Charging for iView is an insane idea

The Lewis review into the ABC’s efficiency reportedly suggests that the ABC should charge for iView content. I’m not surprised that the idea would be floated, but it is an appallingly short-sighted idea.
According to the news report, which you can read over at The Age, one of the key recommendations into the government’s “Efficiency Review” is that iView content should be made available on a pay per view basis for legacy content.
It’s a frankly insane AND insulting proposal, and here’s why.
For a start, the future of television is in online broadcasting. Nobody seriously doubts this, although as we discussed in a recent episode of Vertical Hold, the models for internet distribution are still in flux.
As such, the fact that the ABC has a service such as iView is something that should be lauded, not dismantled. Compare iView to any of the commercial broadcasters, and you’ll hit models that look outdated, offer terrible content choices with woeful interfaces. I’m excluding SBS On Demand from that as while they offer commercials, they’re not a commercial broadcaster, and in any case there’s apparently also the suggestion that SBS On Demand should be rolled into iView as well.
But charging for access to iView is quite obviously the first step on a slippery slope, because it brings with it the issue of how to charge, when to charge, and whether to continue to offer non-performing programs.
Commercial TV territory, in other words, which is after all part of the history of the review’s chair Peter Lewis; he’s a former Seven West Media CFO. It limits what iView could do in the future, because minority programming, or the subjects that commercial networks rarely touch (including, for example, sports such as Netball, because despite being in ‘Straya, some sports are more equal than others) would be the first to go. Not “efficient”, you see.
There’s a huge cultural loss there, as making programs for niches in a medium such as television opens them up to wider audiences and wider debate. Four Corners is a good example of this — consider the brouhaha around live animal exports a year or so back after a report there, and consider what keeping that issue dark actually means. Now multiply that by any other program locked away because it didn’t meet “efficiency” guidelines.
It’s also an insulting proposal. The Age report notes that “Most ABC iView content would remain free on the grounds taxpayers have already paid to produce it”, but that archival programs could be paid for under a subscription model.
Hang on… didn’t we already pay to produce that stuff as well? It’s fundamentally the privatisation model beloved of many conservatives; get the masses to stump up money for an asset that they already own.
I’m not opposed, for what it’s worth, to the idea of an international iView subscription for interested parties, although I do wonder how effective it might be. Those keen on the content could well end up behind a VPN to get access if it’s of interest to them.
Naturally, the side effect of weakening the ABC’s output is undeniably one that certain serious backers of the LNP would adore, but that’s not what it’s all about. Efficiency, harrumph, and all that. The standard riposte has been that the efficiency report is all about clearing out excess staff at the back end of the ABC, not affecting programs, but I can’t see how a proposal like this doesn’t affect programs now and into the future, because it fundamentally affects the programs that the ABC can show on iView.
If anything, the ABC should be congratulated for being so far ahead of the commercial competition, but again, that’s not going to happen.
Just before the last election, Malcolm Turnbull declared — and I remember it, because I noted it down at the time — that “there is no more committed defender of public broadcasting in Parliament than me”.
My comment at the time was this:
No, Malcolm. Defenders actually try to stop having Auntie’s arms and legs chopped off. That’s what they do.

It looks like the ABC’s legs will be the first to go.