The BBC used to be revered as the pinnacle of (inter)national audio visual broadcasting.
So I'm told, anyway. As a proud Brit, it's possible I'm inclined to accept that with less resistance. I think there's a danger that things with a history of reverence can tend to free wheel to mediocrity.
Someone once pointed out to me that Sony was a good brand - past tense.
I had been inclined towards a product on the basis that Sony had a good name, and I forget who it was, but the individual alerted me to the fact that I would be buying a name based on its history - not necessarily folly - and that recent (at the time) reviews of Sony products alleged that their product quality had diminished.
So, the BBC: The figurehead of British broadcasting. Publicly funded to passively resist commercialisation and to promote quality programming - such is my understanding.
I can't remember a time when no one complained about paying their licence fee. It's TV tax, and taxes are reluctantly tolerated necessary evils. Bitching about taxes is a British pastime. It's an international pastime too, I know...but it's something the Brits are still genuinely world class at. I understand that nothing gets cheaper. Even when opposition political parties are promising tax reductions, it's just figure juggling. Did you ever actually feel better off as the result of a political power shift? So, the licence fee has become more expensive over time, and that doesn't surprise me. But to my mind the quality of BBC1 programming has diminished over time, representing an exponential decrease in value for money. It's all news, dancing, doctors, rubbish sports, and selling family heirlooms for buttons. Last year and for the previous five or six years it was how to buy and sell houses, and cricket players dancing...on ice! (insert squiggly face emoticon here). It's crap...all of it.
OK, I'll give a little:
Life on mars was awesome.
Hustle was excellent.
Doctor Who is better than it's been for...well, ever.
There'll be other stuff too of course, but I only know what I know. Day time TV is suicidally bad, and most of the evening stuff is too.
This is BBC1!
The oneth!
It's not a league table, I know, but as my buddy (Eh, buddy!) JJ put it, it's so bad it should be relegated. Yes guy!
So we don't get McDonald's or Coca cola ads every 15 minutes..true. But is it commercial free? Is it buttocks. Between most programmes and, indeed, on a fair few programmes, we get BBC propaganda boasting of its own benevolent excellence.
Eastenders - Everyone's talking about it. Really?...Really everyone? And what about it? How good it is? Are you sure?
News 24 - international news with on-the-spot reporters for timely, unbiased and accurate feedback. Celebrity come dancing results are not fucking international news!
Celebrity come dancing has leaked on to everything. It's on Breakfast, it's on the One show (a hideous, hideous programme despite Adrian Chiles' (arguably the best thing about the BBC currently) best efforts), it's on Something for the weekend, it's on between programmes, it's got midweek update programmes. I could easily conceive of an hour long Eastenders entirely dedicated to Dot Cotton and Peggy Mitchell discussing their favourite celebrity in a come dancing special. (Dammit!...I talked about it.)
How do you solve a problem like Maria?...on TV? Really? We're not watching the show, we're watching the auditions! That's the boring stuff before the actual stuff...and we're paying for it! That in turn 'evolves' into a failure show...it transpires that were more interested in the losers than the winners after all. What exactly was the problem anyway? What was the problem that didn't already have a centuries old solution?
The Apprentice?! It's a job interview! On TV! A belligerent yob selects his favourite imbecile from a bumbling of incompetents.
Dragon's Den - I liked this for a while, but I realised it had become an insult fest. Surely the concept here was to encourage the inspired and the inventive to tout their products and ideas to successful business men and women in the hope that they could net the emotional and financial backing required to nurture it to success. When I see (I resist using 'watch') the show now, I witness ridicule and persecution. It's bullying....broadcast by the BBC. This is the same BBC which condemns bullying on shows like Breakfast, Newsround and Grange Hill (RIP). In its favour I suppose I could concede that programmes like this will encourage the motivated to go it alone rather than suffer public humiliation at the hands of self-indulged elitists. I can only hope that it will evolve itself out of existence....or (dare I?) that someone with scruples and integrity gets a grip on it, if it's not already too late.
So, this has turned into a more general rant than originally intended. I can't entirely remember my original point.
Basically, my solution is this: Make it commercial and kill the TV licence.
There is nothing to lose. We will not have more commercials than we do currently, and honestly, I don't think the programming quality has a great deal to lose either.
At the very least, I can stop bitching about it.
Jordy's world commentary
The articles contained here will be a combination of observation, satire and sheer fiction. None of this content should be considered representitive of my core principles or beliefs, and none of it will ever be intended to offend, but deception, parody and crudity will be in evidence. Should you find yourself taking offence, you must exercise your right to seek entertainment elsewhere.
Sunday, 16 August 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)