worldwide being subsidized by the BBC.
The benficiary is the licence fee payer who gets more value for his/her fee than he/she pays. Simple as that.
I guess the problem JR is that the BBC is simply too capitalist. Except when it’s being too socialist.
Obviously.
John Reith – the issue for me is whether the BBC should even be in the business of acquiring private companies. What are the limits to this bhaviour? Do such limits even exist? Do you see no problem at all with a quasi-state enterprise effectively nationalising private companies? For everyone outside the BBC and Arthur Scargill’s inner circle, nationalisation was proved time and again around the world to be a disaster. Do you think there should be no limits to the scale and scope of the BBC in the public’s life? Finally, given that the BBC is meant to be trimming its gargantuan expenditure, do you think that funding this extraordinary purchase “from the BBC’s overdraft facility” is wise or prudent? Given the BBC’s holier than thou posturing on the rise in consumer credit in the wake of the Northern Rock affair, do you think the BBC has a leg to stand on now?
Here’s a good typical BBC story.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7023706.stm
“Cuban doctors working in Bolivia have saved the sight of the man who executed revolutionary leader Che Guevara in 1967, Cuban official media report. ”
It has all the elements – the glorification of the Communist terrorist Guevera (complete with the iconic revolutionary image chosen as the picture), plus propaganda for the Cuban government:
“Mr Teran had cataracts removed under a Cuban programme to offer free eye treatment across Latin America. ”
No mention of the actual standards of healthcare in Cuba, nor of the games-playing of the Cuban government of exporting its doctors for propaganda purposes while its own citizens are not treated.
A couple of paragraphs of unchecked Communist propaganda, thrown in for you:
“Four decades after Mario Teran attempted to destroy a dream and an idea, Che returns to win yet another battle,” the Communist Party’s official newspaper Granma proclaimed.
“Now an old man, he [Teran] can once again appreciate the colours of the sky and the forest, enjoy the smiles of his grandchildren and watch football games.”
Because if there’s one thing BBC journalists like better than Labour party propaganda, it’s propaganda for the plucky Communists of Cuba, such a lovely place that over a million of its citizens have left, clinging to makeshift boats and rafts, fleeing at any costs.
The BBC: plenty of room to promulgate interesting left-wing propaganda, without any mention of the truth behind, but strangely no room whatsoever for the far more relevant (to us in the UK) and interesting (it would surely have been number one on the ‘most e-mailed’ list) story of asylum seekers stowing away in the back of Tony Blair’s BMW on the way to the UK. But then it would be rather beastly and right-wing to actually tell people what’s going on in this country, far better to put out fairy stories about the Communist never-never land of Cuba.
“I guess the problem JR is that the BBC is simply too capitalist. Except when it’s being too socialist.”
Dear oh me. Do we have to spell it out for this guy?
and, in that BBC Cuba piece, there is also implict the Michael Mooresque rhetoric ‘aren’t they so wonderful, curing this poor man, even though he killed their greatest hero’.
No mention of how Cuba *actually* handles dissent: 30 years in imprison, or brutal violence at the hands of the state.
I’ve just been listening to the afternoon play “Man of Steel”.
It was set in the 80s and concerned Margaret Thatcher, Cruise Missiles, Unemployment, Falklands, Greed.
Just about every negative cliche the left/liberals have used from this period was played.
Coincidentally this programme is being played when the Conservative Party Conference is on.
Wasn’t deliberate now was it?
>BBC Worldwide sells some products with a BBC logo on them. The guy at WGBH Boston or HBO couldn’t give a rat’s arse whether the guy in London calls himself BBC Worldwide or WLH, just so long as the programmes he’s buying have BBC stamped on them.
Rubbish. Of course a buyer cares who he’s dealing with. Most buyers would prefer to deal with people who are an actual part of the BBC, rather than some bunch of unknowns who have no other contact with the programmes other than they fact that they bought them, and who could disappear overnight.
David Gregory (BBC) | 02.10.07 – 2:29 pm |
The “positive”….classic punishments like amputation and stoning unlikely to be carried out.
Yes, the fact I, as the accused, was unlikely to be stoned or have my hand cut off would be no end of a relief to me 🙂
In any case since the flow of money is exclusively FROM BBC Worldwide to the BBC, it’s wrong to talk about Worldwide being subsidized by the BBC.
So, anyone can resell copyrighted BBC material on the same terms as BBC Worldwide have with the BBC? Where is that capability available in the retail/wholesale media market?
Do BBC Worldwide employees share any facilities (like employee phone books, networks, databases) with the rest of the BBC?
Why is the state (in the guise of BBC Worldwide) buying up/nationalising private companies?
According to it’s last Annual Report BBC Worldwide appears to have had an income of £974m in 2006 from sales. It transferred £99m back to the BBC Public Service Broadcasting Group (I assume as royalty payments).
Note that for all the discussion about the separateness of BBC Worldwide, this is somewhat misleading, there is only a single balance sheet in the Annual Report.
The talk of subsidy of the licence fee is disputable. The BBC appears to operate on a licence fee + basis, in other words any income over and above the licence fee is seen as additional cash to be spent. If the external costs were subsidising the license payer in any normal sense. the external income would be used to reduce the fee payments within a fixed budget.
John Reith would probably argue that the licence payer gets more for his money under the existing sytem, but possibly people might like to have the same amount for less money and since no one has ever asked this point must remain moot.
Sharia courtesy BBC
Funny how we see no mention here of organizations such as Channel 4 International, 4Ventures, Channel 4 Creative etc – all commercial subsidiaries of what really IS a government (or State)- owned media company – Channel 4 – and performing equivalent roles to BBC Worldwide.
By contrast, the BBC, as Susan B has so eloquently explained already, is NOT a ‘state broadcaster’, a ‘nationalized industry’ or ‘owned by the government’. Nor does it ‘get its funding from the government’. It collects directly from the licence-fee payers the sum that Parliament authorizes it to collect. Big difference.
As for ‘nationalizing private companies’…..what rot.
So far as I am aware Lonely Planet will remain a private company – Lonely Planet Publications Pty Ltd – a company registered and based in Australia.
Lonely Planet’s main ompetitors are Random House (German owned), Wiley (US owned) and Berlitz (part of the Japanese Benesse Corp).
thanks anonymous: much as I suspected. The BBC and their kin are great lovers of cultural relativism, it is seen as wrong to judge as bad anyone who falls into an approved minority. So Shariah law will get careful consideration, an hour of prime-time TV, and apologists brought on to defend it. Equally, Islamists who approve of terrorism, killing homosexuals, etc., will get the mealy-mouthed treatment, which basically amounts to ‘this is their culture, we must understand it, and see things from their way, it would be RACIST to criticise it’.
But the British ‘string-em-up’ brigade are laughed at, and worse (see the BBC’s attempt to get BNP members locked up in prison).
It is shocking: the worst thing about it is that it is easy for any sensible person to see that shariah law is revolting, unwanted, a total anathema for people in Britain, utterly against the values that built our country. Fine, perhaps, for Saudi Arabia, but here in Britain, a country blessed by a thousand years of Judeo-Christian understanding, BBC ‘liberals’ are determined to bestow it with moral legitimacy, thus working to undermine the fabric of our society, contributing to the culture that we must listen to and adopt alien values as our own.
Roland Deschain: tut tut. Dropping words when quoting back at me, I’m surprised the quotation marks didn’t disappear either!
According to the doco those sentenced to amputation or stoning all had those sentences commuted on appeal. Bar two, who didn’t appeal for some reason.
It’s a bit hard to discuss a programme second hand, maybe it’s on YouTube or iPlayer?
I really wasn’t making any points good or bad about Sharia Law. Once again I have no desire to see it here. I was just giving a shortish precis of an interesting programme because it was being critised in a post by someone who hadn’t even watched it and
B-BBC tends to be at it’s weakest/worst when banging on about unseen programmes
David, the programme synopsis, namely considering whether shariah might be suitable for Britain is utterly wrong-headed, and sufficient for my condemnation.
I do not see anything wrong with a documentary on shariah law, as it is applied, just as I don’t mind documentaries on Nazism. But I don’t think they should be in anyway presented as an option for Britain.
And hey poncho there it is on LGF. Missig the continuity announcers description of it as anti-women and barbaric though… hmmm
“Funny how we see no mention here of organizations such as Channel 4 International, 4Ventures, Channel 4 Creative etc – all commercial subsidiaries of what really IS a government (or State)- owned media company – Channel 4 – and performing equivalent roles to BBC Worldwide.”
We don’t like that either. We don’t go on about it because this blog is concerned with the BBC. But now that you mention it, let me say that we don’t like it. (However, at least Ch. 4 doesn’t receive, and never has received as far as I’m aware, any public funding).
Matt: As I said I thought the whole “would it work here?” thing was a dud angle. I can see that attraction for a documentary maker, after all in Nigeria it operates besides the British Legal system. But since we’re never going to have Sharia in this country it’s a no goer. I think the doco maker rather over eggs this point.
But as a study of Sharia in Nigeria it was very interesting. Comparing it to how the law works in Saudi Arabia or under the Taliban would have been more interesting to me personally.
“Nor does it ‘get its funding from the government’. It collects directly from the licence-fee payers the sum that Parliament authorizes it to collect. Big difference.”
This *is*, in effect, getting your funding from the government. The fact that the government doesn’t pay you the cheque, but rather gives you the gun that allows you to extort the money directly from the people isn’t an important difference. Without the government, you wouldn’t have that license.
I am pleased you agree. I turned it on and was treated to the sound of some vox pops talking about the suitability of sharia in Britain. I immediately turned it off.
I would have been happy to watch a straight documentary on the way it actually operates, not just in Nigeria, but also in say Aceh (where there is regional shariah granted to Islamic rebels as a concession by the government), in Malaysia (which I don’t believe is a sharia state, but follows aspects, such as forbidding apostasy, and khalwat (adultery)), and so on.
Re. Lonely Planet. John Reid [it’s ‘Reith’, not ‘Reid’. Ed.], I think you miss the main point which, from my perspective, is that there are decent, law-abiding people working their butts off in the private sector trying to make their publishing businesses survive. Suddenly they have a competitor that has access to enormous amounts of exposure on the BBC – a channel to which no one else is allowed access. This is deeply unfair. It is just the same as when the BBC launched a whole series of magazines as direct competitors to legitimate businesses and then advertised them relentlessly on the BBC. That you and those in the BBC cannot see how wrong this is shows just how little you understand about the world most of us live in and why we can be so suspicious of your extraordinarily priviliged position.
Edited By Siteowner
“As I said I thought the whole “would it work here?” thing was a dud angle.”
It’s all very well some BBC person coming on here and saying this wasn’t a very good angle. The fact is that a lot of Muslims who live in the UK want Sharia law here. It’s very much a live issue, and will be increasingly so in the future, and the BBC gives it credibility by running a doco with that as a subject (whatever the doco itself concludes).
As for ‘nationalizing private companies’…..what rot.
So far as I am aware Lonely Planet will remain a private company – Lonely Planet Publications Pty Ltd – a company registered and based in Australia.
John Reith | 02.10.07 – 4:16 pm
I’m not aware that calling something “rot” is an adequate substitute for a reasoned argument JR – unless of course you are running out of ideas.
In what way can Lonely Planet be described as a private company anymore? Do you know what that means? It is not in private ownership. It is now owned by the BBC. The BBC is not a private company (despite being run as a private fiefdom). You are not making any sense and should admit it when you are wrong. No wonder the BBC has a reputation for zero understanding of business issues.
BBC only owns 25% share I think? Still don’t see why they should be acquiring commercial companies though.
BBC only owns 25% share I think?
OFCOM criticised Sky today for buying a 17.9% stake in ITV, commenting that a stake of that size potentially distorts the market.
BSkyB’s Stake in ITV Restricts Competition, Regulator Says
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119130776022546250.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
BBC’s stake in Lonely planet is 75%.
BBC to Acquire 75% Stake
In Publisher Lonely Planet
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119127618987245594.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
If I was a travel information publisher, I’d be slightly concerned at the Beeb swallowing up Lonely Planet, swoshing cash at it’s publications and website, and relaunching it as a travel ‘super-site’.
Another BBC fake.
Also covered by Media Guardian.
Makes me wonder just how many of Jo Whiley’s ‘live lounge’ sessions were actually live.
There are differences between the two articles though – the BBC one neglects to mention this instance wasn’t flagged up during ‘Bite’ Mark Thompson’s trawl.
“Classic punishments like amputation and stoning unlikely to be carried out.”
So they aren’t carried out in most Muslim countries worldwide then…? In fact they are. Regularly. Public executions by sword or rope most weekends in Jeddah, many of whom are not even Muslims/Saudis (Pakistanis/ Indians/Filipinos who are working in Saudi). So you are not even a citizen of that country and you still get chopped! Brown and his mates have let the Muslims slowly get Muslim banking and financial advantages, are letting them have four wives, tax benefits and welfare for each one, so why would they then not allow the Islamic community their own laws (which the Imans/leaders would sue to terrify their community into submission with as they do elsewhere). Any religion that relies on death to keep people in line cannot possibly co exist with other faiths/countries etc.
Why are C4 doing all the leg work when the BBC should be doing this!?
David Gregory (BBC) | 02.10.07 – 4:22 pm |
My apologies if you felt I was misquoting you. I wanted to show what I was replying to without reposting your whole comment. I put in the dots (is there a proper name for them?) to show where I had omitted the words. Is that not the convention?
I am reading elsewhere that Martha Kearney got duffed up at Blackpool and accused of (one of the constant temes on this blog)
Gordo the snotgobbler – good
NuLabour is us
Tories – bad always lurching to the RIGHT.
And then brought her session to an early close.
Anybody got any info?
“According to the doco those sentenced to amputation or stoning all had those sentences commuted on appeal. Bar two, who didn’t appeal for some reason.”
That’s alright then,no discomfort at having such appalling penalties on the statute book? Incidentally,what’s the penalty for faking “phone in” programmes?
The Admiral | 02.10.07 – 4:46 pm
In what way can Lonely Planet be described as a private company anymore?
In the sense that it will not be a public limited company quoted on a stock exchange or a national corporation but will remain a limited liability company based in Melbourne Australia. 25% of its shares remain with its founders. 75 per cent have been acquired by BBC Worldwide Limited. Nothing has changed about the staus of the company bar the names on the register of shareholders.
BBC Worldwide Ltd is itself a company with diverse interests. It has a joint venture with Woolworths Group Plc selling videos and dvds, another with Random House, selling books. It has a 25% stake in a film and TV production company, it has a joint venture with the Times of India selling magazines (or at least used to), it publishes the Radio Times and many other magazines, it sells BBC programmes and channels round the world together with merchandizing rights.
Some of these activities (e.g. magazine publishing) can and do sometimes raise competition issues in the UK.
But the acquisition of an Australian company which competes chiefly with German, American Japanese rivals ….. what UK competition issues are there here?
Time we Brits got a piece of the action, if you ask me.
Time we Brits got a piece of the action, if you ask me.
John Reith | 02.10.07 – 5:27 pm | #
Do you really believe that the BBC is capable of running a profitable business…without having to threaten its customers for money?
I predict that the Lonely Planet organisation will be used as a retirement/holiday home for BBC senior staff. I also believe that its profitability and viability will decline from today.
You say “its time we got a piece of the action”
Surely you are of an age to remember British Leyland?
David Gregory (BBC):
I guess the problem JR is that the BBC is simply too capitalist. Except when it’s being too socialist.
Obviously.
David Gregory (BBC) | 02.10.07 – 2:55 pm | #
Huh? Which private individuals own the BBC? Last time I check it is using extorted public funds.
“As I said I thought the whole “would it work here?” thing was a dud angle.”
It’s all very well some BBC person coming on here and saying this wasn’t a very good angle. The fact is that a lot of Muslims who live in the UK want Sharia law here. It’s very much a live issue, and will be increasingly so in the future, and the BBC gives it credibility by running a doco with that as a subject (whatever the doco itself concludes).
Telford
Telford. “Some BBC person”. It says “David Gregory” in my post! Charming!
So it’s a “live issue” and will be “increasingly so” Surely that’s an argument FOR doing such a documentary.
Roland Deschain: Apologies. Leaving out “for want of a better word” made me uncomfortable, I’m sure you were just shortening for reasons of space.
Matthew: Why switch? Why not stay and watch? It was really interesting and the voxs were the weakest part really.
David Gregory said: So it’s a “live issue” and will be “increasingly so” Surely that’s an argument FOR doing such a documentary.
It’s a live issue for a number of Muslims who are very hostile to the rest of Britain and its traditions, not for anyone else.
And if being a live issue justifies it being a documentary, well then, there’s a dozen other docos on “live issues” the BBC could do, but won’t, isn’t there? Hypocrites.
JR
The BBCW exists to exploit commercial opportunities of BBC product – broadcast sales, toys, DVD’s, related books etc.
Lonely Planet guides are not related to the BBC now. By this logic BBCW could use it’s considerable clout to buy, and profit from, any type of media business it felt like. How is that exploiting BBC product? It’s stepping into a competitive marketplace using the name and resources of a not-for profit company.
And if being a live issue justifies it being a documentary, well then, there’s a dozen other docos on “live issues” the BBC could do, but won’t, isn’t there? Hypocrites.
The effects of immigration are a ‘live issue’, especially with white working class people – any chace of a BBC doco on that, or is it only the Islamic population that is indulged?
“The fact is that a lot of Muslims who live in the UK want Sharia law here.” DG (BBC)
And MILLIONS of Roman Catholics would like various discriminatory acts revoked such as the Act of Settlement which still 300 odd years later makes me and mine outsiders in a country we have fought and died for over the centuries. Also MILLIONS if not at least 1.3 BILLION Christians would appreciate it if they were treated the same way in Muslim countries that they treat Muslims in Christian countries. ie no burning or defilement of churches, murder of Christian schoolgirls or Hindu children, no executions under Sharia Law (!) for being Christians or converting to or merely following something other than Islam.
And STILL the BBC tries to support the claims of a very tiny minority over the wishes of a huge and vastly more numerous majority as well as significantly larger minority communities such as the Hindu, Sikh and Jewish for example.
“The fact is that a lot of Muslims who live in the UK want Sharia law here.” DG (BBC)
The fact is that the overwhelming majority of people who live here do not want a religious legal system imposed on ANY of the members of this society. Where were their views?
The fact is that it is not the job of the BBC to highlight and promote any one religion.
And the fact is that they pro-actively don’t promote one particular religion (quite rightly).
But that is why they have been so very keen to turn a Sunday morning religious show into an umbrella programme where Wiccans, Wahabbists and sundry weirdoes are given as much credence as the majority religious faith of this country.
Balance? If she weighs as much as a duck… BURN HER!
In July Panorama did a programme examining immigration. Watch it here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/6908390.stm
dave t:
ShugNiggurath:
Please don’t attribute this to me
“The fact is that a lot of Muslims who live in the UK want Sharia law here.” DG (BBC)”
It was a direct quote from Telford. I’m sorry if that wasn’t clear in the original post.
I heard the news quiz on radio4.
They said that Thatcher’s obit was locked away because the BBC was losing too many man hours with people watching it.