BBC? ITV? Netflix? Amazon? TV times are changing

Jeremy Clarkson has never been a man to mince his words. And when he left the BBC after 27 years in 2015, moving to pay-per-view broadcaster Amazon, he didn't hold back:

"I feel like I've climbed out of a biplane and into a spaceship," he said.

• Could YOU live without a TV licence? See two contrasting views below

Of course Clarkson's departure from the BBC was not entirely voluntary, and in the words of his old boss, 'he is not a man given to considered opinion'.

But behind the characteristic trademark bravado, did the former Shropshire Star journalist have a point about the future of the broadcasting industry?

When BBC director-general Tony Hall addressed MPs last week, he spoke of the threat that the emerging breed of internet-based broadcasters such as Amazon and Netflix posed to traditional outlets such as the BBC and ITV.

While in the past the mainstream broadcasters could earn a steady income selling their programmes, he observed that these these days could be numbered as the new entrants increasingly produced their own material.

Lord Hall said, if they were to remain relevant, the likes of BBC and ITV would need to pool resources and work collaboratively.

"Whereas two or three years ago you could sell a great deal to Netflix and Amazon, they are investing less in us broadcasters, and we're going to have to go our way with people who think like us," he told MPs.

That viewing habits are changing is not in question. While MPs were quizzing Lord Hall about whether the BBC would ensure over-75s continued to receive free TV licences in years to come, the real challenge is the growing number of people in their 20s and 30s who have never actually held a licence.

Lord Hall is suggesting the BBC and ITV could join forces to form their own 'British Netflix' to take on the new competition from Silicon Valley. ITV chief executive Dame Carolyn McCall is thought to be sympathetic to the idea, although such a bold move is bound to be fraught with difficulty.

Bianca Fox, a senior lecturer in media and broadcasting at Wolverhampton University, says the established broadcasters will need to change the way they work if they are to have a future.

"Young people almost never use a TV, many don't even own one," she says.

"Why would they? Everything they want to watch can be easily accessed by YouTube."

She says that while a tie-up between the BBC and ITV to produce a commercial streaming service could work, it would pose questions regarding their public-service remit. For example, if they were they to go head-to-head commercially with Amazon and Netflix, how would the BBC justify the licence fee?

There would also be questions about whether the civil-service like BBC and the advertising-funded ITV would make good bedfellows, let alone how they would compete in a cut-throat global market.

It is not just BBC and ITV which are feeling the heat, either. The newer, satellite broadcasters such as Sky also face intense competition.

Fragmented

For example, Netflix has more than 9.1 million subscribers in Britain, and Amazon Video is available in five million homes. Between them, they are thought to have more subscribers than all the satellite or cable pay-to-view services combined.

While Amazon and Netflix's combined reach of just over 14 million households is still some way behind the 25.8 million TV licence holders in the UK, the gap is closing.

Of course the arrival of the streaming services is just one example of how our viewing habits have become more fragmented over the past 40 years or so. In the 1970s, considered by many to be the golden age of television, it was not unusual for top-rated programmes such as The Likely Lads, Crossroads, or Morecambe & Wise to pull in upwards of 20 million viewers.

But at that time there were only three channels available, so it was not surprising that hit programmes could command huge audiences.

Channel 4 and its Welsh sister S4C arrived in November 1982, but the picture was still largely the same. By 1987, when there were five channels available, EastEnders was the most watched programme, with 28 million tuning in to its New Year's Day edition, with the Christmas Day episode of Coronation Street – which marked the departure of favourite character Hilda Ogden – pulling in 26.65 million viewers.

Perhaps more tellingly, the travel programme Wish You Were Here?, in sixth place, was watched by 18.05 million viewers, and the forgettable sitcom Don't Wait Up came ninth with 16.65 million watching.

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Compare that to last year, when there were 342 channels to chose from, including satellite and and digital providers. In 2017 the most popular programme of the year, Blue Planet II, pulled in just 14.01 million viewers, just half of what EastEnders managed 30 years earlier.

Many will argue that this is simply the result of viewers having more choice. And with hundreds of channels to chose from, it will perhaps take more than holiday tips from Judith Chalmers to galvanise the nation. The question is, though, that if programmes cannot draw in viewers the way they used to, where will the revenue come from to make quality new programmes?

A report published last year warned that established broadcasters such as the BBC, ITV and Sky could lose a combined £1 billion a year if online-only broadcasters such as Amazon, Facebook and YouTube continue to expand over the next decade.

The study, by OC&C Strategy Consultants, found that more than a fifth of under-35s now used eight or more different services to watch television programmes, and that 40 per cent said that they found it confusing.

This confusion is likely to lead to the rise of two or three 'super-aggregators', says Mostyn Goodwin of OC&C. These will be 'gateway' websites that bring all the different online broadcasters into a single place. The broadcasters will then pay the website a commission for the viewers it refers to them.

OC&C identified Amazon, Facebook and YouTube, with their huge global audiences, as potential middlemen.

Stranglehold

In May last year Amazon announced plans to add 40 new channels to its UK streaming service, including ITV and live sport including the Olympics.

Facebook also has a TV rival Watch, while YouTube – owned by Google – has its own TV services.

But if these websites become the 'go to' place for people to decide what to view, it will give them considerable power. And as the web monopolies gain a stranglehold on the market, they will be in a position to squeeze the broadcasters very hard indeed.

"It is about the balance of power," says Mr Goodwin. "At first there may not be much of a charge, commercial negotiations are easy, as the digital players want to grow their businesses.

"Over time, as they grow, the nature of the deals can change. What choices the broadcasters make now will define what scale of problem they face."

Lord Hall warns that more than a fifth of funding for original home-grown programmes could disappear as the advertising market declines, and the BBC cut its budgets under the terms of the latest licence fee settlement.

Adapt

He says for all the popularity of the new streaming services, this has not resulted in increased spending on British TV production. While Amazon may have ploughed hundreds of millions into Clarkson's Grand Tour, and Netflix opted to film its lavish drama The Crown in the UK, these were very much the exception to the rule.

"The reality is that their investment decisions are likely to focus increasingly on a narrow range of very expensive, very high-end content – big bankers that they can rely on to have international appeal and attract large global audiences," he says.

Bianca Fox does believe there is a place for the established broadcasters in the digital age, but only if they adapt to the challenges ahead.

"I think the money will be there, but there's different ways of making money," she says.

"Income doesn't have to come in the traditional way, it can come in through social media, from downloads, from advertising online."

At the moment she and her colleagues at the university are carrying our research into the youth-orientated BBC3 channel, which went online-only in February, 2016, and whether this could be a template for other stations to follow.

"When BBC3 went online, people thought it was simply managed decline, and that it would die soon after," she says.

"That hasn't been the case, it's still going, and it appears to be thriving. Often, when we speak to our students, they will not know what the lead story is on the main news bulletins, but they will know what's been on BBC3.

"Our research is looking at BBC3 viewers, and how they find out about what it is showing."

Whether that is a model for others to follow remains to be seen, but as today's millennials become tomorrow's middle-aged, it is unlikely that our broadcasters will be able to put the online genie back in the bottle.

"I think the days when people got together as a family to watch a particular programme, and then talked about it the next day, that's not going to come back," says Bianca Fox.

*Bianca Fox is looking for BBC3 viewers to help with her research. She can be contacted by email at B.Fox@wlv.ac.uk

Blessing not burden after ditching live television

Forget a £145 TV licence – there is an advert-free world to explore on streaming, says Mat Growcott:

It was an easy decision to stop paying my TV licence.

Warnings from worried family never really came true – we never got BBC enforcement officers smashing Swat-like through our windows in the middle of the night trying to catch us binging on Countdown.

In fact, it’s been nothing but a positive, and while our alien way of life might not suit everybody, ditching live TV was far more blessing than burden.

Some people might tell you that it was the endless repeats of Dad’s Army that got them to finally stop getting their licence, others might complain about there being too much Strictly and not enough quality scripted work.

But for me it was more about distractions. There were always films or television to watch on Blu-ray or to stream on Netflix. To this day I haven’t finished The X-Files or The Sopranos – what chance does some mediocre new drama stand? This hit me like a brick when I settled down to watch Comic Relief in 2011 and realised I’d watched absolutely nothing else live on telly all year. It had cost me £145.50 to not really enjoy Red Nose Day, and not a penny of it had gone to charity. I had nothing to show for it except an empty wallet and mixed thoughts on Lenny Henry.

It has been seven years since I stopped paying. That’s more than £1,000 just for not watching the things I didn’t want to watch anyway.

And believe me when I say it has revolutionised the way I watch TV. My wife and I are watching Breaking Bad – at last – in 4K, some four-times better quality than is usually broadcast, and we’re doing it when we want and, most importantly, without any adverts. No longer do I need to sit through seven minutes of toilet cleaning products and flu relief to watch three minutes of television. What my toilet misses in the latest and greatest in bleaches I gain in quality entertainment.

There’s no more settling for things. We all know people who watch anything just because it’s the best thing on – a low bar if there ever was one. There should never be a time when someone has to pick between watching repeats of Supermarket Sweep or repeats of Last of the Summer Wine, but that’s the world of rigid broadcasting we live in. And people not only begrudgingly accept it, but often they defend it.

For most people, ditching the licence isn’t possible. They’re used to watching sports or news, and anything else is just a bonus. There’s nothing wrong with that.

But more and more people are changing the way they enjoy television, and there’s money to be saved for those, like me, who want more freedom in the way we watch.

Spoilt for choice over bland programmes

Bruce Sringsteen once sang ‘57 channels and nothing on’. Mark Andrews couldn’t agree more:

So many channels, so little to watch. Has there ever been a time in British television that the viewer has been so spoiled for choice when it comes to banality?

We live in a time when Pointless vies with Extreme Cake Makers for teatime viewing, when a nude dating show featuring a member of a Take That tribute band is considered cutting-edge, and when BBC1’s Saturday flagship involves obscure celebrities trying to dance.

And don’t get me started on all those ‘gritty’ drama shows where Sarah Lancashire mumbles a lot.

The idea of taking out a subscription and paying serious money to watch even more of this rubbish seems beyond comprehension.

To be honest, I wouldn’t know where to start.

Do you need to wire the telly up to a computer?

I’ve still never worked out how to record the programmes on the VHS player since television went digital a few years ago, let alone reconfigure the telly for online streaming.

And given that there never seems to be anything on worth watching, it hardly seems worth the bother, does it?

Despite what people think, it’s not a reluctance to embrace new technology.

But a glance at the listings on Radio Times shows I’m not missing a lot.

Sister, an Australian sitcom about a fertility doctor who’s been taking his work a bit too seriously and father’s a secret family.

Or American Vandal, which has moved on from last year’s whodunnit about spray-painted penises, and focuses this time on a “canteen laxative prank”. And these are supposed to be the pick of the bunch.

You hate to think what the rest of it must be like.

Compare this to the boring old days when you didn’t really have much choice, you just switched the telly on and there was usually something worth watching.

Minder, The Sweeney. The Avengers, The Professionals, Dad’s Army, On The Buses, The Likely Lads, Reginald Perrin, Mind Your Language. Even Dallas and Crossroads were easy viewing if you didn’t want anything too taxing.

Yes, I can be partial to a box set, but I’m more likely to buy mine from Ebay than Netflix.

And it will be a DVD or VHS cassette of one of the classics from the golden age of television. They really don’t make ‘em like they used to.