Italian TV strike

Rather interesting. Do you think a similar strike is necessary here, or is British television just too fab to turn-off. And also, will a mass strike by viewers really make that much difference...

I think the biggest difference here is Berlusconi is both PM and the largest stockholder of Italy's independent television industry, and (by virtue of his political office) controller of the state-run TV agency as well. No one person controls that much of Britain's air.

I think Italians are rightfully revolting against Berlusconi, and not necessarily television itself.

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Agreed, although having watched Italian TV myself, and having spoken with several Italians, they hate the television programmes just as much as Silvio Berlusconi! It's quite shockingly poor!

It's been tried here - with the Sun and others trying to organise a boycott of watching the BBC... it didn't have much affect on the ratings though.

Yep, the situation summed up perfectly in one post

Apparently some theatres in Italy are running a scheme whereby if you turn up tonight with your TV remote control, you'll get a free ticket.

What a great idea (assuming it doesn't drop out of your bag on your way home)

Have to agree as I live in Italy at the moment the quality of TV is rather poor to say the least. You have to look at this from a polital context as tv here is all about polital control since Berlusconi started his media empire with the help of his polital pals ie the disgraced socialist leader craxi. Berlusconi has never looked back and now his latest foray is digital terrestial tv not only will he control the content through his media set group he's also making the actual set top boxes Hahahahaha this guy takes the biscuit and crushes it!

I knew that he owned Media Set, but does he own RAI and the new Sky Italia? If so, he's got quite a hold on the market!

Has it got *that* bad here? No. I'll comment on the downturn in the quality of British TV (particularly ITV's) as much as you like, but at the same time I don't believe we've seen more than the tip of the iceberg - it can (and unfortunately probably will) get a lot worse than this.

As it stands, I don't believe it's appropriate for any 'viewer's strike' yet. That any attempt to organise one here would doubtless fail illustrates that point. But if it succesfully happens in Italy, then it does demonstrate to commercial TV stations - and more crucially to advertisers - that if they let their standards drop too much, viewers will turn away. This will discourage the advertisers from spending so much on TV advertising, and worry the broadcasters if they think the advertisers could pull the plug on them. Sadly, by the time British TV gets bad enough to warrant such a strike, the government will doubtless have cleared the way for all of our commercial broadcasters to be owned by some sprawling American media giant, who will view the UK as just another market, and couldn't really give a toss if there is an advertising downturn here.

What's happening in Italy should be taken as an indication to the UK government of what might happen here if they don't stop this misguided policy to move to almost totally deregulated commercial TV (I personally saw nothing wrong with regulators like the IBA holding the commercial broadcasters up to standard with an iron hand - so what if it means we wouldn't have had hundreds of channels on Sky Digital now - can anyone honestly say that they think that has benefited UK TV?), but of course it won't happen.

I knew that he owned Media Set, but does he own RAI and the new Sky Italia? If so, he's got quite a hold on the market!

Yes Media Set 100% Berlusconi & family
RAI is the state owned but has always been used as a polital football, as for Sky italia well Berlusconi and our friend Murdock own 50/50 each.
I remember back in the late seventies and eighties Italian TV was like the far west anything went it was fun incomparison to UK remember 3 tv channels shut down at midnight ahhh those were the days.

Damm not got to grips with the quoting proceeder

I still think we have some of the best television in the world and it's not *all* low budget trash. Things like Saturday Night Takeaway are glitzy, expensive, live shows and are really wonderful to watch.

What is Italy's Formula One TV coverage like? Yay or Nay?