United Kingdom Leads the World in TV Downloads

SumDog writes "The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women. However, according to a story on the Guardian, a new study puts the UK ahead in one more category: it leads the world in TV piracy, accounting for 38.4% of the world's TV downloads, with Australia coming in second at 15.6% and the US in third at a pitiful 7.3%"

Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Xner]

"The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women."

My sarcasm detector must be malfunctioning, I actually had to read that twice before it blipped ...

Piracy is why Battlestar Galactica is on usenet.

[ABeowulfCluster]

.. not like any of you whippersnappers know what USENET is...

winge

[CGP314]

The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women.

...and for complaining about absolutely everything in a sarcastic manner.


-Colin [colingregorypalmer.net]

Australians download TV shows...

[Anonymous Coward]

... because there is a serious lack of content. Unless you like cop shows.

Damn it was hard going back there after US cable.

Re:Piracy is why Battlestar Galactica is on usenet

[Anonymous Coward]

Quiet you! They'll never find out about it if you don't mention it!

Nothing to see here folks.

Usenet? Why that's what they called the internet before it went global. Yup. U.S. Experimental Network. That's what it was called. Al Gore ya know, he invented it.

Re:known for beautiful women??

[tod_miller]

Just to put parent and sibling down:

As a brit male who has sown his seed in many a fine field, both here and abroad - the concentration of fine women does not differ greatly, however in tourist places or high profile places (in city centers) where shopping is good you will find some fine filly.

It is true, there are many corners of foreign fields that will be forever england. I just cannot remember some of thier names.

Tod the stud (I was drunk)

Re:known for beautiful women??

[eatmywake]

The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women.

This is what is known as a "e u p h e m i s m"! It can be read as "The UK is known for many things, fish 'n chips, overcast skies and slappers."

Piracy?

[Mr.Progressive]

Piracy is a pretty strong word for this particular act. I like to think of it as Distributed Tivo.

My Boss

[krumms]

My supervisor at work probably accounts for about half of all the Australian TV downloads. Absolute champion.

I personally don't see the point: Just go watch the TV for real you fucking nerds! :P

Re:Wait a minute...

[Lally Singh]

He got the UK mixed up with the Caribbean. Common mistake.

Women?

[rxmd]

The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women.

Don't forget the excellent beer!

Re:What shows?

[Gumph]

If you had read the article, you'd know it's 24, Enterprise, and Six Feet Under ...

I would just like to take this opportunity on behalf of my great nation to apologise for the Enterprise thing - not sure what we were thinking, the series must be playing on it's predecessors good PR!
We will petition the PM and get back to downloading Pr0n forwith!

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you call a pretty girl in the UK? A tourist.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[meitsjustme]

Britain, Britain, Britain! Discovered by Sir Henry Britain in sixteen-oh-ten. Sold to Germany a year later for a pfennig and the promise of a kiss. Destroyed in eighteen thirty-fourty two, and rebuilt a week later by a man. This we know. Hello. But what of the people of Britain? Who they? What do? And why?

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[CGP314]

A sarcasm detector? Oh that's useful.


-Colin [colingregorypalmer.net]

UK TV Licenses

[Napoleon Blownapart]

Speaking as a UK citizen I quite enjoy the UK TV license system and their amusing requests for money.

The letters are funny too.

"Dear Sir.

We are really quite angry that you haven't bought a tv license.

While we have no proof that you actually have a tv we assume you've got one because, well, most people have got one.

Failure to buy a license will result in us sending you another letter telling you how angry we are."

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[chrisbeatty]

There are some hot women, you just need to have drunk quite a lot first!!! (-;

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Xner]

You owe me a coffee. And a keyboard.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[druid_getafix]

"The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women."

Reminds me of a joke (told from an Indian's perspective of course!!).

Heaven is: American Salary, British Home, Chinese Food, Indian Wife.

Hell is: Indian Salary, Chinese Home, British Food, American Wife.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Alioth]

The climate is wonderful if you're a duck! There's also great food in the UK too - things like Indian, Chinese, Italian. There's also plenty of beautiful women, and most of the beautiful women have cute foreign accents!

TV downloads?

[kTag]

What? They are downloading their TV?
Jesus, we are quite behind in France, we still have to go and buy these damn TV from Darty!!

Re:known for beautiful women??

[ettlz]

But a good british accent can be sexy on a woman...

Anyone download the Queen's Christmas Speech?

Climate has improved now people drive 4x4s

[evilandi]

I'll have you know that the British climate has improved dramatically since Americans started driving 10-mile-a-gallon SUVs.

It hits 100F pretty much every year nowadays.

Global warming may be turning Africa, Asia and the Mediterranean into arrid deserts, but... actually, now I come to think of it, some silver linings don't have a cloud! (Disclaimer: I'm British and drive a 4x4... albeit only a 1.3 litre, and I live next to a farm)

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[pjt33]

They're not glamourous or

sexy [extractando.com]

I'm sorry: were you trying to be sarcastic?

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Zilquis]

I'm a lady, with a ladies comment. I'm all flustered now and must sit down for tea and biscuits. I'm a lady you know

Typo in the article

[Richard W.M. Jones]

Shouldn't that be "London leads the world in TV downloads"?

Rich.

Re:Women?

[phusg]

>> The UK is known for many things, great food, a wonderful climate and beautiful women.

> Don't forget the excellent beer!

Exactly, this is what makes the food, climate and women so great in the first place!!!

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the writers of The Simpsons do.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[ThaReetLad]

:I want that comment. :But that's a funny comment. Yo don't like funny comments :Yeah, 'know :What about that comment over there? Thats informative, you like informative comments. :Yeah 'know :So i'll just go and get that informative comment :No. I want that one. :Are you sure? It is funny. :Yeah 'know :OK I'll get the funny comment

later... :I don't like funny comments.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Zilquis]

Yea but, no but, yea but, no but, yea but, no but, anyway Melanie said she saw CowboyNeal down by the bike sheds with Natalia Portman, and he was feeling er up, the dirty slag, so it coudn't have been me, so shut up

Dont know about torrents but emule links here http://www.the-realworld.de/modules.php?name=ed2k& op=Category&cid=1&csid=541 [the-realworld.de]

Re:TV Tax

[pjt33]

Are you callin' me insignificant 'cos I is black?

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[ghakko]

The original quote:

Best case

Salary from America,
house in England,
Japanese wife,
Chinese food.

Pretty good case

Salary from England,
house in America,
Chinese wife,
Japanese food.

Worst case

Salary from China,
house in Japan,
British wife,
American food.

--Bungei Shunju magazine

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:winge

[Mr_Silver]

...and for complaining about absolutely everything in a sarcastic manner.

You forgot singing about the London Underground [ic.ac.uk] too!

(warning, don't play the link on speakers if you're in an office full of easily offended people)

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[R.Caley]

In hell, the English are the chefs!

The devil has all the best food, to go with the tunes.

Re:Aaaaah, stereotypes

[Anonymous Coward]

English backpackers have a pretty lousy reputation in England, too. Fortunately, we've a long and illustrious tradition of taking our most obnoxious inhabitants and shipping them down under.

Once we called them convicts, but now they prefer the term "Travellers." (For some reason, when you -- accurately -- call the "tourists" they get all snooty. Fecking middle class tossers).

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[ayjay29]

Heven is where the police are British, the lovers French, the machanics German, the chefs Italian, and it's all organsed by the Swiss.

Hell is where the police are German, the lovers Swiss, the machanics French, the chefs British, and it's all organsed by the Italians.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Anonymous Coward]

As the comedian Billy Connolly once said, "There's no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothes."

Re:Aaaaah, stereotypes

[Malc]

And before anybody chimes in and says things have changed since 11th Sept: sorry to break it to you, but immigration has always been this way. I first visited the US 15 years ago, and welcome at the border was horrendous. It really makes you question why you're visiting and puts a bad impression on a trip before it's even begun. I haven't been to the US for 5 years since some jumped-up-abover-her-station power-tripping working-class trash with a gun decided to falsely accuse me of working illegally in the US and refused me entry to the country. I'll spend my money elsewhere thank as they've obviously got enough and the recession they've just had can't have been that bad.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[greppling]

There are some hot women, you just need to have drunk quite a lot first!!! (-;

It also seems to help if they have drunk quite a lot first...

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[doktorjayd]

American wife

.. Now he warns me....

Hardly Surpising, Ye Landlubbers

[mynameismonkey]

I mean come on, we practically wrote the book on piracy. Black Bart, Blackbeard, Chris Condent, Calico Jack, Henry Morgan [wikipedia.org] for chrissakes. Hell you could add Francis Drake to the list, the Spanish wouldn't argue.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[dcarey]

Heven is where the police are British, the lovers French, the machanics German, the chefs Italian, and it's all organsed by the Swiss.

Hell is where the police are German, the lovers Swiss, the machanics French, the chefs British, and it's all organsed by the Italians.

We hereby note that the latter arguement should be changed to: Hell is where the police are German, the lovers Swiss, the machanics French, the chefs British, the spellers Slashdot readers, and it's all organsed by the Italians

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[albino eatpod]

We've had running water for 10 years, AND we invented the cat.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[aslate]

And it will be perfectly on-topic too, a torrent to download a UK TV show (However, it will be so the Americans can download it).

Wow, they're further along than I thought

[mwood]

Those clever Brit.s have figured out how to download televisions? I still have to lug them home physically.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[QMO]

The Welsh, long known for their insularity, didn't tell the atlas publishers where Wales has been moved to, so the atlases will keep showing Wales where it always was.

It's all a big conspiracy.

You probably believe in North Dakota, too.

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[pla]

If only we could produce hotties like Madeleine Albright, Condaleeza Rice, and Barbara Bush.

Well, you do have Margaret Thatcher...

Not to mention the whole royal family... ;-)

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[buttersnout]

Interesting. Then I shall claim Britain is full of women who are ugly when they are naked. You can try to prove me wrong if you want in the same manner as above

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[batemanm]

- only need to hop across the channel to experience the french

Ahh there is always a down side :-)

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Loco3KGT]

5 out of 59 million ain't bad!

Re:Hold it right there Dr. Smith...

[Colonel Cholling]

Ask the Welsh if they're British.

Better yet, ask them that in Welsh. They'll probably ask you to repeat it in English.

Re:more numbers...

[ConceptJunkie]

Whadaya expect from a country that has FOUR channels?!

We Americans lead the world in quantities of cheap, mindless TV. We are the envy of the world! And half of it is copied from British TV in the first place.

You Forgot

[Anonymous Coward]

Hell is where the police are German, the lovers Swiss, the machanics French, the chefs British, and it's all organsed by the Italians.

And occupied by the Americans!

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Anonymous Coward]

Well done.

Pass the fish, chips and ale, faggot. ;)

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[gowen]

we'll be able to see the missing chunk of the island for ourselves.

You won't. The Welsh have got a lloaking device. (OK, that seemed funnier in my head, and only the if you know how to pronounce the letter ll in Welsh [and yes, that is one letter]).

Re:Malfunction, Will Robinson!

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

I wish I had something against posh totty!