There have been a few questions recently about the state of the BBC. Some traces back to a speech from certain senior management of a large satellite broadcaster and some noise from ITV and other newspaper and news publishers. They seem to centre around ideas that broadcasting must be commercial and that a state or state funded broadcaster should be small and narrow to meet minority interest.
They declare the BBC is too big and has left no space for them to work in. They say no one can sell news when the BBC gives it away online and other media. That the BBC has priced them out of the talent market. They suggest the BBC is killing private enterprise and that commercial TV and the public suffers.
Before the internet and the recession I did not hear the same loud complaint. Advertising revenue was high, syndicated series and formulas were relatively cheap to broadcast, competition was slight. To distinguish their shows they attracted and helped to drive up the price of ‘talent‘ as much as the BBC may have done.
Not being an extreme capitalist, I’m not convinced that a profit motive delivers the best in all things. I don’t think private medicine delivers the best medicine, I think focus on the patient, good research and development and employing the best in caring staff does that. I don’t think private security produces better law and order but a police force with extensive training, honourable people and a sense of civic duty can help. I don’t think money focused MPs deliver the best government…
Why should Sky or ITV be expected to produce excellence in TV?
They prosper by producing TV that will attract the highest numbers of subscribers or viewers that will buy the goods and services they or their advertisers want to sell. The logic being the better the quality of programming the more people will watch.
That logic holds a number of simple assumptions that I don’t hold with. Popular things are not necessarily the best things. Pursuit of something popularist need not be bad, but rarely produces excellence as a by-product. However, pursuit of excellence can be popular, there is good evidence that excellent things are appreciated by more than just the few.
Companies will only advertise on TV, radio or newsprint if it offers a net return, so the broadcaster must be creative and deliver the right environment for the advertiser. That might not be the most educational, accurate or informative broadcast but the most conjusive for the advertiser, perhaps from entertaining to frightening or sensational.
The BBC funding means it can afford to pursue excellence across many fields and I think they should do so. They should leave the popularist pursuit to those that have to. As stated, I don’t think that implies they need to pursue the narrow minority. As a result there is no requirement to be of a particular size, other than to be at least the scale that allows them to deliver excellence.
So what about ‘value for money‘ from the BBC?
Sky TV (BSkyB) uses advertising and subscription model for revenue, creating an annual turnover of about £4.1Bn. The lowest Sky subscription is promoted at £18 per month and there are fees for additional services and channels like online watch again services and recent movies. Additional service types like internet access and telephone can be provided along with equipment supply. They commission new programmes and create channels to suit target groups from arts to sport but also buy in a high proportion of overseas material.
Obviously ITV doesn’t have a subscription model but gets revenue purely from sponsors and advertisers. In 2009 totalling about £2Bn. BBC can’t touch the advertisers, so the field until other broadcasters came in, was clear for them. They need to match audiences with programming and advertisers to gain sufficient income levels. They have the hardest task of the broadcasters to balance those three elements. They provide free at the point of delivery content that rests on the judgement of value percieved by advertisers, listeners and viewers.
In recessionary times creating content that works, means they have to do an exceptionally good job. When revenue drops like it has they have problems funding quality.
The BBC is funded by a licence, not strictly speaking a tax but totals about £3.5Bn per year. The annual license fee is currently £145.50 which equates to about £12.13 per month. This funds BBC services including TV channels 1,2,3,4 radio channels 1,2,3,4,5,6 and their respective websites and iplayer services (in platform independent ways that allow everyone to use it).
It also funds the BBC News services for TV, radio and web.News in all but printed form for all members of the public around the UK and the world. World class drama, news, sport, culture and music for 39p per day per household in the UK. Even a world service broadcast in many languages to the whole world representing the UK’s take on things, still free at the point of delivery.
Much of the content is produced with external production companies and individuals being commissioned to produce programmes and a high proportion of the BBC broadcast content is UK produced. This means the BBC spends much of the money in the private sector and can engender small and imaginative production companies that can be very creative and develop new ideas.
I think that it is good to have at least this level of choice and that the BBC probably represents good value or comparable value.
So why are people complaining? Questioning and discussion is essential to keep things alive but sometimes it is important to see who is complaining and try to understand motives.
A very large international corporation with interests in news and satellite broadcasting suggests the biggest problem in the worlds media is the BBC and it’s size and breadth. If you had a company concerned with advertising revenue loss and finding itself wanting to charge for news online then perhaps you would want to reduce or remove competition that didn’t charge and didn’t need to court advertisers. Especially if you had missed other online opportunities because they didnt suit your existing business models, experience or interests.
With ITV’s problems it too must be tempting to externalise problems and seek solutions from changes to the playing field. I think perhaps the main suspects for ITV are the advertising and subscriber broadcast competitors and the slow response of government regulation to a rapidly changing commercial environment. This has been the case for a long time, probably since the inception of UK broadcasting and now the money bonanza that was TV has settled to a less financially rewarding occupation companies are struggling to find a new level.
If only the commercial broadcasters could get some of the BBC money or reduce the BBC to a size that matched their own reduced circumstances… Then the viewers might have to pay to use their broadcasting services more instead…
With all the higher charges, control over broadcasting infrastructure and their subscribers equipment I am concerned that they expect more ownership of our media and lobby government to give it to them. I begin to wonder why the politicians start to support such calls. I certainly don’t automatically trust their motives to be in line with their voters. I feel right now that what a current politician tells me is good for me is probably a clear contrary indicator. Labour or Tory, I have to be worried that they want to help any one commercial interest gain more control over our media.
ITV are seeing revenue drop markedly and have had trouble recruiting a CEO so have limited scope for a return to improved profit. As their revenue is advertising based I think they should have had a closer eye on the changes in their market. Google and other internet driven marketing and promotion has revolutionised the way companies reach their market. ITV find themselves locked into an old model, proprietary online formats, declining revenue and subjectively falling quality.
Are not these issues exactly what capitalist business is about? Money tends towards the more profitable and leaves those models that fail to return investment rewards? If these businesses cannot innovate and do something new then they should fail. When big business complains the world in which they operate is not fair to them, I tend to assume, perhaps unfairly, that they are not being well run and are busy looking for excuses rather than creativity in the boardroom.
I value that at least one broadcaster does not need to court big business or other interests. It can provide a different perspective, biased as all perspectives by their nature must be, but fundamentally different. I like the fact that a broadcaster can report news that may be uncomfortable to governments and powerful figures, such as sexed-up dossiers and employ persistent interviewers like Paxman.
Most newspapers and some broadcasters represent the opinions of their owners and there are many accounts of news suppression and targeting. Consider how one newspaper even attempts to claim it affected a UK election and asserts it can affect the upcoming one. Even the very quality of reporting and news comes in for scrutiny, especially in some tabloids and there are many who have unflaterring terms of reference for some commercial 24 hr news channels.
People should be able to watch, hear and read whatever they want on media but lowest common denominator should not prevail everywhere. Formulaic series, repeats, celebrity dance challenges, reality TV and rolling news are fine, but they are only part of what should be available. Media should be varied and imaginative. Profit focus or bean counting has often killed originality in art and drama. Nothing is immune to financial constraint, but seeking profit from artistic endeavour has historically been a volatile thing.
Is the BBC perfect?
I think the BBC can improve and perhaps some of its broadcasting experiments don’t work and should stop or change. I think the BBC should concentrate on excellent things not mass appeal. Some of the excellence will be mass appeal, like Sir Richard Attenborough’s natural history series or Dr Who, whereas some, like Dear Diary will appeal to another smaller group. Series given more than one season so they find their feet are rare on any commercial media but not so on the BBC of even recent past. Blackadder for example just got better from a slightly obscure start.
I think the BBC at its best works to challenge other good broadcasters to keep up or improve on what they offer. I think that should also work the other way around, some of the good parts of commercial broadcasting should challenge the BBC.
Should everyone have to pay for the BBC?
Yes, I think they should. Choice is often touted as a right, as being offered without consequence. So how do people choose? When you offer a choice of sweet, salty, fatty foods to people they will often take them in preference to other foods. Their choice is informed also entirely by desire not need or benefit. If you offer them a choice they consume more just by virtue of their being a choice. I doubt any modern society would or should be able to tell people what to eat but they shouldnt encourage the removal fruit, veg and clean water either.
I feel the BBC produces some of that essential content for a healthier mind that counter balances the triviality of entertainment only broadcasting. That makes the license fee, the price of real choice.
I think it should make more constructive ways of involving us, the public, in debate and content – beyond the Big Brother or morning chat show formats. Dragging some of the establishment and institutional figures to be held accountable would be a start. Not in some gladiatorial contest but in more considered attempt to find things out rather than be sensational. The BBC could do that in ways that commercial broadcasters simply couldnt and wouldnt. I want the BBC to be more and play a bigger part in the life of the UK not smaller.
I think we British should be incredibly proud of the BBC. It delivers all the products it does freely to the whole of UK society and for a comparatively very small license fee. It possibly needs to change, perhaps be more accountable to its viewers but certainly not to government or big business. It could improve and take more risks but it shouldnt be clipped and chained to allow a clear field for self-interested commercial domination.
Sure, the BBC isn’t and can’t be perfect, but if we want a good counter balance to unfettered commercial interest in broadcasting, we need an organisation, large enough, fiscally strong enough and independent enough to do so, without fear or favour. If something other than the BBC exists that could do that, please comment.