3x01: See The Whole Staircase

Stuart Langridge, Jono Bacon, and Jeremy Garcia present Bad Voltage, in which we begin a new series, the world is under lockdown, and:

  • [00:01:40] And Finally: a [medical fetish site donates its stock of scrubs after being contacted by the NHS](https://www.newsweek.com/medical-fetish-site-donates-stock-nhs-1494951), cops in Hamilton [bust a cocaine dealer for doing "non essential business"](https://www.680news.com/2020/03/31/hamilton-cops-charge-man-with-selling-cocaine-operating-non-essential-business/) during the coronavirus lockdown, more cops bust a man for [teaching his dog to drive](https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/us/washington-man-arrested-pit-bull-drive-trnd/index.html), and [don't use shredded T-shirts as toilet paper](https://fox40.com/news/california-connection/shredded-t-shirts-used-as-toilet-paper-back-up-california-city-sewer/)...
  • [00:05:47] News: the BBC suggest that [the compulsory licence fee could be replaced by a broadband levy](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/mar/31/tv-licence-fee-could-be-replaced-by-broadband-levy-says-bbc), Twitter are removing a whioe bunch of misinformation but [Ben Thomson at Stratechery has issues](https://stratechery.com/2020/unmasking-twitter/), and yet another Zoom issue, this time that they've [misleadingly claimed that their meetings are end-to-end encrypted](https://theintercept.com/2020/03/31/zoom-meeting-encryption/) although [the UK government don't seem to mind](https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1244985949534199808)...
  • [00:16:40] Main discussion: What's the role of technology, open source, open data, and the community in a large-scale crisis scenario? Are there useful ways to contribute, or is it best to just stay out of the way? Can, and should, you get involved?

Come chat with us and the community in our Slack channel via https://badvoltage-slack.herokuapp.com/!

Download from https://badvoltage.org

News music: [http://dig.ccmixter.org/files/Robbero/59218](Long Live Blind Joe by Robbero), used with attribution.

To pick up on the TV licence. At the moment you can’t legally watch BBC programs via your computer or tablet if you don’t have a license.

The BBC is a public service provider and currently advertising free. The BBC have always argued that they need “Dr Who”, “EastEnders” etc. to justify their existence as otherwise hardly anyone would watch.

This leaves a few options.

  • Keep a TV licence or ring fence money via some form of general taxation.

  • Allow the BBC to generate money through advertising.

  • Let the BBC die and put some requirements on commercial TV companies to do public service broadcasting. These companies would be reluctant because as they get relatively small viewing figures they would have difficulty getting people to advertise.

I am really annoyed that satellite / cable TV charges a fee and also has advertising. Should be one or other, not both.

Just throwing this out to clarify the thinking behind proposed changes to public service funding.

Yeah, I had to skip past that segment after a bit before I annoyed the missus by shouting at the speakers.

It’s not been tied to TV ownership in donkey’s years and it’s applied to the iPlayer for quite a while now. If one doesn’t use their services there’s no obligation to pay. If you’re going to discuss it then come on, guys, at least get it right on how it currently works.

I’ve not had a TV licence in years because I just don’t watch that much of anything.

From https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one:

Do I need a TV Licence?

The law says you need to be covered by a TV Licence to:

  • watch or record programmes as they’re being shown on TV, on any channel
  • watch or stream programmes live on an online TV service (such as ITV Hub, All 4, YouTube, Amazon Prime Video, Now TV, Sky Go, etc.)
  • download or watch any BBC programmes on iPlayer .

This applies to any device you use, including a TV, desktop computer, laptop, mobile phone, tablet, games console, digital box or DVD/VHS recorder.

That to me seems like roughly what we said, no? Sure, if we implied that merely possession of a TV which you do not ever use to watch live television requires a licence then we were wrong and I apologise for that.

I forget who said what but I interpreted a discussion point as “people who don’t own a TV don’t have to pay it” which is categorically wrong.

The rest of the show was excellent - had to get a bit of a whinge in though!