State of British Childrens' TV

[Greg David]

Have any of you guys seen the news today about OFCOM's comments regarding childrens' programming in the UK?

For more details check this out

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/med...

Personally, this doesn't come as a shock to me at all. Even before the banning of junk-food ads came into force, the budgets for kids programming have been slashed,but recently ITV ceased making their own shows for CITV.

This has been coming for a while now. Funnily enough, yesterday I read a report by Pact called 'Mouse or Superhero' which detailed the state of the animation industry in the UK. The report was written in April 2002, but applies very much to today. The report says that due to limited funding, a lot of the UK productions are having to be co-produced with overseas studios, who end up having more control and gain more financially than the original studio. It's like I came up with the idea, but had it snatched from me, leaving me with nothing or very little to show for my efforts. Don't get me wrong, I've nothing against co-producing, but there are obvious downsides to it.

The report goes on to say that studios are surviving from production to production, rather than having a long-term income through Intellectual Property Rights.

Does this mean the beginning of the end, as a lot of analysts have been saying? When you read that the budget for CBeebies this year was an estimated £16 million, whilst it's reported that presenter Jonathan Ross's BBC salary was £8 million, it certainly makes you wonder where the BBC's priorities are, doesn't it?

[calzord]

yer your right, i just hope that ofcom dont come down even more on cartoons that could be seen as violent or disturbing(funny or wierd) any how bbc suck, and gernraly its kinda crap to be an animator in britain.