Ofcom Discussion

(26-10-2012 00:07 )HenryF Wrote:  Don't know if anyone has noticed but Sky's online offering NowTV has parental control to R18 level. Don't get excited, the content, quality and cost of the service has been piss poor to date.

Interesting.

Of course it is Video On Demand and subject to different laws and joint regulation. They can legally show R18. They might even be able to show beyond R18.

Anyone know what strength Sky Italia goes up to?

Just to highlight the declining standards of the UK babe channels ETV which as some of you may allready be aware of is now coming to an end on SKY UK. 31st October will be the last and final time we will see it broadcast.

So what does this tell us about the reality of the UK Babe Channels. Quite a lot if you ask me. Eurotic TV appears to have lost a lot of its old audience and callers as a result of having to stick to tame and unworkable ofcom rules for the past few months.

This move to offer us the show back in the summer turned out to be an absolute financial disaster for them. They have simply had no choice but to abandon ship. The European's have had enough of Ofcom and it's piss poor set of rules.

If only the UK viewers did likewise and showed the same amount of distain towards the UK based ones then I'd imagine something would have to be done.

Desperate renegotiations would have to be called for. They'd have to storm into Ofcom HQ and demand enough is enough.

The UK as a nation is a shambles of a democracy. Why is nobody standing up to the politicians and rule makers. When was it decided that ofcom's word was final. As a SKY subscriber and viewer of Adult material I object.

ETV's departure is another nail hammered in the coffin, our hope that more European channels would follow have been dealt a fatal blow.

At the start of every year I always have high hope that things night change for the better. 2012 I think will best be remembered as a year to forget as far as this type of entertainment goes.

Just how much stumbling do we have to see before a radical change in fortune happens. This waiting for ofcom rules to change tactics is getting nobody anywhere.

The only message it sends out to ofcom is to increase their strict rules. They know the channels are shit scared of enraging their wrath that it's adding more and more fuel to their increasing power.

A truly piss poor state of affairs to be in and if ofcom had been challenged from the word go then I very much doubt we'd have to play witness to tame shows that are truly an insult to any inteligient adult viewer.

A lot of nights when I switch the channels on I think, what the fuck is this shit Just what point are ofcom trying to make.

If you don't like the babe channels and are offended by them you are going to be offended by them regardless of the strengh of the content.

Mind you I'd also say if you are that offended by them just why are you forcing yourself to watch them.

Plenty of other channels out there, too bloody many religious ones if you ask me. But they don't offend me because I don't watch them.

It's a bit like complaining about a certain flavour of crisps to ofcrisp yet you still chose to eat them

(27-10-2012 19:31 )Scottishbloke Wrote:  Just what point are ofcom trying to make.

The point that they do not want any form of sexual entertainment on UK TV.

If they have to have it, it'll be Page 3 strength on unencrypted and Confessions of a Window Cleaner strength on encrypted.

They are having it all their way and being backed by the government of the day in their efforts too.

this is not adult tv, if it were brought before the british board of censors it would just about classify as cert 15 , i am finding myself more and more distanced from the shows and havent called in on them for over a year now,i cannot get my head around the people who still find this type of drival entertaining enough to spend 1.53 a minute , its after 11 on a saturday and ive just flicked through for the last time tonight even though camilla"s on,the girl tries her best but with the current state of the limits they are allowed its hardly worth the bother , sooner or later even the die hard fans of the tamer girls will feel short changed on the performances and to put it bluntly i can only see it getting worse

(27-10-2012 20:31 )blackjaques Wrote:  If they have to have it, it'll be Page 3 strength on unencrypted and Confessions of a Window Cleaner strength on encrypted.

This brings up images of Mr & Mrs Ofcom relaxing at home after a long day, sitting down on the sofa (still in its plastic wrapper) wearing socks and sandals and sipping halves of shandy to watch a fun film with a bit of amusing naughtiness. Nothing disturbing or smutty mind. After all they dont want to over stimulate the brain before cocoa time as they have to be up at 7 the next day for a motor down to Cleethorpes.

More seriously I was surprised to see a UK channel on European Hotbird satellite (13 degrees). Exactly matched the UK broadcast apart from the Arabic text. Cant say which as they may have their reasons for keeping quiet, but it was nice to get another chance to see the presenter in her trademark thong.

So heres a thought. Whats to stop British babe channels buying a channel on Hotbird and reselling their content to the various local stations that buy in syndicated filler through the night?

But its tame UK strength you say. True but it would be easy to have a second camera with harder content, or pipe the webstream, or use an unused studio - several channels operate at less than full capacity. The channels are already paying most of the costs so it would be relatively cheap for them.

We have always had a problem with sex in the UK.

The Swinging Sixties and the permissive society are still held to blame for the problems of "Underclass Britain".

A huge fear exists within the ruling classes of what might happen if the rest of British society has television access to explicit sex.
(Don't know why as it's freely available in all other media formats).

Successive governments have therefore implemented a censorious regime against sexual imagery.

How long, for example, did it take to allow full-on sex on video? It was only legitimised in 2000, and that after a fight in the High Court.
The Establishment fears it greatly, unlike our European neighbours who recognise that adults are sexual beings and can make their own choices about what they (and their children) watch on TV.

How do we change Ofcon's stance?

I really don't know.
As an organisation I have found them (on the few occassions I have spoken to them) to be a totally intransigent bunch which leads me to believe that this witch hunt against sex on TV is dogma-driven.

I find it quite dispiriting, to be honest.

(28-10-2012 00:52 )eccles Wrote:  

(27-10-2012 20:31 )blackjaques Wrote:  If they have to have it, it'll be Page 3 strength on unencrypted and Confessions of a Window Cleaner strength on encrypted.

This brings up images of Mr & Mrs Ofcom relaxing at home after a long day, sitting down on the sofa (still in its plastic wrapper) wearing socks and sandals and sipping halves of shandy to watch a fun film with a bit of amusing naughtiness. Nothing disturbing or smutty mind. After all they dont want to over stimulate the brain before cocoa time as they have to be up at 7 the next day for a motor down to Cleethorpes.

More seriously I was surprised to see a UK channel on European Hotbird satellite (13 degrees). Exactly matched the UK broadcast apart from the Arabic text. Cant say which as they may have their reasons for keeping quiet, but it was nice to get another chance to see the presenter in her trademark thong.

So heres a thought. Whats to stop British babe channels buying a channel on Hotbird and reselling their content to the various local stations that buy in syndicated filler through the night?

But its tame UK strength you say. True but it would be easy to have a second camera with harder content, or pipe the webstream, or use an unused studio - several channels operate at less than full capacity. The channels are already paying most of the costs so it would be relatively cheap for them.

Wouldn't work, Eccles, as the channel that takes the syndicated content is still as responsible for it as the broadcaster - as if it were home produced. So Ofcom would be quick to jump on them if the feed exceeded their generally accepted standards guff. Would be interested to know who is broadcasting to Hotbird, though. There was a well-known online only offering that was selling recorded content to Hustler for broadcast on Sirius and Thor - but they have since folded, so no more Brits doing the things we'd like to see more of.

(28-10-2012 18:53 )HenryF Wrote:  Wouldn't work, Eccles, as the channel that takes the syndicated content is still as responsible for it as the broadcaster - as if it were home produced. So Ofcom would be quick to jump on them if the feed exceeded their generally accepted standards guff.

Well spotted HenryF and technically corrrect but it would be interesting to see Ofcom argue that broadcasts aimed at continental Europe to the standard that applies there exceed "generally accepted standards". Particularly if not on the same satellite as Sky but one that could only be received by special dishes.

Since inception Ofcom has not banned a single Euro porn channel aimed at the UK (unlike its predecessors) despite having the power to do so. You can go into WHSmiths and openly buy a magazine where UK businesses openly advertise equipment to receive Euro porn channels.

Why is this not banned? Because the audience know what they are doing.

There have been a few standards cases against Scandinavian channels uplinked from the UK, but those have been clear cut. Strong swearing at kids tea time. Graphic interviews in sex shops at kids tea time. Nothing that smacks of imposing narrow UK views on Norwary or Sweden.

So the prospect of the UK regulator applying UK rules to a strong(er) UK sex channel aimed at Europe and letting it off is not totally far fetched.

The whole thing is absurd.
In the UK, you have this organisation costing millions doing its utmost to keep explicit sex off our TV screens whilst the rest of continental Europe have had theses images on their TV for years and years. I ask you, what damage has it done to France, Holland, Italy, Germany etc? At a guess, bugger all........and all the while doing this under the guise of "child protection".

Any glance at the images on this site of the caps from Babestation x which feature explicit clos-up shots of female genitalia, would surely prompt the question "Why are these images suitable for children and penetration not"?

The answer is, of course, that it's not about protecting kids at all. If kids are in danger from explicit sexual imagery, then they are in danger from it from TV, internet, mobile phones, magazines etc. In short, it does not matter what media format it appears in.

It's all about these fearful idiots at Ofcon imposing their own outdated, puritanical views on the rest of the adult population of Britain.

The real answer is that politicians are afraid of the phoney outrage which would be whipped up in The Daily Mail or The Daily Express if the guidelines were liberalised. What always fascinates me is that we have just about the strictest censorship rules in Europe, yet we also have the highest rates of teenage pregnancies and one of the highest of sex crimes. Go figure!