James Murdoch Criticizes BBC For Providing "Free News" 703
Hugh Pickens writes "News Corporation's James Murdoch says that a 'dominant' BBC threatens independent journalism in the UK and that free news on the web provided by the BBC made it 'incredibly difficult' for private news organizations to ask people to pay for their news. 'It is essential for the future of independent digital journalism that a fair price can be charged for news to people who value it,' says Murdoch. 'The expansion of state-sponsored journalism is a threat to the plurality and independence of news provision.' In common with the public broadcasting organizations of many other European countries, the BBC is funded by a television license fee charged to all households owning a television capable of receiving broadcasts. Murdoch's News Corporation, one of the world's largest media conglomerates, owns the Times, the Sunday Times and Sun newspapers and pay TV provider BSkyB in the UK and the New York Post, Wall Street Journal, and Fox News TV in the US." Note that James Murdoch is the son of Rupert Murdoch.
Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
That is what is threatening the plurality and independence of news. Sounds to me like the guy doesn't want plurality, he just doesn't want competition.
The fact is that the BBC is known for its objectivity. I know a lot of American who only get their news from there because they regard the American press as either too liberal or too conservative. (Or more often than not, too sensationalistic or too "fluffy.")
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Funny)
"One of the world's largest" is actually number two, according to Wikipedia, behind Disney. So now we know what his real target is. The Mouse.
Please don't tell me that! (Score:5, Funny)
Don't tell me it's News Corp. vs. Disney -- I won't know who to root against. I mean, that's like the media conglomerate edition of Alien vs. Predator!
Re:Please don't tell me that! (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Disney's the largest media conglomerate just by sheer company size, not necessarily as a measure of its control of news media--- Disney makes a bunch of money from movies, cruises, and theme parks as well.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm surprised the BBC gives-away free news on the web. They block their radio and television programs from being seen by anyone who has not paid a TV/radio license (UK citizens), so I would expect them to do the same for text. (shrug)
It's only advertising-free in the UK, just like their TV channels. (Though to be fair, their web ads are at least reasonably discreet; the ones on BBC World News - which I've watched a fair bit of over the years as I've been traveling - are much more annoying.)
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
An awful lot of BBC generated content on the radio is NOT repeat NOT blocked from internet users outside the UK. I listen to Radio 5 a lot. There are many text's & email from listeners all over the world.
The main exceptions are where they don't own the worldwide broadcast rights. Eg PRemiership Footie. Even part of that is broadcast worldwide via the BBC World Service.
The recent Cricket Test series between England & Australia was broadcast worldwide. TMS ( Test Match Special) is very proud of its Worldwide audience not just its listeners in the UK and Oz.
Perhaps you should check your facts?
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You also don't need a license to listen to BBC radio. The license fee applies to people using TV receivers. You can stop paying the license fee and continue listening to the radio without fear of consequences and in good conscience.
I knew as soon as the Murdoch junta declared their intent to charge for internet news that the BBC would be attacked in the near future.
Every time I hear those people crying for the end of the license fee, I see the world dominated by those rich media oligarchs like Murdoch and h
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That just proves how out of touch with reality America is.
How can you have a "World" series when only one country from the "World" competes.
Because it was named after the company that sponsored it.. The "World" newspaper, as far as I remember. It could just as easily have been the times series or the enquirer series or any other paper you care to mention.
And America wonders why people hate it so much.
We don't hate.. We just point and laugh.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Informative)
Because it was named after the company that sponsored it.. The "World" newspaper, as far as I remember. It could just as easily have been the times series or the enquirer series or any other paper you care to mention.
Not so - see http://www.snopes.com/business/names/worldseries.asp [snopes.com]
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Funny)
Just like the "Miss Universe" only has females from one species on one planet.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Interesting)
Though, to be fair, the News Corporation is at least an order of magnitude more evil.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
For free NOAA/National Weather Service forecasts for your ZIP code (USA only) go to weather.gov [weather.gov], input your city and state.
Then, at that next page, input your ZIP code.
Save the URL of the resulting page with the forecast for your ZIP code.
This will make EX-Senator Santorum weep bitter, bitter tears.
And you'll get, essentially, the same forecast you'd get from the local media. After all, the NWS is where they get their weather info from.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Funny)
And you'll get, essentially, the same forecast you'd get from the local media. After all, the NWS is where they get their weather info from.
WRONG My local ABC/CBS/NBC/FOX affiliates all employ highly trained meteorologists who more often than not have won many prestigious awards and have access to the latest ACU-DOPLER 4000 weather satellites/radar nodes/whirlybirds.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
And yet they still try to tell me it wasn't supposed to rain last night...
Seriously, the vast majority of the time the convienence of not going to some crappy site and being bogged down by a corporate nightmare of a website, or having to wait for the weather on the TV, greatly makes up for whatever limited insight meteorologists can possibly add.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Being British, I didn't know about this. Did they try and lock down taxpayer funded weather data so they could sell it to the people who had already paid for it?
Each day I find it harder to see the line between 'business' and 'racketeering'
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
Each day I find it harder to see the line between 'business' and 'racketeering'
It's easy to remember - 'business' is government approved.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Informative)
It wasn't just the forecasts that Santorum and crew wanted to lock down. It was *all* of the weather data that is available for free. WSR-88D Radar images, atmospheric modelling outputs, watches & warnings, high resolution satellite images, and quite a bit more. Accuweather wanted everything that is available on both the EMWIN and the NOAAPORT networks to be encrypted and unavailable to anyone who didn't want to pay a bunch of money to Accuweather.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
In addition, it's ad-free. NOAA and the NWS are some of the unsung heroes of government organizations. There, you can actually see your tax dollars at work. If you're giving Accuweather or Weather.com your clicks, you're giving them free money for not doing much of anything.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
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NOAA forecasts are not available to non-U.S. citizens (or if they are available, have no value way over in Europe).
A. That's just not true, and B. do you have any idea how much information on, well, pretty much everything the U.S. government gives away for free, whether you live here or not? Bash America if you like, but get your goddamn facts straight. Oh, and while you're at it turn off your GPS receiver: that system was paid for by U.S. taxpayers and you really shouldn't be using it, you know. Wouldn't be right and all, since you didn't pay a single Euro for it.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Funny)
Now, that's something you didn't see on the BBC.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
What about when CBS rigged cars to explode when they slammed into a wall, and then used that story to convince viewers "to call your Senators and Congressmen to ask for tougher safety laws". Fake news indeed.
And then there's John Stossel over at ABC who admitted his corporate overlords routinely censor his pro-small government stories saying, "We can't risk angering the Congress." That video, in case you want to watch it, is on youtube. Keywords - Freedom Watch John Stossel
Fake news indeed. Bias evident.
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Oh I forgot NBC. They did a story about rollover-prone SUVs on Dateline, but some sharp-eyed viewers noticed that the SUVs were *pushed over* by a machine under the vehicle.
If you believe FOX News is the only channel that lies, then you are easily duped.
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If you make zero effort to distinguish faux news from a rigged demonstration, I sincerely hope you aren't investing in any technology IPOs.
Microsoft provided a rigged demonstration of the interdependence of Windows and IE on videotape to the U.S. supreme court. There's what the profit motive gets you.
Neither does a padded resume doesn't render a prospective hire incompetent. In fact, we're often judged negatively for failing to put the best face forward, even if the best face involves creative omission, a
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
Seeing as I live a third of a world away from the UK, I wouldn't be listening to and reading BBC coverage if it wasn't good. Admittedly it covers very little of the local issues, but I don't expect them to do so.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Informative)
No, they sued and won for the right to fire employees for refusing to lie to you.
No. The implications of that case were much more broad. Not only did they permit them to fire them -- but it was then, under judgement, supporting the matter that the news is 'merely' (lol) entertainment and that the information need not be factual by any means.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
No, they sued and won for the right to fire employees for refusing to lie to you.
A distinction without a difference. It's an uncontested matter of court record that they ordered the producers to knowingly include false information in a news documentary. By prevailing in the law suit, they have established their right to do so again. Do you think they have discontinued the practice after getting a favorable court ruling?
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think anyone's arguing that News Corp. was wrong as a matter of law--- it may indeed have been legal for them to fire an employee for refusing to including knowingly false information in a news broadcast. But it does mean that, as a matter of credibility, News Corp. is now on the record standing up for this right to knowingly provide false information in its news broadcasts. Do you really want to get your news from a news company that is willing to go to court to defend its right to lie?
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Interesting)
It is not a loophole. There is just something that people assume would be illegal that is not.
You may put News Corp. in a different category than The Onion, but that is your problem.
The employer told the employee to do something completely legal. The employee refused. The employer fired the employee. Whistleblower protections do not apply - there was no whistle to be blown.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
1) In our country a judge is not required to make a ruling solely based upon laws that are on the books.
2) Whistleblower protections also include "threats to the public interest" - which is certainly true in this case.
You, and obviously many judges, forget the purpose of a justice system. The purpose is to meter out justice, not blindly follow a fucking rulebook.
seeing the lies (Score:3, Funny)
That's fairly easy to see on the mainstream new world order bilderberger news. Government press official being quoted..odds on to be lying, that would be anyone in the executive branch. It gets accepted as gospel and repuked back at you by the newsies, no matter how completely improbable or out to lunch sounding.
In the legislative branch, elected reps and so on, odds are..clueless and just drunkenly mumbling stuff they have no idea about whatsoever based on the lies some biz schmuck or lobbis
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Funny)
They are as slanted as PBS, constantly trying to explain why we need more and bigger government programs. I don't need to hear that bias. Just once I'd like to hear either the BBC or PBS present a story about why government needs to be smaller, but of course that will never happen.
It's not like they'd ever run a story [pbs.org] on Thomas Jefferson [wikipedia.org].
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
To the right-wing mind, helping people is intrusive "big government," but killing people is fine and dandy.
Hope that clears things up.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
>>>I'd trust the BBC any day of the week over "news" reported by a Murdoch mouthpiece.
I disagree. Not that I have any great love fox Murdoch, but I don't trust the BBC. They are as slanted as PBS, constantly trying to explain why we need more and bigger government programs. I don't need to hear that bias. Just once I'd like to hear either the BBC or PBS present a story about why government needs to be smaller, but of course that will never happen.
You can say what you want about the BBC but they employ people like Jeremy Paxman [youtube.com] AKA the last news man with balls. If he lived in the states he'd probably be relegated to some topical comedy show.
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Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Interesting)
With regard to competition, it appears they've committed to a scorched earth policy against all "free" news sources to make their proposed model palatable. It'll be interesting to see the message crafted against PBS+NPR. Even though it is a subscription model at the core, the attack vector will most likely still revolve around the concept of "freeloaders".
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No, not in the UK it isn't. That's absolutely nothing like a "fact". The BBC's long been criticized for having a a pro-Labour party bias, as well as a few other biases. It does have also a virtual monopoly on UK broadcasting, with very little to challenge its practices.
Murdoch is correct in some ways. He's obviously saying it for his own nefarious ends. And the large percentage of the UK media his company owns is also a very big part of the problem
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
This.
Don't trust the BBC to be impartial, fair or balanced, because it is none of these things. Everything it broadcasts reflects the viewpoint of the British Establishment. I trust it to provide me with weather reports, and that's about it. I resent having to pay for it.
Biased BBC [blogspot.com] has the definitive guide.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
That blog is definitive, in a sense. In that it accurately represents the fact that those who believe the BBC is systematically biased are right-wing nutjobs
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No, not in the UK it isn't. That's absolutely nothing like a "fact". The BBC's long been criticized for having a a pro-Labour party bias
They labeled you a troll because "they can't handle the truth". Every organization is biased in some respect. Just follow the money back to the source.
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So the BBC is biased towards the British people who pay the licence fee?
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If the BBC really provides value for money, then why doesn't it move to a subscription model, so that people can pay for it if they want? There are subscription channels on satellite and digital terrestrial TV. If you don't pay, you don't get them.
Clearly, if most Brits love the BBC, they won't mind "opting in" and paying for BBC channels.
On the other hand, if most Brits would rather not pay for the BBC, then that rather calls the whole "licence fee" thing into question, does it not?
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
If most Brits didn't like the license fee, it would be a major issue. The Telegraph has spent the last thirty years trying to push for the BBC to be privatized, and it's never had any traction, not even during the height of Thatcher's power. If Thatcher wouldn't kill the BBC, then it's pretty damn clear there's no public will, just evil lying bastards like Murdoch who doesn't want any outside agency showing just how immoral and unethical his news is.
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Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
Technically, the BBC is neither government owned nor taxpayer funded. Of course, by law if you operate any equipment capable of receiving broadcast material you have to pay the license fee, but the government doesn't handle or distribute the funding. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bbc#Governance [wikipedia.org]
As an interesting aside, you can use the BBC iPlayer to watch previously shown material without a license, but you can't watch the live stream without one. As long as you watch everything an hour later you're good.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
Would that be fair?
Depends on whether you subscribe to the Reaganite doctrine that a government should not be allowed to do anything that a capitalist middle-man could make a profit on.
Beyond that, I'm having a bit of trouble working up any sympathy for a guy who's complaining that a public service is making it hard for him to charge people for the lies he tells them.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Informative)
Define 'long run'. The BBC has been around for 87 years, if it's going to turn into a instrument for government propaganda, it's taking its time.
Are you American by any chance? They seem to be paranoid about the government doing anything at all, so I'm not sure whether to take them seriously or not.
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Um...really?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_the_BBC [wikipedia.org]
NOTE: For the record, I think FOX News is shit and Murdoch should be hung by his balls...but let's not pretend that the BBC is some bastion of fairness and impartiality.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
I know a lot of American who only get their news from there because they regard the American press as either too liberal or too conservative. (Or more often than not, too sensationalistic or too "fluffy.")
As an American myself, I'd say that much of our news is all of the above, but I could accept that. The problem is, it's more often inaccurate, misleading or simply outright fabrication. Note that the press in this country was given special consideration under our Constitution, the supreme law of our land, so that we could make informed choices about who we select as our leaders. Unfortunately for us, the press has largely abrogated that responsibility in favor of crass money-grubbing and political pandering. And that has gone hand-in-hand with the rapid expansion of our various governmental bodies and ongoing loss of civil liberties.
... mostly for impartial reporting on the political affairs of my own country. That pisses me off as well. Oh, not at the BBC, but at the news organizations in the U.S. who seem to believe that it is now their job to provide PR for the big boys, and in the process mold public opinion. I do not want my opinion molded, and I think that any reporter who fraudulently expresses his personal opinions and biases as fact without disclaimer should be given free room and board by the State for a while.
... they're disinforming us and yes, Mr. Murdoch, you're at the forefront of that particular movement. Furthermore, any claims you have about the quality and impartiality of BBC reporting sound like they are: more lies. The BBC does a fine job and most of its counterparts in your organization could learn a few things from them. The Brits already pay for the privilege of having the BBC so it's hardly free, and in any event, they're better off without having you anywhere in the picture.
Had the free press done its job as the Founders intended it to do, we wouldn't be having this discussion. At least we still can (have discussions like this, I mean) but it's by no means guaranteed that that will always be so. In any event, I do hit the BBC for a lot of information
At this point, I'm inclined to think that if the press isn't going to do their jobs right, they shouldn't be given any special privileges. They're no longer informing us
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Which is why the BBC has been at the forefront of reporting the MP expense scandal in Britain, which has certainly done far more damage to Labour than to the Conservatives.
I'm not saying the BBC is perfect, but as new sources goes, it's probably up there as being one of the most reliable in the world. Look at the demonstrations in Iran. Without the BBC's Farsi division, the extent of our knowledge of what happened after the election would be far less.
Besides, even if there is some bias in the BBC, it's no
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
I get really tired of people claiming that Not Spouting Right-Wing Garbage = Left-Wing Propaganda.
More politely: Lack of a bias in favour of X does not necessarily equate a bias in favour of some (real or imagined) opposite of X.
In nearly every country I've been in (excepting the US), the Beeb has a much better reputation for objectivity and believability than any US network, including CNN. The reason? It's not beholden to corporate interests or the political biases of an owner.
Warning: "To push politically-correct left-wing viewpoints" is code for "refusing to endorse right-wing/corporatist viewpoints".
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Paranoid much? "Left" seems to be a swear word among people who want to replace Western civilized liberalism with some feudal conservative hatemongering more prevalent in the Mid-eastern countries the same hatemongerers pretend to attack. When in reality right-wingers just don't want a mirror...
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"American style government" != "Western style government", though it is certainly a subset, and rooted in largely the same philosophy.
Americans didn't invent neither republicanism, nor democracy, nor rule of law, nor individual rights, nor "no taxation without representation". And all the processes that have ultimately resulted in Democratic West as it is today have started, and yielded results, long before 1776, and on a different continent.
In particular, see Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth [wikipedia.org], and Dutch Repub [wikipedia.org]
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Funny)
Isn't it funny how 90% of Americans are "far left of center" according to Fox News Viewer? That crazy majority of rational people are just the "far far left"... I guess that could happen but for some reason I doubt it. Of course we'll all be sorry when the proof comes out that Iraq perpetrated 9-11 and that Obama is going to kill our grandmothers.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh please. The BBC is hardly impartial. It's been accused (with evidence) of being pro-Palestinian and well as anti-Israel. It's not neutral. Is the BBC as a concept wonderful? Yeah. Is it objective? No.
Yeah, well plenty of other people have accused it of being pro-Israeli [google.co.uk], so go figure.
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Threatening plurality? (Score:5, Interesting)
Symmetry (Score:5, Insightful)
That's OK, I criticize James Murdoch's News Corporation for providing false news.
I know which I would rather not be accused of.
As a company (Score:5, Insightful)
As it is, I think the Murdochs are just upset that a REAL news group keeps them from controlling the news. They want power. If there were anything else I could say to make this a stronger condemnation of News Corp, I would. They are really that bad. They are the evilness that Microsoft only aspires to.
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Ultimate irony (Score:5, Insightful)
The BBC reporting on someone saying the BBC is shit.
That sort of objectivity is why they need to survive just as they are.
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That is not irony. It is simply unbiased, objective reporting.
Re:Ultimate irony (Score:5, Informative)
Irony given News Corp's attitude to reporting about themselves. When they were recently implicated in illegal phone tapping, the silence from News Corp's papers (the Sun, the News of the World et al) was deafening.
Re:Ultimate irony (Score:5, Interesting)
Former BBC director general Greg Dyke said Mr Murdoch's argument that the BBC was a "threat" to independent journalism was "fundamentally wrong".
He told BBC Radio 5 live: "Journalism is going through a very difficult time - not only in this country but every country in the world - because newspapers, radio and television in the commercial world are all having a very rough time."
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The BBC claimed that they were forced to provide DRM by the rights owners, but that
Murdoch is not an idiot... (Score:5, Informative)
I like the BBC. Murdoch's an idiot.
Rupert Murdoch may be many things. He's an entirely amoral, self-serving piece of shit who as far as I can tell has never believed in, stood for, or even demonstrated any interest in anything other than furthering his own business interests. Everything else is a means to that end. He's shown no compunction in repeatedly subverting journalistic integrity to promote his own business agenda.
The recent Silvio Berlusconi scandals were promoted by his former ally Murdoch, when Berlusconi made moves to tax Murdoch's Sky Italia satellite TV network less favourably. Yes, Berlusconi is just as bad, but that's beside the point- the fact that Murdoch can use the might of his own network to wage a partisan campaign against him is hardly A Good Thing.
It's been clear for a long time that Murdoch Sr hates the BBC because it's competition, and not because of any higher principle, regardless of what he likes to claim. Like the Berlusconi case, it's clear he's quite happy for his mouthpieces to sacrifice journalistic integrity in favour of going after his enemies.
Anyway, back to the point. Murdoch may be many things, but he's not an idiot. Quite the opposite. His one-dimensional focus and complete absence of any principles have made him an extremely shrewd businessman.
I wouldn't count him out too soon, any more than I'd finish the cancer drugs halfway through the course because the tumour hadn't been quite as aggressive this week.
Pot and kettle (Score:5, Insightful)
It isn't free (Score:5, Insightful)
Why should they pay again just because Murdoch doesn't like the competition?
Re:Government sponsered (Score:5, Informative)
Untrue. The BBC is funded solely through the license fee, sales of it's programmes abroad, and sales of other materials.
It receives no government funds. It is no more answerable to the government than any other media organisation. It pays it's taxes. It also has a unique lack of pressure from external commercial interests.
everyone that purchases a TV in Britain [has] to support the BBC, whether they actually watch it or not.
Yes, this is true. But the BBC in turn provides such an excellent benchmark that all the other FTA broadcasters in the UK have to raise their game, so it arguably has a positive effect on your viewing even if you don't watch it. Just the reduction in commercial break sizes (a maximum average of 12 minutes, versus about 18 minutes in the USA) is worth the license fee, which is very small compared to the costs of equivalent offerings.
Imagine if the USA had an equivalent, independent, federally mandated institution (PBS is federally funded and thus is not independent). It could either produce about 4 times as much content or cost half the money .. and still produce twice as much content. And that's compared to....
And that's all commercial free [bbc.co.uk] , with a mandate to inform, educate, and entertain [bbc.co.uk].
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
BBC World Service is funded by the Foreign Office, not the license fee.
The BBC is also split into many other companies, outside of the UK they are usually commercial and not funded by the license fee also.
Hey Murdoch, ask me (Score:5, Informative)
Hey Murdoch, I am a UK BBC licence fee payer and I have no problems with what the BBC is doing with my cash with regards to their news provisions, especially their excellent news Web site.
You don't like what they are doing with my cash? Tough - if you don't like it, get another job.
Yours etc..
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't know why this is Flamebait. I'm one of his countrymen. (Countrywoman in fact.)
I don't want to watch Sky TV. So I don't. I don't pay Mr Murdoch anything, and I don't get any Sky programmes. No problem.
I *also* don't want to watch BBC TV. But I still have to pay the BBC their licence tax. I still have to listen to other Brits going on about how impartial, fair and balanced the BBC is, even though I know for a fact that it isn't. I pay for the BBC to crush the competition through the power of their tax
Re:How special do you think you are? (Score:5, Insightful)
Where is my opt-out?
You don't need to own a TV. Or live in the UK. Either will work just fine for getting you out of paying the license fee.
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TV licensing shouldn't exist at all.
I disagree. I've seen the wasteland of shit that is US terrestrial TV. Even the PBS channel system is mostly very poor. CNN's OK for a while, but it persistently lacks real intellectual depth so it palls rapidly. It's not just the US either. German and Italian TV is also not good, and Polish was funny but for the wrong reasons (they had dubbed a single heavy male voice over a programme with several young women making out, which is just plain wrong and yet hilarious). Swedish TV is mostly worthy and dull, li
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I disagree. For two reasons. Firstly, the BBC has political bias. I've gone on about that at length, won't mention it again.
Secondly, the quality of BBC programmes isn't all that great. There are some gems out there, but a lot of it is just mindless mainstream dross of the sort that could quite easily be produced by any of the commercial channels. It's as if they've given up on trying to be cultured, and have just decided to compete for viewers instead. I find myself watching a lot of TV imported from the US these days - no BBC influence there - so I just don't think the licence fee is worth it.
This seems to be a common gripe in countries with strong public television. I happen to live in Finland and we have the same kind of system and the complaints are the same. Depending on which party is in the majority the public broadcasting company is accused to favor it and the mandatory tv license is often called unconstitutional, unfair, and whatnot on discussion forums. And the funny part is - our broadcasting company buys several BBC and HBO shows and there are both people who claim that the quality is
Indepdendent? (Score:3, Interesting)
OH SNAP:
Media Concentration [sourceforge.net]
Read: media without profit motive threatens the moneyed-interest propaganda monoculture. And are we seriously supposed to believe that the son of Rupert Murdoch doesn't understand that media is international these days?
"As Orwell foretold, to let the state enjoy a near-monopoly of information is to guarantee manipulation and distortion," Murdoch said, referring to George Orwell's book, "1984."
What an unbelievable fucking tool.
QOTD (Score:4, Insightful)
'It is essential for the future of independent digital journalism that a fair price can be charged for news to people who value it,' says Murdoch.
Murdoch isn't selling anything I want to pay for. Now, if the BBC charges for its content, I would give serious consideration to doing so. There -- free market in action!
Ahh Yes the Free Market (Score:5, Insightful)
What many people don't understand is that companies don't want to compete. Ideally, they want to form a monopoly and then stop innovating (because that's a cost) and raise prices (because that's profit). If they can't form a monopoly, they want to form a cartel with their main rivals. Murdoch and Son realize they can't buy the BBC, so they're taking the cartel approach whining about how they "can't compete". Actually what they're saying is, "Our plan to raise prices won't work, as long as someone doesn't. Join the news cartel, and we'll all profit."
News and Information is meant to be free (Score:5, Insightful)
The Internet is all about free access to information and news. The BBC, PBS, NPR, etc are all public organizations that give out free information anyway and usually funded by the government and donations.
News Media Corp is a private corporation and doesn't seem to get the free news and free information philosophy of the Internet. If they charge for access to news and information they will suffer for it. Then only the wealthy will be able to access it, and some of the wealthy will refuse to pay and go to free sources instead.
Also when a news or information source is pay only and private, it cannot be used for citations anymore as a professor cannot log on to verify the source because they cannot afford the fees to every pay source of news and information and usually require the student to use the sources that the college provides for peer reviewed news articles and papers.
Murdoch is shooting himself in the foot with such a move.
Re:News and Information is meant to be free (Score:5, Insightful)
He's not shooting himself in the foot, he's acting in his own self interest. Yes, it may be kind of short-term thinking, but it would be profitable if he could do what he is trying to do.
I don't know if all info is meant to be free. The Wall Street Journal charges and makes money. They are providing a specific sector with timely and well researched information. There is value in that.
But what he is missing is the fact that for most topics a newspaper, newscast, or news channel is no longer the commodity. The STORY is the commodity.
Up the BBC (Score:5, Insightful)
I find their news to be far more balanced and fair than any commercial operator I've encountered, as they're not beholden to their advertisers and contributers and rather to their audience. A perfect example being the current debate in America about socialized healthcare.
First we had reports about how the NHS was being used as an example of how socialized healthcare doesn't work, then reports on the anger this caused in the British populace (my God I was angry), then reports on the isolated incidents where the NHS has failed people.
Nowhere else have I found a more balanced and fair news outlet and I'm eternally grateful that we have our wonderful British Broadcasting Corporation.
It says a lot that James Murdoch has felt he had to attack the BBC to protect his business interests.
I wish Murdoch would quit whining (Score:3, Insightful)
Backhanded compliment (Score:4, Insightful)
If a member of the Murdoch family is criticizing you, you're probably doing something right.
Just for the record, I love the BBC and I love the NHS; nuts to anyone who thinks they're somehow evil.
Typo in summary... (Score:5, Funny)
Sorry you can't call The Sun a 'newspaper'! Seriously, a publication who's most popular story today is entitled "I had walk with a yeti on holiday [thesun.co.uk]"??
He's sorta right (Score:5, Insightful)
Good news coverage is worth paying for. Unfortunately for Murdoch, with the sole exception of the Wall Street Journal, none of his holdings produce good journalism. Because with the exception of the Journal, everything covered in his TV stations or newspapers I can find in three hundred other locations on the web, in other newspapers, or on other TV stations. Because its all reworked AP stories. Good in-depth journalism died years ago, and now all we get from 99.9999999 percent of US media sources, including Murdoch's, is cookie-cutter stories.
If Murdoch really expects me to pay, then he's going to have to improve journalism at his own holdings and give me original information I can't find anywhere else. When he can do that, I'll pay (as I do for the WSJ now). Until then, not a chance in hell.
he's actually wrong! (Score:5, Informative)
The WSJ does produce decent news, and he's busy trying to stop that, because since he's had it, its gone down hill like hell.
Seriously, some of the best quality media comes out of the independant but govt owned sources, the BBC in the UK, ABC & SBS in Australia, the CBC in Canada and so one. Because these news sources are largely empowered (not fully so CBC & SBS, but mostly) to operate without bowing down to advertisers and big corporate interests, and LARGELY the govts have backed off from interfering with their autonomy (Oh they try, but the stations tend to resist). We actually need that. In Australia the ABC have proven their govt independence by shows like 4 Corners that have always been prepared to attack the government when it behaves badly , and interestingly in ways the commercial TV stations seem reluctant to. The SBS provides foreign and experimental programming that would never be shown by the bottom-line conscious commercial shows. And at a time when commercial TV is completely debased by ridiculous reality shows and idiotic right wing "current affairs" (usually consisting of harrassing poor people for being on welfare and the like) , the ABC provides high class drama, news, documentaries and so on.
Seriously Murdoch can go fuck himself. His shitty newspapers spread hate and fear in our community with its attacks on minorities and poor people, and he's done the same in the US with the gutteral fox news service. He's got no right to complain if nobody wants to pay for his "news". Make a non shit product and people might pay for it. Its not govt money that makes the BBC popular, its the fact that the alternatives are so fucking dismal.
You can't compete with free? (Score:4, Insightful)
Murdoch concerned with news independence? LOL (Score:4, Insightful)
So the scion of the world's most notorious propagandist has the audacity to speak publicly about media policy.
If voters wish their government to do something for them, they vote for politicians that promise it, and it gets done. Those in England have voted to have a "public option" for news. Some will say that because it's "government owned" its objectivity cannot be trusted, and this is indeed a danger, just as it is a danger that privately owned media cannot be trusted, let alone under the laissez faire regulation regime that Murdoch Sr. and Jr. lobby for. Power is power, and it is not a foregone conclusion that power controlled by elected representatives is more dangerous than power controlled by corporate sponsors or the whims of billionaires.
It's reasonable that a government-run news organization could do a better job than a privately run organization. Similarly for electric power, firefighting services, courts, schools, etc. It's not guaranteed to succeed, but there is no fundamental problem with it in principle, as long as a nation has a free press (the government can say what they like, but so can everyone else).
The Murdoch's underscore the point by running some of the most servile and ludicrous propaganda instruments in mass media today. For those concerned about the difficulty of competing with the government to make news, one must simply examine reality to see how it is done. Amusingly, Murdoch himself is not always concerned with profit - he runs propaganda instruments such as the New York Post in the red simply to gain influence and push competitors out of business.
While some could make this story into a discussion about the principles of government, media and democracy, that would be elevating Murdoch's ploy far above what it is: a transparent attempt to destroy another competitor and gain even more unified control over the world's mass media. It is breathtakingly hypocritical on his part to cloak it in the rhetoric he does.
Conspiracy to raise prices (Score:3, Interesting)
A quote from Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations 1776, is the best answer on James Murdoch worry for News Corporation's $32.996 billion USD revenue:
"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."
The News ... for sale (Score:3, Insightful)
Thank you, but because they matter to me, I prefer to get my news from sources that do not consider either them or me or both as objects of profit.
I realize every news source has some agenda, so I check more than one for the really important stuff. But, you know, the thing about agendas is that they are fairly solid and if you know them, you can compensate for it. The thing about pure for-profit companies is that their agenda will change to whatever marketing says that day.
Journalism is one of the areas where we can witness, live and in colour, that the free-market ideology does not provide the optimum solution for every problem on every axis. Rather, it provides an optimum profit-maximum solution for problems along the financial axis.
In related news... (Score:5, Insightful)
Prostitutes are demanding that everybody else stop providing sex for free, as it reduces the demand for their paid services.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Talk to the hand.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Sigh (Score:5, Insightful)
Murdoch Senior had a nasty habit at kicking the BBC in a similar manner. Nice to see Junior hasn't bothered to develop his own consciousness and has merely cloned his dad's. Seriously these rants translate as little more than a vain attempt to undermine the competition with cheap rhetoric designed to increase profit and feed ignorance. I mean when Dad's worth an estimated $4 billion world domination is about the only thing left to try, and the BBC as an a mostly impartial and independent media service is obviously standing in the way.
Anyone who is in any way swayed by Murdoch Junior's argument needs to read Noam Chomsky's book Manufacturing Consent and then needs to wake up to the fact that the BBC is perhaps the one media outlet that stands in the way of the frightening picture this book paints. After all the BBC is in a different industry in that they're about providing media to their audiences and news to the public, not audiences to their advertisers and propaganda to their punters.
Re:it's not free (Score:5, Insightful)