BBC Store - Do you use it? What have you bought?

Although sceptical of the idea with already having to pay for the TV licence, it allows access to things that otherwise wouldn't be on other services like Amazon or Netflix, it's a useful companion to torrenting what might become rare programmes such as one off documentaries because obviously like Amazon Prime each programme is stored in the cloud for you, I wouldn't use the download option because I really don't like DRM.

Programmes are a bit pricey but they even put things up like "Treweryn - 50 Years On" a one off documentary about the reservoir controversy on BBC ONE Wales and "Charlie Brooker's 2015 Wipe" these are the sorts of programmes that never get released on DVD, with programmes that are released on DVD the BBC Store obviously seems a bit pricey as you can usually get DVD's of full series cheaper. I bought the dreadful sitcom "The Wright Way" on there just because it's so bad it makes interesting viewing.

More ease of watching the BBC Store would be good, it to launch on Fire TV/Fire Stick and PS3/PS4 would be welcome, some sort of merge with the IPlayer app might help achieve that. There's an Android app to watch on your phone, not compatible with every device though, the IPlayer app itself is much more widespread.

Wish £1.89 hadn't caught on as a default price for a TV episode, 99p would be much better!

Hypothetically if you didn't pay the TV license you'd be able to use the BBC Store to buy and watch programmes from the BBC, and of course IPlayer except for live TV.

Miranda - Finale
Charlie Brooker's 2015 Wipe
Rory Bremner's Coalition Report
Treweryn - 50 Years On
Michael Portillo's Great British Railway Journeys - 1 episode showing Liverpool
Horizon - Space
The Office - Christmas Specials
The Wright Way
Cats v Dogs - Which Is Best
Fighting The System (BBC THREE)
The Age Of Loneliness
The Ugly Face of Disability Hate Crime
Louis Theroux - The Most Hated Family In America

so far

Rather crazy that individual episodes of Eastenders, Bargain Hunt & Eggheads are on there at £1.89 each, that price for each one of hundreds of episodes, some sort of pass for whole episodes of a season of these shows at a low price surely would be more appropriate given the nature of the type of viewing it is, maybe people would buy an individual episode of Bargain Hunt if it featured their town, why a single episode of Eggheads or Eastenders would be bought I can't figure out, perhaps a winning episode or with some good sarky comments from CJ or something.`

Comments

  • ovbgovbg Posts: 1,451
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    Actually, I fully understand that outside of currently airing shows, the TV license doesn't cover permanent access to every show the BBC ever made (not that you're suggesting that it did ;) ) but I so often hear people who thinks it does.

    Anyway, I think the BBC made a big error in their store. It will generate a bit of income for them, but not a lot as buying content is so old hat these days. What most people would prefer would be a subscription service, say £10 a month for all the older content that the BBC have - basically, their back catalogue.

    People will still need the TV license, as that would cover current shows and episodes and the 30 day catch-up (when the new charter includes it), but if people say subscribe to the back catalogue as an extra, then the shows don't roll off after 30 days, and basically everything the BBC made is available - much like networks in the US are considering (HBO, Showtime, etc).

    Of course, currently licensing agreements may mean that it could take a few years before certain content can be included, and of course it will take years to get all of the BBC's archives on, but how cool would that be?

    I'd definitely pay the BBC £10 a month on top of the license fee for that.
  • Bill ClintonBill Clinton Posts: 9,389
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    ovbg wrote: »
    Actually, I fully understand that outside of currently airing shows, the TV license doesn't cover permanent access to every show the BBC ever made (not that you're suggesting that it did ;) ) but I so often hear people who thinks it does.

    Anyway, I think the BBC made a big error in their store. It will generate a bit of income for them, but not a lot as buying content is so old hat these days. What most people would prefer would be a subscription service, say £10 a month for all the older content that the BBC have - basically, their back catalogue.

    People will still need the TV license, as that would cover current shows and episodes and the 30 day catch-up (when the new charter includes it), but if people say subscribe to the back catalogue as an extra, then the shows don't roll off after 30 days, and basically everything the BBC made is available - much like networks in the US are considering (HBO, Showtime, etc).

    Of course, currently licensing agreements may mean that it could take a few years before certain content can be included, and of course it will take years to get all of the BBC's archives on, but how cool would that be?

    I'd definitely pay the BBC £10 a month on top of the license fee for that.

    It would be advantageous in that you wouldn't have to keep paying smaller amounts (and larger amounts for box sets and series) for each and every blasted thing you wanted to watch, now you have to really like the programme for it to be worth it, with paid episodes you don't really want to just try out a programme by paying for it, that lends itself more to the Netflix model, maybe the BBC Store should ideally be a combination of both.
    Goes without saying even though I'm saying it that subscriptions have the obvious disadvantage of losing everything when you stop paying, lose a job or your benefits, lose your BBC back catalogue, at least now the already paid for programmes will keep working. Amazon has a combination of paid for and subscription streaming.
    A subscription charge can't be too much or it would be offputting, maybe £6-£10 a month but no more than that, would definitely sort out being able to watch old episodes of Eastenders because who would pay £1.89 each, that sort of thing needs a Netflix model.

    I wouldn't mind having a Coronation Street Netflix type service to watch the old episodes, they're all there but we can't watch them!

    It's worth pointing out that there are lots of free downloads from BBC Radio 4 simply in MP3 format, but we don't get that for TV, when we could benefit from educational programmes, you have to pay for them on BBC Store after the 30 day IPlayer window, that is obviously not very public service, PBS manage to make their content playable for free in comparison, so in a way the concept of a BBC Store for a public service broadcaster is a little bit dubious, but they've always released DVDs, VHS tapes in the past, but the BBC Store makes more available than they would release on DVD or Blu-Ray where there's effectively hardly anything but the store has a lot in HD.
  • kevin88kevin88 Posts: 864
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    I personally think that the BBC store is total rip off, Our licence fees have already paid for these shows. >:(
  • ovbgovbg Posts: 1,451
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    kevin88 wrote: »
    I personally think that the BBC store is total rip off, Our licence fees have already paid for these shows. >:(

    No they haven't. The license fee pays for the live TV broadcasts, not ownership of every programme ever made by the BBC? Did you walk into the brick and mortar BBC stores 10 years ago and expect to be able to walk out with every DVD on the shelf?
  • Javier_deVivreJavier_deVivre Posts: 1,390
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    kevin88 wrote: »
    I personally think that the BBC store is total rip off, Our licence fees have already paid for these shows. >:(
    Well it paid for it's creation and to show it on TV when it was first made.

    Repeats have to be paid for because there are costs for doing so, paying royalties to the actors etc.

    This is the same for all broadcasters, not just the BBC. I currently pay for Sky TV, I wouldn't expect to be able to continue watching the programmes on now for free for eternity if I stopped paying.
  • Bill ClintonBill Clinton Posts: 9,389
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    ovbg wrote: »
    No they haven't. The license fee pays for the live TV broadcasts, not ownership of every programme ever made by the BBC? Did you walk into the brick and mortar BBC stores 10 years ago and expect to be able to walk out with every DVD on the shelf?

    I prefer to think a bit deeper than these obvious arguments, yes we know the licence fee only pays for watching TV and the BBC as we get it on the TV stations/radio stations, but philosophically the licence fee is a rather communist model where we the British public actually do pay for programmes to be made, but we don't get to benefit from being able to always access them as a library of TV/Radio programmes that would be useful to us all at any time, this would be more valuable than just the BBC broadcast stations and the 30 day IPlayer.

    Radio 4 does offer some programmes as free MP3 downloads, but TV programmes, even educational ones are being treated commercially after the public has already paid for them to be made, this is a dubious situation admittedly, and the same really applies to BBC DVDs and the programmes being shown on pay channels such as Gold & Eden, particularly as you might pay Sky to access them. That said, I still have used the BBC Store, have bought BBC DVDs and subscribe to Sky but this is a valid argument, PBS has made programmes freely accessible and it's not just a 30 day window, All4 offers box sets of archive Channel 4 programmes in general rather than just a 30 day window, there is no All4 Store but I have bought some programmes I like such as Peep Show on DVD and Black Mirror on Amazon Video, the BBC seem to not be going down the road of actually offering programmes such as Africa & A History of Scotland to educate the public because of the BBC Store, but at least we get access to some things at all.

    People say that you don't understand the situation with what the BBC licence fee pays for if we object to having to pay again to access programmes, but I & many others do understand it, but we are questioning it.

    Wonder if the Adam Hart Davis' What the Tudors/Victorians/Romans etc Did for us series will make an appearance?
  • mossy2103mossy2103 Posts: 84,307
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    Regardless, the facts are that the LF pays for the initial production and a set number of broadcasts of a programme, including the negotiated & agreed rights and associated payments/royalties). And taht rights/copyright agreements are recognised the world over - it's not simply a UK phenomenon that can be addressed in isolation.

    To have an unlimited agreement that would also cover free access in perpetuity would firstly be much more costly (adding to initial programme production costs) and would probably take much longer to agree (adding to the time taken to turn a programme idea into a broadcast product).

    There would also likely be objections from commercial broadcasters and distributors concerned that the BBC was abusing its position.

    Finally, a great deal of BBC programming is now made by independent production companies - generally it is they who will either own the rights or will have a stake in the rights.

    Radio examples could be very different, as there are fewer platforms (less lucrative), likely to be fewer people with rights interests, and some music will not have the same copyright restrictions anyway
  • The PhazerThe Phazer Posts: 8,487
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    All4 offers box sets of archive Channel 4 programmes in general rather than just a 30 day window,

    With advertising to fund it's continuing availability, and even then only a fairly small selection of content. Indeed, the public service iPlayer has stacks of archive content, it's just not very popular stuff.
  • emailsemails Posts: 11,275
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    Just brought a video from BBC STORE hoping it would be a dvd? turns out its an online video . The video named ON STAGE LIVE FROM TELEVISION CENTRE i was hoping to get as a genral video download via sites like youtube ,but its not there.So i looked at BBC STORE where i found it,but online only,so how do i or can i copy/paste this to disc? As at the moment its not letting me ,even though i have paid good money for it?
  • Billy_ValueBilly_Value Posts: 22,919
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    I just download the free episodes that are on offer
  • emailsemails Posts: 11,275
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    I just download the free episodes that are on offer

    What on BBC store?
  • emailsemails Posts: 11,275
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    Well i have just read on the site about downloading etc ,it says i need silverlight to oporate the store downloader ,which all have been down ,now the issue i got is downloader wont install saying the following WINDOWS CANNOT ACESS THE SPECIFED DIVICE,PATH OR FILE. YOU MAY NOT HAVE THE APPROPIATE PERMISSION TO ACESS THE ITEM. All this after installing silverlight,whats gone wrong? This is on a w7 machine.
  • barbelerbarbeler Posts: 23,827
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    I'd never heard of it.
  • emailsemails Posts: 11,275
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    Just had a chat with the staff at the BBC store where they confirmed it's not possible to put the online video to dvd. So now I seek to find the programme on stage live from television centre on dvd.
  • emailsemails Posts: 11,275
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    I kind of woundered is there any software i can use that can over ride DRM on a website so that i can copy my purchased download to desktop files? otherwise i may as well just ask for a refund.
  • RamjetRamjet Posts: 24
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    I downloaded the 1st episode of a recent BBC series ( as the BBC had removed it from iPlayer very very quickly so they could rush me for the extra £1.89 )

    I can get it to play eg on my Samsung Android tab but not on my connected TV ( also Samsung on same home WiFi network )

    don't understand what I'm doing wrong - after all I have paid to keep this episode so it seems right I should be able to play it on a connected TV

    R
  • emailsemails Posts: 11,275
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    Ramjet wrote: »
    I downloaded the 1st episode of a recent BBC series ( as the BBC had removed it from iPlayer very very quickly so they could rush me for the extra £1.89 )

    I can get it to play eg on my Samsung Android tab but not on my connected TV ( also Samsung on same home WiFi network )

    don't understand what I'm doing wrong - after all I have paid to keep this episode so it seems right I should be able to play it on a connected TV

    R

    i had the same issue ,even after PAYING FOR IT still can't get it from my ONLINE account to my dvd DRM rights appear to be in the way, surly its not copyright ,i just gave them my money for it ,so it now belongs to me.
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