Could the BBC become a US Network ?

[London_Calling]

Just curious really. I understand BBCA is doing reasonably well on cable and that kind of move could be seen as classic case marketing.

I suppose what makes the idea intriguing is that the BBC isn’t ‘owned’ in the conventional sense (as it’s established by Royal Charter and is maintained by the fee paying public), but does that mean that it could potentially circumvent the US legislation that required, for example, Rupert Murdoch to take US citizenship.

I also understand that BBCA now, occasionally, carries…commercials ! The horror !! As the beeb are now keenly looking at a range of cash-raising options to put into programming, I also find myself wondering if that might add to any potential impetus.

Anyone know what the legal restrictions might be ?

[friedo]

There aren’t really many legal restrictions at all as far as cable is concerned. As far as broadcast stations are concerned, there are very few left which are not already affiliates of ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, UPN, WB or PBS.

[KoalaBear]

Essentially none.

NewsCorp (Australia) owns all that is Fox, so foreign ownership of a broadcast network really isn’t much of an issue.

The problem for networks these days is the balkanizing effect of cable. The more channel choices that are offered, the fewer demographically desirable viewers the network can round up in any given time slot, the lower ad rates drop, the more difficult it is to sustain profitability.

But the BBC can (and undoubtedly does) make more money selling its programs on DVD in North America than BBC America makes selling commercial airtime. It’s a welcome addition to the cable lineup, but it does have the ambiance of a token presence – a sort of “We’re there, we’re square, get used to it” kind of thing.

[Phouchg]

BBC America is owned by the BBC, but is operated in the US by Discovery. Most of their revenue comes from cable subscriber fees (cable systems pay X cents per subscriber) - advertising is secondary - most of the spots on BBC America are “per inquiry” and “direct response” ads which generate nominal revenue. Due to copyright laws, BBC couldn’t just simulcast BBC1 or BBC2 on US TV - so they cherry pick what they think will work in the US (lots of Monty Python, Ab Fab, Keeping Up Appearances, as well as british Movies, music specials (especially Top Of The Pops and Later with Jools Holland) etc. )

Phouchg
Lovable Rogue

BBC America

[Mr.Frink]

*Originally posted by KoalaBear *
**NewsCorp (Australia) owns all that is Fox, so foreign ownership of a broadcast network really isn’t much of an issue. **

Wasn’t Rupert Murdoch required to become an American Citizen at one point due to his broadcast ownership? Someone refresh my memory here, I’m pretty sure that Murdoch is now an American…what exactly was the reason for that?

[KoalaBear]

I do sort of vaguely recall that incident.

Wasn’t it somewhere around the time he acquired Field Communications (WFLD-TV and the Chicago Sun-Times) but was forced to divest the newspaper due to cross-ownership limitations?

Funny, though, that they didn’t force citizenship on Akio Morita when Sony bought Columbia a decade later. But perhaps CBS was already a separate entity by that time.

[friedo]

According to Time,

Although now an American citizen (he made the change so he could buy American television stations in the 1980s), Murdoch was born in Australia and into the newspaper industry.

And according to the Museum of Broadcast Communications,

As perhaps befits a man with such a great level of power and influence, Murdoch has often found himself at the center of political firestorms. He became widely scorned by labor organizations and pro-labor politicians around the world because of his hardline tactics in battling the British newspaper workers’ unions in the mid-1980s. His 1985 purchase of the Metromedia television stations required him to become an American citizen to comply with Federal Communications Commission (FCC) restrictions on foreign ownership of U.S. television stations; many felt he received inordinately preferential treatment by the Reagan administration in expediting the citizenship process. His FOX television network was able to avoid complying with the FCC’s Financial Interest and Syndication (FinSyn) rules, first, by airing fewer hours of programming than was required to define FOX as a “network,” and later, by receiving a temporary FCC waiver of the rules–an action the other three broadcast networks vigorously opposed.

So there ya go.