 |
|
|
|
 |
|
 Homepage of The Media Show, Radio4's weekly look at the media. Wednesday 1.30pm. |
|
|
|
Have your say |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
Stephen Carter |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Radio Okapi |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Creative Risk and Comedy |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Comments on today's programme |
|
|
BBC Licence:
Once again the BBC Licence was described as an unavoidable and unfair tax without any analysis of the funding of ITV.The vast range of services that come from the BBC is never high-lighted and neither is that paucity of services that we get from ITV. Personally I think that Radio 4 is worth the fee alone. In the Border TV area we are losing the last of the regional stations and the autonomous TV production that has explained us to ourselves for 47 years. With it goes opportunities to enter the industry locally. Most of the industry has been sucked into the London Maw.ITV is not funded with Lottery money or sea-shells or manna from heaven. It is paid for with advertising revenue. Ads which are transmitted in ever increasing breaks of 5 to 6 minutes. Some programmes have 15 to 20 minutes of advert pollution per hour. The 7 minute per hour limit disappeared long ago thanks to the puscillanimous OFCOM.ITV per annum costs as much as the BBC for an ever decreasing and dumber service. Those costs are paid for by a purchase tax on goods which every one pays whether they have a TV or not. Now that is what I call unfair.Come on BBC. Stop taking it lying down.Fight back.
Alan Marsden, Penrith
With the veritable Pandora’s Box that can be elicited with a prospect of Channel 4 becoming an ‘Public Service Broadcaster’ I will be Devils Advocate with this proposal: Scrap the TV Licence.I for one resent having a sawn off shotgun aimed at my temple for the dubious privilege of enjoying the increasingly tawdry fare passed up by Auntie as entertainment. There is really no difference between her dross and that of Channel 4 or indeed any other TV channel. Coupled with the complete abdication to Sky Sports for coverage of e.g. the Rugby League World Cup, and what good is the licence other than to line the pockets of presenters and execs? American football and indoor cycling world cup indeed call them sports because I don’t?
Barry Cross
Ross And Brand and Comedy:
Your talking heads were totally complacent. One implied that the problem was that Andrew Sachs had not chosen to give consent. So its his fault is it?The abusive nature of the original telephone calls and the Ross/Brand byplay was compounded by the failure of the production team to deal fairly with Andrew Sachs. Their undertaking on consent were valueless and the programme was broadcast in breach of promises as well as taste.The whole thing smells of juvenile bullying. The fact that only 2 complaints were originally received was presumably due to a small as well as supine audience. If your 2 test dummies think that apathy will help their 'all good fun - look at our brave wit' approach will pass they are mistaken. Apathy rules but not to that extent. The constant comparison to the de-bunking role of "Have I got News for You" is weak. Those prctioners are far superior to Ross let alone Brand.The politicos and media folk criticised have signed up for publicity and are usually getting in the neck for hypocrisy and pretence. Your interviewees were weak but no doubt pocketted a good fee for such dullards.
John Hartman
So this telephone incident was 'just a case of not requesting permission'? Has no one on the show have any knowledge of the Telecoms Act? Quote:- 'Improper use of public electronic communications network (1) A person is guilty of an offence if he— (a) sends by means of a public electronic communications network a message or other matter that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character; or (b) causes any such message or matter to be so sent. (2) A person is guilty of an offence if, for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety to another, he— (a) sends by means of a public electronic communications network, a message that he knows to be false, (b) causes such a message to be sent; or (c) persistently makes use of a public electronic communications network. (3) A person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable, on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale, or to both'.
Gordon Thom
What your contributors failed to acknowledge is that much modern so-called comedy is simply not funny. Certainly utterly un-amusing to the main body of licence-fee-payers ie middle-aged, Middle-England. So why should we pay for it ? As to Channel 4 - it is ersatz BBC 4. Why not simply integrate the two ? We could then save on overheads - C4’s boss’s £1 million plus wages and the awful Snow person, to mention just 2.
Edward Wheatley
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Download or subscribe to this programme's podcast |
|
|
The Media Show |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Listen again |
|
|
|
Previous Programmes |
|
1 October 2008
Andy Burnham on public service broadcasting
8 October 2008
Michael Grade on ITV
15 October 2008
Future of DAB Radio
22 October 2008
Andy Duncan and Channel 4
29 October 2008
Reporting Poverty
5 November 2008
Stephen Carter
12 November 2008
Lionel Barber and the FT
19 November 2008
Dr Tanya Byron on Kids TV
26 November 2008
Manchester and the Media
3 December 2008
Twitter's role in Mumbai Attacks
10 December 2008
Shannon Matthews and media coverage
17 December 2008
BBC Partnerships and media access to family courts
24 December 2008
Bush and the press and 1968 Apollo broadcast
31 December 2008
The Moralising Media
7 January 2009
Jeremy Hunt, Gaza Reporting and New Talent
14 January 2009
Prince Harry, Gaza, Persian TV and iPlayer
21 January 2009
Ofcom's PSB Review, Ross' return and British News
28 January 2009
Sir Michael Lyons, Hutton Report and New Nation
4 February 2009
Sky, Children and Reality TV and Financial Reporting
11 February 2009
BBC Children's Services, Jade Goody and Journalists' Conscience Clause
18 February 2009
Reporting Trauma, Subeditors and Teletext
25 February 2009
Dawn Airey, Disability on TV and Facebook
4 March 2009
Media and The Miners' Strike and ITV
11 March 2009
The Editors' Codebook, "Crown Jewels" of British Sport and Viviane Reding
18 March 2009
Christopher Meyer, Metro at Ten, Phorn and Impartial Drama
25 March 2009
Future of Journalism, Obama, Radio Caroline | |
Steve Hewlett |
|
Steve Hewlett is a Guardian Columnist and broadcasting consultant. He is visiting Professor of Journalism and Broadcast policy at Salford University and a fellow of the Royal Television Society.
|
Don't miss We want to hear your experiences |
You might well not of heard of him but rest assured that what he decides will end up affecting us all pretty directly. Because, now as Lord Carter - he makes his maiden speech in the House of Lords tonight - he’s Britain’s first ever minister for Communications, Technology and Broadcasting. Taken together these industries are reckoned to employ 500,000 people and to turn over £52 billion pounds a year.
Public debate is something we probably take for granted. As are the free press and broadcasting organisations necessary to for it to flourish. But in developing countries, and especially when they are at war, those freedoms are very rarely to be found. 
Now the BBC director general Mark Thompson found himself last week having to sort of face both ways at once. On one hand seeking to reassure licence payers that “manuelgate” or “sachsgate” – depending on which newspaper you read – would not be allowed to happen again at the same time as maintaining that the BBC’s appetite for creative risk-taking remained as strong as ever. 
