Comment by jaccola | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jaccola | Hacker News Reader

In the UK I would say most people are proud of the BBC^; many people I speak to are smug when comparing it to e.g. Fox News, CNBC, etc... I think this is a big mistake, and that the USA system is actually better.

It's impossible for one news source to be unbiased, and the delusion that it is unbiased is dangerous. If you truly believe a source is "the truth" and unbiased it allows you to switch off any critical thinking; the information bypasses any protections you have.

Much better to have many news sources where the bias is evident and the individual has to synthesise an opinion themselves (not claiming this is perfect by any means, but a perfect system does not exist).

It is obviously the case that Wikipedia is biased, and I think competition is a great thing. We would be better served by a market of options to use our own faculties than a false sense of comfort in a fake truth.

^though many are refusing to pay the (almost) legally mandatory "tv-license".

I agree we need multiple news sources, but the UK has multiple news sources. What the BBC adds is one with a different funding model so different biases. I do not think this works as well as it did historically.

As for unwillingness to pay the license fee, the biggest issue is the rise of streaming alternatives. It reduced the BBC from providing about half of available TV to being one among many providers so the license fee no longer feels like good value for money.

Its not mandatory. I have never owned a TV. If you do not watch broadcast TV or Iplayer you do not have to have a TV license.

I also think Capita's aggressive scare tactics in trying to get people to pay the license fee have created a lot of hostility towards the BBC.

I think a significant part of the pushback against the TV license is that it pays for the BBC, I believe many people are of the opinion that they'd be perfectly happy not having the BBC and not paying the licence fee. A significant portion of the people paying for the BBC have never watched anything on it.

I am not proud of the BBC at all. I have boycotted their licence fee for almost as long as Wikipedia has been around.

If you want to know who the UK is going to war with next, watch the BBC.

Their news is horrendously biased when it comes to the British royal family. They have an institutional bias against Scottish independence since it would cut 10% of their licence fee. (Their provision to areas outside the Home Countries is a disgrace and patronising.)

Some people seems to confuse, willingly or not, unbiased with targeting neutral point of view, free of any perspective.

We can step back from a debate and reports who's saying what, but this is still reporting ongoing debate. And still involving attention within its considerations, which do change our mental process as much as performative effects can go. That's as opposed to remain completely unaware the debate could be even be considered.

no one is going out of ontological constraints and brings absolute truth from transexistential considerations.

No one who regularly watches biased news sources does so while acknowledging the constant bias. And I don’t think most people think the BBC is unbiased, it’s constantly attacked as having bias to both sides of the aisle ironically. The BBC is far from perfect but it’s in a different league to Fox News to the point that it feels disingenuous to suggest you’d be better off watching Fox News while telling yourself that you’re filtering out the bias.

BBC has very little credibility in the developing world

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