Sky News - 74 (and counting) hours without adverti

Sky News is the only UK channel that hasn't run advertising since first breaking the news of the terror attacks (before any other station in the UK). That was at 2pm on Tuesday, now over 74 hours since the carnage, Sky are still without advertising. Is this necessary? Would advertising on Sky News offend you in any way?


(Edited by SkyNews at 1:43 pm on Sep. 17, 2001)

No SIR!

Sky News is Much better without adverts...

I wish it would stay like this forever, obviously not the story in progress, and with wetaher business and sport updates again

Well unfortunatly Sky News is not like the BBC. Sky News has to stand up on their own two feet to support themselves financially in this way. Unlike the BBC which steals our money by us paying the stupid license fee. I never watch BBC channels, I dislike news 24, so why should I have to pay for it????

Sky can easily get enough revenue from its other channels and the subscription fee.

Same here, BBC World is also another channel without ads, but they've sort of stopped giving a continious service, preferring to show 32 minutes of News, then into a programme like Simpson's World or HARDtalk.

You're quite right, SkyNews isn't like the BBC.

It is part of a major commercial network supported through monthly subscriptions, adverts and sponsorship deals which can distribute its money however it deems necessary to its channels.

The BBC (and I mean the UK networks - BBC1/2/Choice/Knowledge/N24/Radio1-4/Local Radio) all has to come out of a part share of the licence fee. (Please don't tell me your naive enough to think that all the money goes straight to the BBC.) Plus it is also publically accountable and subject to high scrutiny because it is public money.

I don't like paying taxes (and that is what the licence fee is - a tax on the ability to use television and radio receiving equiment), but I have to.

Also don't forget that BBC World/Prime/America/Canada are separate and are run by BBC Worldwide on a commercial basis, as no money collected through the licence fee is allowed to be spent on them.

{oops, sent twice}

(Edited by Andrew Wood at 2:21 pm on Sep. 17, 2001)

I saw Sky News carrying advertising on Saturday night.

If you watch Fox News, you'll see that they now give cable operators the chance to opt-out of coverage for a few minutes, 'We'll be right back with continued coverage in a few moments'. They then carry on with a very small update for everyone still watching, then it's 'We're now going back to our continued coverage of America United'.

I only noticed this yesterday evening though...

Simon

Buzz, you're not that lost twin of mine, are you?

There is (still) an ongoing investigation into News 24 and how viable a service it is, in relation to what it costs us, or in my case, Parents A and B.
The results of this investigation (this will be the 4th investigation) will be known shortly, we hope.

There is an expectation, or at least there was a year ago, that N24 would be attached on to the BBC Worldwide arm, and hence carry advertising. Whether this will happen or not remains to be seen.

I've not got a problem with advertising, not the sort we get on UK TV. American TV, yes. I'm not keen on the weather sponsors on Sky because it does actually break down the banter. The presenters will occasionally talk to the weather man/woman and then you'll get a sponsorship message in the middle of that and it seems to make then look a tad stupid.

On the other hand, it's better than 'now the weather', that I'd find on the BBC.

People seam to imply that Sky News is free! It's not. It costs me and you hundreds of pounds added onto our shopping bill to pay for all those adverts it screens. We have to pay this irrespective of whether we have sky or not. As well as that fat subscription you have to pay into Rupert Murdoch's pocket.

At least you can see exactly how much the BBC costs.


(Edited by Marcus at 1:48 pm on Sep. 17, 2001)