should sport be run by big money?

There's the rub - is it better to have a series of sports run by the big money people so that they can provide the facilities that spectators want? Or should sports be run according to what the sports fans want? The truth is that most, if not all, sports are short of money and need rich sponsors. Most have decided the way to get money is to get in the rich and the mighty - and to squeeze as much money from their fans as well. Some have decided that broadcasters are a rich source of funding and so they have sold their souls to the pay per view channels or the subscription channels. That leaves the less rich audiences out in the cold. When recession hits, the ranks of the less rich audiences swell up. That's what we have now.

That's why you'll find football fans sitting in pubs, trying not to drink much, so they can watch their teams on Sky or ESPN. But what about the sports that don't fit pub viewing? The rugby world cup might fill a pub now and then - just as the soccer world cup did, but cricket? Surely not. And Formula 1? Doesn't seem likely somehow. And what about the viewers who don't like pubs?

So where do we go from here? How about sponsors paying the broadcasters' costs so that they can continue free-to-air? Let's face it, we already have public events with a sponsor's name in the title - even the Chelsea Flower Show - and the BBC read out the full title. It's happened for snooker - and for some yacht races...why not F1?

by the people for the people

The row that has broken out in Britain over the TV rights to F1 motor racing raises a question. Who decides what a public broadcaster should do?

It looks more and more likely that the split coverage deal is a direct result of the BBC running out of money and having to find cuts wherever it can. Why did the BBC run out of money? Two reasons spring to mind - poor management and a government refusal to increase the public funding that the BBC relies on. Given that the whole world seems to be short of money, it's not a surprise that the BBC budget has been cut. But if the BBC was a private company, they would have gone out of business long ago without effective management. Stories abound of inflated crews for outside broadcasts; of high salaries for key presenters and artistes; of huge investment in new buildings. No matter how true those stories might be, the question remains - who decides how the BBC should spend its money? How much does the BBC take notice of what its audience wants? Is the problem that the BBC is still riddled with the old public service mentality - in managers and unions?

There is an uncomfortable parallel in the way that Britain's railways have been run. In the 1990s, the rail network was sliced up and sold off - the direct result was poorer services at higher fares and an almost complete lack of network thinking. Studies have shown a huge waste of money on expensive resources - mostly consultants and extra spending on health and safety issues - with little tangible benefit. Now there is an apparent effort to bring the network back under some sort of rational control with lower costs that might come down to the level that other countries spend.

Do we need the same sort of root and branch study of the BBC to cut out waste and bad management and allow the kind of broadcasting that actually meets the needs of the audience? We can all think of things that are bad at the BBC; who will have the guts to tell the top managers and directors it's time they quit?

do broadcasters care about their audiences?

Let's face it; most mass media is aimed at the lowest common denominator - money. In other words broadcasters focus on what costs least, pays most and/or gets the biggest audience. Sports events want TV coverage so they can get big audiences; if it brings in high-paying sponsors - even better. If they can extract money from their audiences - even better still.
So, today, I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that Formula 1 motor racing has gone where the money is. The BBC is short of money and is cutting back on things wherever they can. Today that includes F1 as they have said they are only going to broadcast half of the races and show highlights of the rest; Sky Sports are going to show everything. And what has been the mass reaction from sports fans? Negative - and overwhelmingly so. Why? Because the sport is accessible to everyone if it's free-to-air as it has been so far - whether on ITV or BBC. And because a lot of sports fans either can't afford to pay the high prices demanded by Sky, or because they regard Sky as the Evil Empire - not surprising if you look at the bad press their majority shareholder, News International (aka the Murdochs), has been getting. Sky is the lowest of the low when it comes to quality - and the highest of the high when it comes to subscription prices.

The way out of this mess? Get the sponsors and the teams and the stars to fund the free-to-air broadcasts. Remove the possibility of exclusive broadcasts by TV channels that are not free-to-air. If Sky complain, tell them to go back to the US or Australia..or....