Post here all non technical related topics about Formula One. This includes race results, discussions, testing analysis etc. TV coverage and other personal questions should be in Off topic chat.
munudeges wrote:There's nothing in the Concorde agreement that specifically mandates free-to-air, but the commercial interests of sponsorship and advertising in the sport demand viewership. I don't see how that's ever going to change.
I have not got a source but I remember hearing quite a while ago that F1 has to appear on a certain amount of free-to-air TV to ensure as wide as possible exposure for the sponsors. Going to just pay-to-view makes no sense at all.
If anyone has a copy or a link to the Concorde Agreement I would be interested in having a look at it.
It does say that but it says something along the lines of 'where possible'. So I guess if SKY where the only serious bidders then I guess it would just go to Sky. It doesn't really matter what it says in the concorde agreement if free-to-air channels are saying they can't afford it.
F1 will die on pay-per-view. A1GP anyone?
I recently cancelled my SKY tv subscription because the price had been hiked up so much, and I barely watched it. I was on the base package as well, which still came in at over £20 a month. Try to include sports in there and it shoots up to £30-40 a month, crazy prices. What made it look even more silly was I immediatly bought a Freesat box and I'm now getting all the HD channels, for free!
One thing is for sure, the world will be a better place without Rupert Murdoch in it.
Ps- How can the BBC be low on cash, what the hell are they doing with all that TV licence money!?
Perhaps this is a round the houses way of judging public opinion?
I for one think that the NEW BBC coverage is exemplary, and frankly worth the license fee.
Perhaps I am biassed, but for all the, generally Tory nockers of the Beeb, I think it's bloody good value. My littelun would agree with me on that. She gets morning to night Cbeebies, and if she's up late she gets Gavin and Stacey too (which wierdly she loves).
Personally, I love the i-player ad bbc news websites too. Each of these is enough to justify the license fee. I could wish that they weren't flogging white city to be more "relevant" to the north. What about being relevant to "the south"?
I don't know the stats, but I reckon more people in the UK live south of Birmingham than live north of it? We've been flooded with people with "regional" accents on the BBC news for some time, so I guess it's been a work in progress?
A plea to the beeb, keep F1. For me it's one of your strongest defenses against the pro murdoch brigade, and we NEED your impartiality over the coming years.
The answer to the ultimate question, of life, the Universe and ... Everything?
I for one think BBC contribution to F1 coverage is utterly appalling, a bizarre combination of children's TV and care in the community gone wrong. That producers forced an unwilling populace to endure Legard for two long grim years reveals everything about their lack of competence, and arrogant contempt for their viewership and its wishes.
We can tell BBC apologists don't actually believe their "bloody good value" received-wisdom party-line that they spin, their actions always betray them, if they genuinely believed it to be such a compelling and overwhelmingly obvious value proposition they would not have to rely on compulsion and the full violence of the state in order to finance it.
Instead, they would offer it as a choice in the market, if as they insist its value is outstanding, it would prosper. The fact they fear the choice, proves they do not believe the value is legitimate, and must instead be enforced by coercion.
Products of such supposed value and virtue do not resort to harassing, bullying, and imprisoning the market for non-compliance.
Good products have willing customers, not detector vans and a database-state.
It is not really relevant whether you, despite all evidence to the contrary, believe BBC to be impartial. What is impartial anyway? You really think that there is an inarguable and universally legitimate middle-line that can be navigated and applied on all issues, and that BBC editors have unique access to this line and without fail steadfastly and reliably navigate it ... really?
I am sure that Guardian and Independent readers believe their paper to be impartial and honest, just as I am sure Daily Mail and Daily Express readers consider theirs impartial and honest, apart from a vibrant and glorious expression of unfettered diversity and free-choice, that is neither here nor there ... the point is that you are not compelled by law to purchase the Daily Mail before being allowed access to any other source of news media. Were that the case, how would you enjoy that?
Can you even begin to imagine such an illiberal and authoritarian imposition being retrospectively introduced to the free-press ... but apparently it somehow becomes virtuous and to be celebrated when applied to television.
You can already bet the early rumblings of an "Internet License" are in the works as mass-media transitions from TV broadcast to TCP/IP packet. A BBC firewall in every ISP.
The billions and billions and billions of pounds that annually flood into BBC distort and weaken the diversity and innovation of broadcast and internet media in this country. It is a bloated, inefficient, wasteful, sprawling monopoly which, due to the way it is funded, destroys competition and suppresses start-ups.
Were such a greedily overarching monopoly controlled by Berlusconi, by Microsoft, or by Murdoch, BBC apologists would be outraged ... their hypocrisy on this matter, just because BBC editorial and commissioning policy happens to roughly coincide with their own generally statist world-view is appalling and indefensible.
It is nothing more than greedy selfishness ... those that personally enjoy the output from BBC, but do not wish to pay fair value price for that service, instead demand that others are forced against their will to contribute to fund that service and subsidise their own narrow tastes. It is unfair and indefensible.
... and it is clearly just BBC, not the BBC, a wilful misappropriation of the unique determiner as insidious strategy; to subtly and deliberately entwine the corporation into the national consciousness as if it it somehow couldn't ever not be there. What other ungainly bloated state-corporations help themselves to a 'the'.
Let's all hope BBC do forego F1, if as is claimed here it is an important contributor to demographic diversity, then axing it will further weaken it's false claim to legitimacy, and help hasten the long overdue demise of an archaic, unrepresentative and outmoded institution.
Big sporting event so lets chuck as many people and as much money at it as possible, and then 2 years later it's "oh crap we can't afford it". They should fire their accountant or whoever does their budget as they clearly have no concept of forward planning!
They do not need 3 pundits wittering sheer rubbish for an hour at the start of the race. I find this section virtually unwatchable as I start to have violent thoughts towards Eddie Jordan involving his head and a fridge door (anyone who has watched Bottom will knowwhat I mean). I would agree with Feynman is a tit.
BBC currently has a coverage team comprising of 6 or 7 pundits/commentators - far too many, total overkill. BBC Radio 5 has 2 commentators and someone in the pitlane and their coverage/commentary team is far superior to BBC1. When a race is on I mute the TV and stick on the radio and get a much more balanced commentary that does not make me want to pull my ears off and feed them to the dog!
I don't believe that the BBC will drop F1. Other than MotoGP they have no motorsport, considering the amount of motorsport that used to be on the BBC. F1 is a huge ratings draw. It also benefits the sponsors given the availability of the BBC. Last I read, MrE is wanting the coverage to remain on the BBC which is promising I think.
Diesel wrote:Ps- How can the BBC be low on cash, what the hell are they doing with all that TV licence money!?
From what I can see, they are spending it on ridiculously huge salaries for someone to sit and read an auto cue a few times a day. Another large chunk of our hard earned cash goes on paying Z list nonentities, sorry I mean celebrities to act like total fools on Saturday night TV. Some of what is left is spent of showing ping pong, golf or football on all channels sometimes showing the same game at the same time. The remainder goes to Jeremy Clarkson so he can drive lots of flash cars, obviously making up for something there. Now that’s value for money!
And that's the best you've got to offer us?
All those lazy assumptions and spoon-fed conventional wisdoms about the cherished state broadcaster look suddenly threadbare, they fell apart on you, and you obviously had nothing left to use to construct a reply. Hence what we got.
Don't beat yourself up about it, I stated the charges were indefensible, you really only demonstrate that fact.
But is this really what a lifetime of 'unique', 'envy of the world' public service broadcasting gets us in terms of rational counter argument. I think we might have been short-changed.
The obvious counter to that is that if you think it's bad on the BBC then wait until it gets on to a subscription channel.
Telling us how bad the BBC is without telling us how F1 coverage would improve elsewhere is simply not an argument I'm afraid. The whole attack on the license fee is not telling us how F1 coverage will be improved or made worse and to be honest it sounds like it was written by James Murdoch because he's used that exact same tac before.
And that's the best you've got to offer us?
All those lazy assumptions and spoon-fed conventional wisdoms about the cherished state broadcaster look suddenly threadbare, they fell apart on you, and you obviously had nothing left to use to construct a reply. Hence what we got.
Don't beat yourself up about it, I stated the charges were indefensible, you really only demonstrate that fact.
But is this really what a lifetime of 'unique', 'envy of the world' public service broadcasting gets us in terms of rational counter argument. I think we might have been short-changed.
Don't you dare for one minute make any assumptions about me.
You make some valid points, but you mostly come off as someone that escaped from the looney bin.
Regardless of whether or not you want to pay your TV licence (I'm against it BTW), you can't deny the accessibility of formula 1 since it moved to the BBC. All sessions available live online, all sesssions available recorded on iplayer, the driver tracker, post race analysis in the f1 forum, etc. etc.
We wouldn't get this level of access with Sky, not without a hefty premium anyway. To get access to the Sky online player you need multi-room or broadband unlimited, so your looking at a bill in the region of £40 plus. Heck with Sports + HD it's going to be £50+ ... A MONTH! The TV licence is approx £140, and you will still have to pay for this!
I'm afraid if F1 did have to move to Sky, I would probably have to resort to finding a dodgey stream online somewhere.
Diesel wrote:I'm afraid if F1 did have to move to Sky, I would probably have to resort to finding a dodgey stream online somewhere.
In my case, there is no "probably" about it; I will not pay Rupert Murdoch any money for any reason, PERIOD. I'll just have to avoid the internet for a few hours until the race is available through BitTorrent.
"Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine ..."
I would almost certainly stop watching if it were on Sky too. I found the years it was on ITV complete with adverts almost unwatchable, I see no reason why that might change with Sky.
I'm not sure if SkySports run ads? That's another thing that pissed me off with Sky, you pay all that money and the channels still run an unbelievable amount of ads.
My choice is simple. I couldn't afford Sky when I was employed, I certainly can't afford it now, and I sure as hell won't be able to afford it for about 3 hours of viewing every fortnight.
Dodgy on-line stream for me if it happens.
At least when F1 was on ITV it was free but the adverts were annoying. It is amazing to think that the football on ITV could go for 45 minutes without adverts yet F1 needed adverts every 10 minutes.
Though here's a thought if the BBC drop F1. Channel 5?
Channel 5 would get Cheryl Cole and Victoria Beckham to give technical insights.
Points will be awarded by a panel of judges who havent a clue between them, and even less of a clue to what happens in a race.
The beeb ought to dig deep. And Bernie ought to drop his demands slightly for good of the sport.
