4 ms·

Rights issues, and of course the fact that BBC content is -- a fair whack of BBC funding comes from Worldwide (or whatever it's called this week), which sells B

Rights issues, and of course the fact that BBC content is -- a fair whack of BBC funding comes from Worldwide (or whatever it's called this week), which sells BBC material internationally. Watch a BBC production on CBS or PBS or BBS or whatever and some money goes back to the BBC. I believe Britbox is an option too. Same with television formats. Dancing with the Stars I believe is a popular US program based on a BBC show, the format has been licensed to half the planet.

n8cpdx 5y ago
I still don't understand why I (an American) can't pay the BBC money for access to iPlayer. BBC has been saying hell no to my money for over a decade now. It doesn't make sense. Free money! You could lower your TV tax! I think it must be BBC official policy that they want the whole world buying VPN and pirating the content. It doesn't make sense. Throwing money away and then asking why they aren't competitive with the commercial offerings.
- iso1210 5y ago
  1) the rights to show those programs outside the UK don't exist 2) If they do exist, this would cannibalise the income via global sales, and someone has (rightly or wrongly) crunched the numbers and determined that selling Top Gear to foreign broadcasters makes more money than having iplayer as a subscription. There may also be political issues with having iplayer as a subscription too (including a call from the right wing to make iplayer subscription based for everyone. After OnDigital/ITVDigital collapsed, the BBC got in very quickly with freeview, ensuring that large numbers of decoders lacked a CAM and thus making it harder to argue for subscription) See also Channel 5 sell Peppa Pig to Nickleodon rather than doing it direct. Or paramount selling rights to Star Trek series' via netflix or amazon rather than paramount plus outside the US.
- abdallabbc 5y ago
  You may want to have a look at BritBox, which combines content produced by BBC and other UK outlets (ITV..etc).

n8cpdx 5y ago

I still don't understand why I (an American) can't pay the BBC money for access to iPlayer. BBC has been saying hell no to my money for over a decade now. It doesn't make sense. Free money! You could lower your TV tax! I think it must be BBC official policy that they want the whole world buying VPN and pirating the content. It doesn't make sense. Throwing money away and then asking why they aren't competitive with the commercial offerings.

iso1210 5y ago
1) the rights to show those programs outside the UK don't exist 2) If they do exist, this would cannibalise the income via global sales, and someone has (rightly or wrongly) crunched the numbers and determined that selling Top Gear to foreign broadcasters makes more money than having iplayer as a subscription. There may also be political issues with having iplayer as a subscription too (including a call from the right wing to make iplayer subscription based for everyone. After OnDigital/ITVDigital collapsed, the BBC got in very quickly with freeview, ensuring that large numbers of decoders lacked a CAM and thus making it harder to argue for subscription) See also Channel 5 sell Peppa Pig to Nickleodon rather than doing it direct. Or paramount selling rights to Star Trek series' via netflix or amazon rather than paramount plus outside the US.
abdallabbc 5y ago
You may want to have a look at BritBox, which combines content produced by BBC and other UK outlets (ITV..etc).