TV licence; a waste of money?

Last year, I watched the tv literally a few times, just renewed, and guess what, nothing of much interest on.

What am I paying for, exactly?

If I hardly watch it again this year then I will not be buying one again I don't think.

What are your views on TV licensing, in general?

And the beeb is one of the only service providers that doesnt have a plus one channel, drives me mad now I dont have sky or virgin.

You`re paying for 2 tv channels and several radio ones without adverts.

tbh, I'm not sure regular TV is 'healthy' either

A lot is very negative, even the fictional hour or so of soaps is failry negative stuff, then you get made up murder stories, most stuff is ancient too!

I put it on last night thinking there is bound to be something I want to watch...one programme and I wasnt even that bothered, ended up reading whilst it was on in the background!

Also, what if I get home from work and I am not interested in the news at that time, or soaps, there is basically nothing (that I have paid for) to watch!

if only they gave you the choice between having those channels and paying TV License V's Not Paying and having no BBC...I wonder where the great beeb would be...

I used to think the same, but I get almost all of my news from BBC.co.uk - not to mention iPlayer for catching up on programs, both of which would be completely spoiled if plastered with ads like the other news sites and tv catch-up services.

It's a real bugbear of mine, it's old hat and should be abolished now imo. Afterall, we have Sky, Freeview etc. and hundreds of channels to choose from so I don't really understand exactly WHY the BBC think they can continue to charge us for theirs?

I'm paying a horrendous amount each month for Sky, so I don't see why I have to pay for a licence! You don't have to abroad when you have Sky do you, so why is it only us in the uk then?

Another thing that gets right up my nose at the moment is not only the adverts, but every bladdy programme now spends 10 mins (or more) of MY viewing time watching it, telling me about some stupid competition or other, and then they have to read aaaaaaaaaalll of the writing on the screen to us every single time and even the BBC are slowly honing in on this with their "text us your questions/worries/c*ap" I don't think I get this on Sky channels though? The worst is Loose Women/Jeremy Kyle (but for his programme of course) and X-Factor so all in all, they're not only getting all the money from the adverts they bombard us with every 7 minutes, but also another 3 minutes of competition c*ap! Sorry, went off on one a tad there lol!

I only listen to DAB local radio (hubby has it on for the footie ) and I rarely watch BBC tbh think Ive watched it twice this week.

I really am starting to grudge it, £150 for what exactly? Half the time its the most depressing stuff...least informative...now and again something is on, but the BBC also insist that if they do put films on etc they will be ANCIENT

I honestly think that if I dont start watching it this year I will just get rid of the TV and the license!!

Thats another bugbear though, you can have a TV in your house, no aerial, no dish hooked up, no phone line etc etc and yet they will fine you and btw who in the hell do they think they are to write and say that they will be coming into my home and deciding to fine me EVEN if you write to them to tell them you no longer have a TV. This is democracy is it? More like Bully tactics. As it happens I didnt I just renewed but I tell you something I seriously doubt next year....its £150 could go on something useful! Half the time I dont even watch any TV...

we don't have a television, we use the computers for all our viewing needs, i know, it sounds a bit wierd, but stay with me...
we found out that you need a licence to view programes as they're broadcast, so on at the same time as conventional television, but if you are watching programes outside of those times you do not require a license.

iplayer, 4on demand, you tube and other sites like blinks and project free tv have a huge range of programmes, and if you install and ad-blocker program you don't get the adverts. then go wireless, so you can have a nice big monitor in the living room. you can still hear or see all the programes you would have done, but you're not tied to their schedule and you can choose for yourself what to watch instead of channel surfing for the least bad option!
we also run the audio through the speakers of the stereo system, so no tinny speaker noise.
as well as using the computers for viewing we can also use it for music as it's going through the speakers anyway, so with i tunes and sites like spotify there's more music than even mr. partypooch can need and he's a dj!

so no tv license to pay, less space taken up by the tv in the house, more choice. it's a real win. more people should do it, you get too little return on your licence in programming i feel.