What's the point of ITV?
Sep. 13th, 2009 10:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ewxIf the worst should happen, and ITV were dismantled or taken over by an overseas company with less of an obligation to create British programmes, it would leave a huge hole. That really is thinking the unthinkable.
Would it? Frankly I'm not sure I'd notice. The last thing I watched on ITV was Law And Order UK which they stopped showing half way through the series without any announcement as to when or whether the rest will appear. (You might think it would be a better fit on C5 anyway given that's where the US versions show.) I can't remember what would have been the previous thing, and I mostly watch C5 and (to a lesser extent) the BBC.
It would of course help if they didn't, apparently uniquely among TV stations, try to stop you finding out what they were showing.
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Date: 2009-09-13 10:16 am (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2009-09-13 10:27 am (UTC)It would certainly be nice if BBC News got a boot up its arse and stopped just recycling newswires, press releases and blogs.
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Date: 2009-09-13 06:02 pm (UTC)In the realm of television news, as far as I know ITN is still a benchmark news provider - the system where ITN and BBC News kept each other honest seemed to work out pretty well. They've maybe dumbed down a bit over the last decade or so and become a bit more populist and tabloidy, but then again so's everyone.
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Date: 2009-09-13 10:31 am (UTC)I'm a big fan of British drama and watch a lot of ITV shows, so actually I probably would miss it, but I may well be in a minority :)
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Date: 2009-09-13 10:42 am (UTC)(As someone I can't remember said, I'm extrapolating from my own experience here, but everyone does that.)
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Date: 2009-09-13 01:13 pm (UTC)I think the only broadcast television I've watched in the past decade has been stuff on new years' eves plus the occasional election of an Obama. I find myself indifferent to the fate of ITV, and don't mind what happens to the BBC as long as news.bbc.co.uk survives.
PS
Date: 2009-09-13 01:14 pm (UTC)Re: PS
Date: 2009-09-13 02:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-09-13 02:37 pm (UTC)Lewis, Marple, cycling, and some re-runs of old stuff that I might watch if I had nowt else to do, which isn't the case. Can't count films coz they turn up everywhere eventually. And Lewis and Marple are take-it-or-leave-it stuff.
... of course CITV has Jungle Run
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Date: 2009-09-14 08:57 am (UTC)Oh, and the football. World Cup qualifier on ITV and Women's European cup final on BBC2 last week.
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Date: 2009-09-14 10:05 am (UTC)Wasn't Law and Order: UK abandoned because it was crap, something which could have been predicted in advance simply by considering the Chibnall Factor?
Last thing I watched on ITV was either 'Primeval', which wasn't half bad (it was a squillion times better than any of the BBC's attempts to fill the early-Saturday slot during non-'Doctor Who' months, anyway) or Lost in Austen which similarly was quite good.
Apparently 'The Fixer' isn't bad, though I haven't seen it myself. Personally I find it reassuring to know that ITV is there, even if I don't watch it, making sure that the BBC isn't the only game in town. Ben Stephenson already has almost-supreme power; I can't believe it would help, culturally, to crown him Actual King of Fucking Everything, would it?
Here's an interesting article on ITV which hovers between a defence and an analysis of its problems (the accounting stuff in particular is whacked out):
http://tinyurl.com/nnxhvp
S.
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Date: 2009-09-14 10:20 am (UTC)The accounting thing does seem rather bizarre.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rochvelleth says above that L+O UK is coming back in the autumn though evidently I missed the announcement myself.
I'd agree that keeping the BBC ‘honest’ is a useful thing, though that article rather suggests that throwing money at ITV may not be a very effective way to do it.
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Date: 2009-09-14 10:30 am (UTC)Also, more worryingly, as a fair chunk of Channel 4's funding comes from ITV (as part of ITV's public-service obligation), it's possible that ITV's collapse might well hole it below the waterline. No more Peep Show, Skins, anything like Red Riding, no more Film4, not to mention the up-and-coming-talent strands that 4 does from time to time.
S.
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Date: 2009-09-14 10:54 am (UTC)Well, yes, the point is more that the article implies ITV would need a fair amount of internal reform (e.g. the accounting thing) to be able to make good use of extra income, and if they can't or won't do that then who's going to want to give them the money?
As for Channel 4...
I can't remember the last time I watched anything on 4, either. Slightly odd since I'm sure I remember finding it being the most consistently interesting channel (but that was probably 15-20 years ago now; my TV watching fell sharply in hours/week when I went to university and only really recovered at all relatively recently).
Film Four (as in the movie making, not the channel), now that I can see would be worth keeping, except I see it's been severely cut back anyway.
(Of course funding channel 4 wouldn't be an argument for subsidizing ITV so much as an argument for subsidizing channel 4 directly. But fixing ITV might imply things other than a direct subsidy, of course - indeed I hope it would; two publicly funded broadcasters would seem like a bit of an extravagance. Although I suppose it might be worth it for the outrage from the Murdoch clan.)
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Date: 2009-09-14 10:59 am (UTC)Skins surprised me by being absolutely, utterly, brilliant. It annoys because it is everything that's wrong with the modern world, and morally of course it appalls me, but it's just amazingly well-constructed.
(I watch a lot more on Channel 4 than I've mentioned but mostly imports, and this is about programme-making not buying-in. But 4 have bought Generation Kill so I eagerly await that).
S.