Thanks also for your explication of the funding system for the BBC. However, even though it may not be directly funded by the government, I believe you are grasping at a distinction without a difference. You said:
Contrary to popular american opinion, the BBC is NOT funded by the British government. It is funded by an (admittedly) compulsory licence fee (although it also makes quite a lot of money through selling its products abroad, and it also has a very nice sideline in its own record and book labels). The point is that all of the licence fee is all posted to the BBC. The UK government is little more than a clearing house.
Who mandated the licence fee? Government. Who provides the compulsion? Government. The fact that all of the fee goes to the BBC is irrelevant. No matter how you spin it, the UK government is much more than a clearinghouse... /g
You said: Thanks also for your explication of the funding system for the BBC. However, even though it may not be directly funded by the government, I believe you are grasping at a distinction without a difference.
I don't think I am. Yes the government mandated the licence fee, and punishes people who do not pay it, but that mandate is one that is derived from the consent (or at least the tolerance) of the electorate. And its all open and above board. Every year there is a review of the licence fee, and every year its a delicate balancing act.
The BBC obviously would like more money, but it knows that if it asks for a hike in the licence fee all kinds of arguments over program content and quality and bias and value for money get bandied around, and they also know that they the BBC will get most of the flak. The Government does not want to raise the licence fee because any rise in costs is unpopular with the electorate, but they also know that the less money the beeb has the more constrained its operations become and the lower its viewing figures go. In other words, the very fact there is a licence fee compels a discussion on the activities of the BBC. Which is more than the so-called "independent" channels have to face.
Think of it like this. You are only allowed to drive at 55mph on the highway, in spite of the fact that your car can go much faster. Who mandates the restriction? The Government. Who profides the compulsion? The Government. In what way is that different? Neither is a bad thing because the Government imposition and compulsion is at the behest of the electorate. And if you don't like either, than you can agitate to have either changed. Plenty of Britons do with the broadcasting setup. BBC bashing is a very popular pastime in the UK! /g
The point about funding is that "he who provides the cash calls the tune". Now with regard to TV, I personally would rather the great British public did that, with all its imperfections and even though Governments sticky hands are over the process. It's better than the decisions being made by a bunch of faceless advertising executives in suits, who have zero accountability to the viewers and know nothing about program making. I'm on the sci-fi lists on FR, and there are constant complaints about US TV axing good interesting series that are just beginning to get going in favour of some mindless, cheap pap. Why? Because it's a commercial rather than a creative decision. And that's fine, except that the end result is a lot of TV that people put up with rather than really like.
And so it goes with FR. People log on here to share views re conservative issues, not to buy haemmeroid cream or whatever. If advertising is introduced, at the least it will detract from the basic core function and most likely it will discourage folk from joining in. Maybe funds could be raised by selling FR type products - tee shirts, cups etc with FR logos. Or even books filled with the collective wisdom and pithy sayings that fill the message boards - "the best of Free Republic", "Free Republic on AGW", "Free Republic on liberalism" - Hey Ann Coulter does all right with that kind of thing :)