BBC open to charging subscriptions for premium content, head of Corporation’s trust reveals
The BBC would be open to charging subscriptions for premium content, the new head of the BBC Trust has revealed for the first time.
Rona Fairhead, who took up her new role two weeks ago, said that subscriptions could be an “intelligent way” to generate extra money for the Corporation.
Asked whether “niche” and “premium” programmes could be offered on a subscription basis, Ms Fairhead said: “I think that would be an intelligent way to look forward in terms of the charter review.”
Earlier this year, the BBC rejected calls for a subscription model, which would see viewers pay for the services they use.
It argued the £145.50 licence fee was still the “most effective way” to fund its output, warning that subscriptions would increase the cost for those who chose to pay.
Seems a bit of a daft way to go about things……if you can make subscription work for some content then you might as well make it work for all, and as for it making things more expensive….only if priced wrongly…a monthly fee if you intend to watch a lot of BBC programming which would keep the cost the same as now but it would be optional as you only pay if you view the content, as well as an option of pay per view for others who want to watch very few items.
And in what way would paying for the proposed ‘basic’ service and then having to stump up for the best programmes not also be more expensive than an all-in subscription service?
The BBC wants to have its cake and eat it with a guaranteed income enforced by statute as well as making a tidy sum soaking us for content we have already paid for.
After all isn’t it the purpose of the BBC to provide that non-commerical niche programming that Sky etc won’t provide?…..and yet they want us to pay for it over and above the standard licence fee.
Now we see how the incoming Head of BBC Trust, Rona Fairhead, sees her roll as representing the licence fee payer. According to her not only should the public continue to be forced to pay the licence fee, but also a subscription for ‘premium content’. She calls this ‘intelligent’, I call it pure greed, so typical of the BBC.
We can now understand why the BBC were very happy to have this woman in the role. It now remains to be seen whether our politicians are as corrupt as this organisation, especially in light of all that is already known about this insidious arrogant cancer on our society.
Teddy Bear
The answer is a picnic – vote UKIP!
Philip Davis MP; “you have been in role for 10 days and gone native already. That must be some kind of record.”
It would be interesting to see what these fools would consider premium content.
Anything that is not left-wing biased I assume.
Although admittedly this won’t be much.
sometimes – sometimes – BBC 4 and Radio 4 put things on I want to see / hear. I guess that I will have to pay for those now – as well as paying for the politically biased current affairs and social(ist) engineering ‘light’ sh*t and hard left ‘comedy. Otherwise they will nab me via RIPA and bung me in chokey.
The BBC is a vile malignant parasite and needs a dose of worming tablets
Have a look at the programmes on R4 today. http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/programmes/schedules/fm And see how many to which you wish to listen.
For me:
1. Niel MacGregor – Germany (even then I have 3 (yes 3) chances to hear it).
2. Inside Health.
All the others have no interest to me.
so we are forced to pay and then if there does happen to be something you want to watch you have to pay again? For a bunch of socialists they do have a love of money and empire expanding
Simon, socialsts always have a love of money – everybody else’s money that is, and that jealousy is why they are such vile, nasty people..
But they also like to see the rest of us in the gutter while they spend our money, if they are so worried about ‘poverty’ they should get rid of the licence, it’s one tax that people shouldn’t be paying.
I think that Rona et al have “seen the light”. The days of a compulsory Licence Fee are over. Some of her comments yesterday hinted at this. At one stage she said; “we will have to look at our output based on the any future funding.” When questioned on this she remarked that there were no clear indications on the method of future funding and it is difficult to give a specific answer as to the future without the information as to how it is going to be funded. She did request a new 10 year Charter renewal to enable proper planning.
This, to me, indicates that she is a grounded manager. Then they moved on to the democratic mandate of the Trust and everything got very messy with admissions that most of the viewing public (i.e. the owners) did not know who the Trust was or that they even existed. Clearly the Trust is well grounded in the elite mindset that the public is still too stupid to understand what they need and how it should be provided and THEY KNOW BEST.
It is clear that the members of the Trust have no faith in democracy. The BBC gravy train is best served by ensuring that progress can only be made by ensuring that public participation is best achieved through surveys which ask the questions that they see as the most relevant to them, to maintain their Black Ops without further interference.
In summary the BBC operation is based squarely in the Victorian era where the elite make the decisions and the people are there to pay for and accept their largesse with gratitude and fawning adoration.
Am I missing something here? Subscription and the TV licence tax.
To me the BBC is the most over funded and over staffed news channel ever. They have been living off the trial of that South African murderer (forget the name) The SA lawyers, both sides, don’t want it to end. Such a gravy train! I find all the other channels much more informative. They at least do not report the wars wherever from the roof of a hotel in the next country.
And let’s not forget that British people, who are the BBC’s enforced licencepayers, have to finance the BBC’s ever expanding global broadcasting empire, with British people forced to finance programmes made by, and for, the peoples of the whole world, not least in the Middle East, such as BBC Arabic TV, BBC Persian Service, etc., etc., etc.
“BBC World Service.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_World_Service
And The Asian Network, 1xtra, BBC3, Cbeebies and CBBC all pushing an agenda, the latter two being the most sinister in the way they peddle diversity and multiculturalism to ‘condition’ our kids.
Camberwick Green’s new high street :
In the interests of Europhilia, the bakery is run by a Pole and the fish shop by an Italian.
Also, in the interests of Islamophilia, the post office is now run by a Pakistani with Somali workers and has a mosque at the back of it.
And Trumpton is not what it was, suffering greatly from the effects of immigration. The immigrants have recently elected Mayor Lutfur and many of the towns old residents, Chippy Minton, Mr Troop, Miss Lovelace, Mrs Cobbett and the retired Ex Army Major have been forced to flee the town, their homes given over to the new arrivals….
Only Ex fireman Captain Flack remains, he is now head of the council after attending a number of Common Purpose courses whilst working for the fire brigade…
Which is why the bbc are ever so subtly introducing the rights for 16/17 year olds to be able to vote! Brainwashed in the ways of the left from an early age who are they going to vote for?
Self serving drivel. Return the tax money to the pockets of the people. That is where it rightly belongs. Then if you are mad enough to want the BBC’s output pay for it yourself.
There should be no argument about this. This is 2014 not 1925. The technology is there. Use it for the benefit of the nation.
One way (unpopular I know on these pages) is to close the BBC iPlayer to those that don’t pay the license fee. It is also highly likely that the BBC License fee model will follow the NEW car-tax license recently introduced (again it’s compulsory) that you apply ‘online’ (or at a local Post Office) before you can access the dim world of BBC ‘entertainment’. Any ‘free’ (freeview) content of BBC repeats would include a double dose of politically correct ‘common purpose’ Dr Who or Top Gear for the 2016 BBC charter. (NO DOUBT ALREADY GRANTED). Even if the next government was to cut the License fee in half. Even that would be expensive compared to ‘free’ TV and Radio channels on Freeview (FreeView may well be renamed ‘payview’ it already has subscription channels. The BBC will argue that they need more taxpayers money plus a compulsory License fee to do what commercial broadcaster(s) do for free already. The BBC empire however could not survive the established competition without the compulsory license fee. That is their objective.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/10909628/BBC-and-ITV-battle-Arqiva-on-future-of-Freeview.html