Discuss whether or not the BBC should be allowed to take advertising and sponsorship in order to fund its new digital channels. What would the implications be for public service broadcasting?

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Discuss whether or not the BBC should be allowed to take advertising and sponsorship in order to fund its new digital channels. What would the implications be for public service broadcasting?

The British Broadcasting Company was founded by John Reith and began broadcasting on television in 1939. Reith's vision was of an independent British broadcaster able to educate, inform and entertain the whole nation, free from political interference and commercial pressure. Scannell (1990, p.13) defined public service broadcasting as ‘…a responsibility to bring into the greatest possible number of homes in the fullest degree all that was best in every department of human knowledge, endeavour and achievement.’

Initially, it would seem that advertising and sponsorship would be a good method to fund the BBC’s new digital channels. The channels, if only available through pay TV systems like Sky or cable television, should not use licence payers money if some of the licence payers cannot see the channels themselves. However, taking on advertising and sponsorship goes against what the BBC originally stood for when John Reith ran it in the 1920s. By advertising, the BBC would possibly have to give into commercial pressures.

At present, the BBC does not take advertising for BBC1 and BBC2 as they fund their broadcasting through the licence fee. According to the BBC’s website (www.bbc.co.uk/info/bbc/lic_advert.shtml), ‘The licence fee maintains a wide range of public services which cannot always be financed by the economics of pay-TV or advertising, and enables mainstream programmes to be available unrestricted to everyone in the UK’. This reflects the BBC’s public service broadcasting objectives to entertain, educate, inform, innovate and enrich. Today, the BBC have expanded from analogue television to the digital world where they plan to keep on funding BBC1 and BBC2 through the licence fee and possibly fund its digital channels (BBC Choice, BBC Knowledge, BBC Four, for example) through advertising and sponsorship.

It is likely that advertising would have a detrimental effect on public service broadcasting. Advertisers and sponsors want value for money and minority programmes that only a small proportion of the population watch will not be cost-effective for their advertisers. Therefore broadcasters are more likely to show popular, audience rich programmes to gain more money from advertisers.  Doctor Howell, in Parliament on 8 May 2002 on Wireless Telegraphy Regulations spoke about the possibility to allow the BBC to introduce advertising, sponsorship or subscription to its public services. He said, ‘All those options would be likely to damage the BBC as a public service broadcaster or that they might set in train undesirable, head-to-head competition with private broadcasters for scarce revenue.’

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Opposing the move for BBC to take on sponsorship and advertising would be the argument that suggests that the BBC would have to give into the commercial pressures of its advertisers. Advertising can lead to advertisers dictating to broadcasters what is shown on the television. Advertisers, for example, may insist on a channel showing programmes with pure entertainment value, as public service broadcast programmes may not prove to be as popular with audiences. For example, sponsors may not want to support minority programmes such as ‘Songs of Praise’ because they do not attract large audiences. Scannel (1990, p.18) argued ...

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