The BBC

[Mr Jinx]

BBC had first refusal on the All Creatures Great And Small reboot being shown on C5, Decided to turn it down because they said they need to appeal to a younger audience, Now the audience figures are out and it pulled in 3.9m viewers, Quite a big coup for C5. The BBC just don't get it, If they're trying for the mainly under 40's viewer then they'll lose out as most under that age group don't watch TV in the way older viewers do, They stream and look on their phones/iPads.

Oh to be a fly on the wall in that meeting:

BBC to writers: "Sorry, we can't run with it, there's no BAME or LBGT characters".
Writers to BCC: "Err...This is rural Yorkshire in the 1930s".
BBC to writers: "I know, but can't you just write some in somehow?".
Writers to BBC: "Err...This is rural Yorkshire in the 1930s. Any suggestions?"....

 

[tavyred]

Not BBC, but media related.
Sky ‘Views’ running a story about U.K. manufacturers selling riot gear to US law enforcement as if its some sort of a revelation and a negative thing to be doing.
Hands across the sea when it comes to Comcast’s liberal agenda it would appear. Hurry up with a new channel Sir Rupert, it’s getting silly over here.

 

[Mr Jinx]

Not BBC, but media related.
Sky ‘Views’ running a story about U.K. manufacturers selling riot gear to US law enforcement as if its some sort of a revelation and a negative thing to be doing.
Hands across the sea when it comes to Comcast’s liberal agenda it would appear. Hurry up with a new channel Sir Rupert, it’s getting silly over here.

Indeed. Sky and its News now going the way of CNN, sadly. First they came for Le Tissier....

I will now relish their sacking Chez Jinx and, like many, eagerly await this new Channel.

 

[Stuffy]

The ongoing culture war just got serious.
Looks like Paul Dacre is bagging the Ofcom job and Charles Moore is getting the BBC chairman gig.
Both have espoused anti BBC sentiments in the past.
Sounds reasonable to me.

Nothing new Mr T..

How Labour Has Packed Quangos Including the BBC & Ofcom for Decades

The revelation in The Sunday Times that Boris wants to appoint Charles Moore as BBC Chairman and Paul Dacre to run the media regulator Ofcom, prompted

order-order.com

 

[DB9]

For me i am so torn with the BBC, I'm not into this biased thing, I tend not to watch the news, I just pick up snippets online, On respectable news outlets but like Jason i would subscribe to it because i do think it has a future, My main gripe is purely from a programming point of view, Their now obsession to appeal to an audience who quite frankly don't watch TV like they use to while ignoring the older viewers who do is so wrong, Ok in time the older ones will shuffle off but until then the BBC have a duty to cater for them. Also the amount of repeats on a daily basis is horrendous, You can go through from after Breakfast til early evening and only watch repeats except for the news and that is both BBC1 & 2.

I accept that the main, popular sports are out of their financial reach and they do as best they can with what is left to bid for. Also pay, You have to have decent presenters on programmes and they can command decent fees, Just like sports people, They also have agents who negociate and can get much more by working on other channels, Not that we have to be grateful they work on the BBC its just a fact.

Finally i do believe they have a duty to keep their views, Political or otherwise to themselves because the BBC is a public service broadcaster but i don't know if their contracts or a BBC rule has been updated to include social media, That could be used if anyone was sacked and took them to a tribunial. (Not sure so can't be 100% about it)

 

[Jason H]

As I've said before, the BBC news bias is more a case of semantics and what/how they report. Note how the announcement of President Trump catching Covid was treated almost with glee and a long piece about how he downplayed it (at least they didn't repeat the lie about him telling people to drink bleach). Much of it was likely true, although it should be noted that when at the outset Trump banned flights from China there was a major critic of this action saying it was absurd to do so and basically downplaying the virus. His name? "Diamond" Joe Biden.

Anyway, I digress. While I very rarely watch the BBC these days as I find most of its output not to my taste, I couldn't do without it particularly for the following reasons:

The trio of quizzes as noted before
TMS
Their coverage of live sport (what there is of it these days)
County Cricket
BBC4 on Friday nights
BBC Parliament (I know)
The BBC's election coverage
The BBC website

I used to listen to 6 Music during the day at work but gave up when they changed the daytime line-up, particularly binning Gideon Coe off to a night slot. I'd keep that too, though.

I agree very much with DB9 about the BBC's attempts to shift its target demographic and how counter-productive it is. My daughter (13 next month - where does the time go?) doesn't watch much "traditional" TV at all these days aside from a borderline obsession with "RuPaul's Drag Race" on Netflix - she mostly watches YouTube and live streams of people (mainly Minecraft players) on Twitch. I'm sure she's not alone in her generation, so the BBC should pretty much forget about her demographic and go after those who still DO watch TV i.e. fogeys of indeterminate age.

The recent example discussed on here is Question of Sport. I grew up absolutely LOVING this show when David Coleman was in the chair with Bill Beaumont and Emlyn Hughes, then Ian Botham, as captains. It was fun but very desk-based and a real test of sporting knowledge, and had ridiculously high ratings (admittedly at a time when there were 3-4 TV channels and no Internet). I lost interest when it started to become more "wacky" in recent years, and now they're looking at changing the format to appeal to a younger audience. The thing is, when I liked it I WAS their younger audience. I didn't need people being all silly and wacky to watch it.

 

[Mr Jinx]

I used to listen to 6 Music during the day at work but gave up when they changed the daytime line-up, particularly binning Gideon Coe off to a night slot. I'd keep that too, though.

Lockdown pretty much introduced me to R6 and at the start it was a complete love affair. But after listening to it every day I became aware that they play the same 20 songs pretty much in rotation all day long. I mean how many times can you play Idles 'Model Village' in an afternoon? 3 times apparently.

As renegade as it may come across at first, at the end of the day it is just part of the Beeb regime and is tied in with its obsession with playlists. Now I can barely listen to it. That said, after working hours, they do play rarer stuff. Don Letts & Mark Riley being particular favourites of mine.

 

[fred binneys head]

I’m a huge fan of 6 Music, I love Mark Ratcliffe and Stuart Maconie but Shaun Keaveney is the best DJ ever to be on the radio, maybe joint with Mark & Lard when they were on Radio 1.

 

[DB9]

I’m a huge fan of 6 Music, I love Mark Ratcliffe and Stuart Maconie but Shaun Keaveney is the best DJ ever to be on the radio, maybe joint with Mark & Lard when they were on Radio 1.

They were the best thing on the station, After they left i knew my time was up with R1. "No neeeeeed" "£5"

 

[Spoonz Red E]

6 music.
7am to 1pm on Sundays.
Radcliffe & Maconie followed by Cerys Matthews.
Great stuff.