Changes to live BBC radio streams

[betarho]

FYI

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/help/questi...io-changes

[the_bertrum]

That will be sad, but I understand their problem. Controlling what a stream is used for is an issue. Guess it is the sounds app and bluetooth for me then.

[Tim Curtis]

I dunno, that might just be a made up problem by BBC because thousands of other Internet radio broadcasters do Global distribution of music content (no geo-fencing), pay monthly copyright royalties and don't seem to have any issue with how their streams are used.

Whats worrisome is that BBC is attempting to force consumption of all the content they distribute to be ONLY through their proprietary app. They cite their company "Distribution Policy" as justification.
https://downloads.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/...policy.pdf

Not good.

[the_bertrum]

The BBC situation is a bit different though, because it is actually a paid for service. We have a thing called "the licence fee" that people in the UK pay, and in the old days it gave a person licence to receive the radio and television broadcasts that the BBC produce. In the analogue days, the consumption could by geographically restricted by which radio towers it was sent from, and then followed up with people on the ground knocking on doors to check if you'd paid. Now that they "broadcast" digitally, anyone in the world can consume and what they are trying to do here is restrict it back to people who can reasonably be assumed to have paid the fee.

[Nutul]

(...) they are trying to do here is restrict it back to people who can reasonably be assumed to have paid the fee.

So basically they:
1. got rid of the old, expensive infrastructure needed for traditional broadcasting
2. broadcast by other means to the whole world, instead of just the UK
3. still want to gather money, despite their expenses have now dropped to the floor (and surely have other means of doing it, such as cable-tv or the like)

UK is a weird thing: they "will change, when the whole world changes" (cit. - can't-remember-from-who-though)

[Nutul]

Anyway, it's not me who to judge their decision. It's a legitimate choice.

[Tim Curtis]

The BBC situation is a bit different though, because it is actually a paid for service.  We have a thing called "the licence fee" that people in the UK pay, and in the old days it gave a person licence to receive the radio and television broadcasts that the BBC produce.  In the analogue days, the consumption could by geographically restricted by which radio towers it was sent from, and then followed up with people on the ground knocking on doors to check if you'd paid.  Now that they "broadcast" digitally, anyone in the world can consume and what they are trying to do here is restrict it back to people who can reasonably be assumed to have paid the fee.

Similar to PBS/NPR in the states but different in funding model and distribution policy..

I suppose we shall see if the to be updated stream links can be fished out.

[Nutul]

The BBC situation is a bit different though, because it is actually a paid for service.  We have a thing called "the licence fee" that people in the UK pay, and in the old days it gave a person licence to receive the radio and television broadcasts that the BBC produce.  In the analogue days, the consumption could by geographically restricted by which radio towers it was sent from, and then followed up with people on the ground knocking on doors to check if you'd paid.  Now that they "broadcast" digitally, anyone in the world can consume and what they are trying to do here is restrict it back to people who can reasonably be assumed to have paid the fee.

Similar to PBS/NPR in the states but different in funding model and distribution policy..

I suppose we shall see if the to be updated stream links can be fished out.

Probably can, but I think there is more to it, something related to the technology:

"(...) If your device does not support protected HLS and DASH streaming technologies (...)"

[Tim Curtis]

The BBC situation is a bit different though, because it is actually a paid for service.  We have a thing called "the licence fee" that people in the UK pay, and in the old days it gave a person licence to receive the radio and television broadcasts that the BBC produce.  In the analogue days, the consumption could by geographically restricted by which radio towers it was sent from, and then followed up with people on the ground knocking on doors to check if you'd paid.  Now that they "broadcast" digitally, anyone in the world can consume and what they are trying to do here is restrict it back to people who can reasonably be assumed to have paid the fee.

Similar to PBS/NPR in the states but different in funding model and distribution policy..

I suppose we shall see if the to be updated stream links can be fished out.

Probably can, but I think there is more to it, something related to the technology:

"(...) If your device does not support protected HLS and DASH streaming technologies (...)"

Yes if the stream is encrypted as is done in commercial Music Services then it becomes device or app-locked and thus difficult to circumvent.

[the_bertrum]

(...) they are trying to do here is restrict it back to people who can reasonably be assumed to have paid the fee.

So basically they:
1. got rid of the old, expensive infrastructure needed for traditional broadcasting
2. broadcast by other means to the whole world, instead of just the UK
3. still want to gather money, despite their expenses have now dropped to the floor (and surely have other means of doing it, such as cable-tv or the like)

UK is a weird thing: they "will change, when the whole world changes" (cit. - can't-remember-from-who-though)

It's not the same as other broadcasters, they are still broadcasting on the old infrastructure (digitally, but over the air like before) and they are required to also provide streams and so on so that us licence fee payers can consume the service in other ways we might want as well, but then they are also required to provide us licence fee payers with value for money and therefore demonstrate they have control over who is watching.
If it were purely a commercial arrangement, they'd have killed the over the air years ago, gone fully digital and had a pay per listen/view model.  There isn't another organisation quite like it.