My own experience as a child in the UK was 1 commercial, 2 state. It became 1 pure commercial, one semi commercial (C4) and 2 state before I left. I believe the UK is now up to BBC5.
The Australian experience I emerged into was 3 commercial, 2 state/semi-state (ch 7,9 10 commercial, ABC/SBS state/semi-state)
I posit, purely from interest, that in the H-H interest sense of 'monopoly' 5 independent agencies broadcasting and either taking Ad revenue or state revenue or a combination is actually pretty bloody good: they have economies of scale, and they can commit to both make shows, and screen shows.
Now, we didn't lose any of those. So 5 in OZ is joined by Foxtel, Stan, Binge, NetFlix, Disney+, HBO+, Amazon, Paramount. You might say "well from an HH index point of view, this must be better" but the experience is no: it isn't. They can't make enough ad revenue to make content, and they compete with the IPR holders for content, and the content is now more diffuse. Its actually not as "good" as old school TV.
W
I actually miss pre-streaming TV. I miss the sense of unity which came from watching the 6 or 7 o-clock news with millions of other people. Timeshifting existed in VHS days but most people didn't time-shift and couldn't binge-watch unless one of 5 broadcasters decided to binge-programme.
What we lack, and the UK has, is time-shifted. So, keep 5 (ok now 25) basic broadcasters but allow them to run their content on 3 distinct time feeds so you can "watch" things without missing them. I think THAT was smart.
TL;DR I watch some streams, but I miss 'channels' and I don't want to have to pay for bundles, or streams, as much as other people seem to want to.
What are your thoughts and experience with ads to support the channels? I'm not sure that I could go back to watching US broadcasts in real time without a DVR to skip the ~20 minutes per hour of commercials. US public television at least puts the non-content filler between shows, not in the middle.
The Australian experience I emerged into was 3 commercial, 2 state/semi-state (ch 7,9 10 commercial, ABC/SBS state/semi-state)
I posit, purely from interest, that in the H-H interest sense of 'monopoly' 5 independent agencies broadcasting and either taking Ad revenue or state revenue or a combination is actually pretty bloody good: they have economies of scale, and they can commit to both make shows, and screen shows.
Now, we didn't lose any of those. So 5 in OZ is joined by Foxtel, Stan, Binge, NetFlix, Disney+, HBO+, Amazon, Paramount. You might say "well from an HH index point of view, this must be better" but the experience is no: it isn't. They can't make enough ad revenue to make content, and they compete with the IPR holders for content, and the content is now more diffuse. Its actually not as "good" as old school TV. W I actually miss pre-streaming TV. I miss the sense of unity which came from watching the 6 or 7 o-clock news with millions of other people. Timeshifting existed in VHS days but most people didn't time-shift and couldn't binge-watch unless one of 5 broadcasters decided to binge-programme.
What we lack, and the UK has, is time-shifted. So, keep 5 (ok now 25) basic broadcasters but allow them to run their content on 3 distinct time feeds so you can "watch" things without missing them. I think THAT was smart.
TL;DR I watch some streams, but I miss 'channels' and I don't want to have to pay for bundles, or streams, as much as other people seem to want to.