Public service going commercial

So, apparently the Swedish public service television broadcaster SVT will now be featuring commercials. Fine by me, as I assume this means we won't have to pay that annual public service fee? If we are, what exactly are we paying for?

SVT Play expiration date

Few things annoy me as much as media corporations try to strangle culture in any possible way. I thought this behaviour would be limited to the large, multi-national corporations, so color me surprised when I tried out SVT Play, the on-demand streaming service, the other day. Now mind you, SVT is public service TV, funded by the taxpayers. And believe it or not these incredible weasels have the nerve to put an expiration date on the material available on their site! Are you freakin' kidding me???

Sure I could understand this with movies or shows that have been bought with certain licensing conditions, but the thing is SVT is doing the exact same with the material they produce themselves.

As a public service broadcaster SVT should be forced to release all material they create into the public domain. That's only fair as the public has paid for it.

(Filed under "...and you still wonder why people pirate?").