Monday 26 January 2015

Everything you needed to know about the industry: Public Service Broadcasting


Public service broadcasting is where a TV program is broadcast purely for the public benefit instead of just for commercial, sponsorship and advertisement reasons. TV programs that are often publicly broadcast include the local news and also broadcasts that are related to art and religion. Public service broadcasting's main purpose is to inform, educate and entertain the general public.
The UK currently has 5 public service TV broadcasters, which are the BBC, Channel 4, S4C, Channel 3 and Channel 5.
Public Service Broadcasting collects its funding in a number of ways. The BBC mostly collects their funding via the TV licence, meanwhile S4C collect some of its funding from government grant. Some public service broadcasters like Channel 4 collect their funding via advertisement. Although they do advertise like ITV, all of Channel 4's income via adverts go straight back into the organisation.
Public Service Broadcasters are funded via these methods in order to be able to have the money needed to make their productions. For example, organisations like the BBC need to rely on the TV licence in order for the organisation to keep producing content as they do not get any income from advertisement.
The BBC are the most popular public service broadcaster in the UK which as we discussed, collect the majority of its funding through the TV licence. With this money, what they do is they then put it back into the company to fund new TV shows, and are able to pay all the costs needed to keep all their channels on air.
The TV Licence

 For
 Against
1. A wide range of shows
2. If there was no TV licence then the government might take it out of taxes instead - Which is not fair on tax payers who don't watch TV
3. No adverts - The BBC don't need to thanks to the TV licence, if there was never a TV licence this would have to change
 1. The TV licence brings unfair competition on commercial broadcasters. This is because commercial broadcasters don't get any funding from the TV licence, meaning some public service broadcasters like the BBC may get an 'unfair' advantage
2. It can be too expensive
3. You may not even support a company like the BBC (so you're paying for a service you don't watch/support)


Organisations like Ofcom regulate public broadcasting to make sure certain TV broadcasters include a specific amount of public broadcasting in order to earn the licence to broadcast.
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