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PS - for the non-brits - there is a British law that lets the BBC tax everybody who is capable of receiving or recording a broadcast television signal even if they don't actually watch the BBC. You just need to be theoretically capable of watching or recording their stuff. It's like the new York Times being able to tax all Americans who can read or have eyes that work.

Interesting. I watch a fair amount of UK TV and I do hear them mention the "license fee" occasionally. I always assumed everyone in the country paid it, but this sounds like they actually have to ask you whether you have a TV. Does anyone come around and check?

Yes. I don't think that you HAVE to let them in but if you do and they find a telly then you could face a fine between £1000 and £2000 plus fees.

For years I had a TV and video recorder but the TV wasn't tuned in. I just played Halo and watched pre-recorded videos. (It was my no-broadcast-tv phase - pretty much the time when Dr Who was off the air - but that's probably a coincidence).

Yeah, I pay it as well even though I don't actively watch Broadcast television. But I happily pay it knowing it's making more Sherlock.

It was bliss.

I hate

• the TV on as background noise
  
• searching for something good on
  
• complaining that there's nothing good on

I'd much rather

• have it off
  
• play Halo
  
• use computer or read book

My family would turn on the TV and stop talking. I saw TV as antisocial. But I've seen the opposite where it is put on very loud then everybody talks over it. And everybody seems to be monologuing - if there were five people in the room then you'd have four * separate verbal tracks and me thinking WTF?!? It can be quite stressful.

* 5 tracks if you include the telly.

The Brits use David Attenborough as the excuse for it. Him and pensioners.

PS - for the non-brits - there is a British law that lets the BBC tax everybody who is capable of receiving or recording a broadcast television signal even if they don't actually watch the BBC. You just need to be theoretically capable of watching or recording their stuff. It's like the new York Times being able to tax all Americans who can read or have eyes that work.

That's just screwed up, even if I do like some of BBC's programming.

If it literally *was* a tax, it'd put the BBC under massive political pressure to ensure its continued funding with each successive government, which may be more or less inclined to protect it from the free market: this is precisely what the Tories are trying to do anyway, although the license fee's rate is a little harder for them to directly influence. This would transform how they broadcast and lobby for continued funding in much the same way the US political system is skewed towards continued campaign finance instead of actual political process. In short: it'd be a disaster.

In actual fact, the license fee is non-payable if you're over 75, or don't watch or record BBC content *as it is broadcast* (i.e. Streaming on-demand is fine). This means lots of people can get away with not paying if they for e.g. only watch on-demand streams on an iPad, an increasingly common occurrence. I don't think characterising it as a draconian 'tax' is remotely accurate or fair, and in actual fact the BBC is the envy of nations the world over, all thanks to how the license fee is set up.

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