Sunday, November 11, 2007

It's news to me...

How do you take your news? In these days of mass media it seems quite easy but for expats there may be challenges, especially those who are not fluent in the local language, making TV news, newspapers, etc., hard work. Well, the wonders of the www can help and we have found the BBC web site absolutely superb as a source of top quality news and information in our first language.

Now some are outraged to find that the BBC news site is carrying advertising. Strange that this should provoke such a reaction in this day and age? Well, one has to appreciate that the BBC's history is one of independence, their TV, radio and related services being funded by UK users paying an annual licence, meaning no advertising!

In fact, since the news and other services have been available on the BBC web site* there had been much discussion that this enabled anyone around the world to make full use of services that are paid for by British licence payers! However, now the BBC has come up with an ingenious system - when you connect to their site it detects if you are based in the UK or overseas and, if the latter, the news site you see will carry advertising. As a Brit overseas, I really value the BBC services and this seems a small price to pay for continued access to a quality news source, particularly compared to, say, having to subscribe to the service - the move to advertising is strongly supported by this particular expat...

* BBC news


Photo: imageafter.com

3 comments:

Mary said...

You are right. We are in Thailand and you can also imagine what we can do without repubblica.it and or nationaudio.com, it helps us feel at home wherever we are.
With or without ads for me it is the same. I also do not mind.
Keep reading my blogs and thanks

Keith Pow-Williams said...

Absolutely, Mary - in fact, "feeling at home wherever we are" is perhaps a theme for us to consider here...

Mary said...

Right plus good health and life is good!