“I don't have a TV, only a few monitors.”
I also highly recommend this. It’s been 18 years since I’ve lived in a house with a tv. It’s still weird to me that people design their living rooms around sitting facing a screen rather than other humans.
I also highly recommend this. It’s been 18 years since I’ve lived in a house with a tv. It’s still weird to me that people design their living rooms around sitting facing a screen rather than other humans.
I spent the vast majority of my time facing a screen rather than other humans.
Its just the majority cannot afford said house, so the TV room joins the sitting room in the multi-function space that is the living room.
I think the meaning of the space in the house mentioned, wasn't just socializing, but also relaxing to music, and observing the sound (the water body) flowing by outside. Othwerwise the house isn't much bigger or smaller than other Norwegian 80's houses, only the layout is different and more inspired.
Walking around in Oslo, or any city, for that matter, there are many examples of various forms of architecture, and the difference between inspired and uninspired or cheap is striking. For instance, I have a rather ambivalent relationship to the institutional brick architecture springing out of 30's Funkis (Functionalism), that really reached its peak in the 70's and 80's evolving into Modernist structures. The uninspired or brutalist versions of it, are ghastly and cheap shells, while the inspired versions, such as Institute for Social Research in Munthes street in Oslo, gives off a feeling of welcoming peace and warmth.
I have often wondered about those spaces in hotels or office lobbies, where a divan or lounge chairs are set out, but serve no purpose, because no one in their right mind would ever consider sitting there.
But it’s not like we have a lot space in our tiny brooklyn apartment, we just set it up for hosting and talking with people. It’s great when there isn’t a pandemic happening.
Because computers and smartphones, the law has since been extended to also include the case where you own no TV but either a PCI or USB tuner, or any internet access that includes TV streaming (e.g those that come with a set-top box, or those extra options on mobile plans).
This was a despicable period and since then the law has changed. Now there is no license fee on owning a TV receiver. Instead everyone pays a tax whether they own a TV, a computer, whatever and no matter if they watch TV or not.
"Once upon a time, the government tried to impose a tax you had to pay if you had a TV or a computer, which was bad because even people who never watched TV would have had to pay it. But it's better now, because instead there's a tax that literally everyone pays, even if they don't watch TV and even if they don't have a computer."
I'm struggling to see what principles would make the first situation bad without also making the second one bad.
Ideally the individual cost is very low, so it’s not outlandish to have everyone pay, especially as even if you don’t watch it, you benefit from the diffusion of qualitative culture and news in society.
By not making everyone pay, this public service has to compete for attention with commercial ones and risks drifting away in quality.
The counterpoint is that such a state-owned channel could become a propaganda tool.
But both are bad, the former more so than the current, at least.
Personally I agree with a mandatory monthly cost but it is way too high, should be in proportion to household income and the people in the upper ranks of the broadcasting companies shouldn't earn absurdly high wages and pensions.
Despite that I like to support proper journalism that is accessible to everyone and content that is often ad-free to watch/listen/read.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licence#France
The issue for me is mostly that I refuse to pay for the bucketloads of despicably low quality content they put out. A shame, because there’s Arte (TV) and FIP (radio) which have quality stuff, but they only get a fraction of it.