BBC4 to be scrapped?

So says The Guardian.

I doubt it will happen, but it would be stupid if they did do it. BBC4 may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it shows and has produced some of the best stuff on TV in recent times. Most of the decent foreign dramas like The Killing & Wallander are shown there, as are the arts & history shows.
Why not scrap CBeebies?

 

My kids love Cbeebies (as do I) and I'm sure room can be made on 1,2 & 3 if they binned all the damned repeats

 

I doubt BBC4 is very expensive to run, and it's where much of the BBC's creative output comes from.
BBC3 is full of repeats, scale that back and then use the savings.

 

As far as I can tell BBC4 has always been considered a bit of a bad move as it's essentialy a channel that dealt with programming BBC2 was already airing, where as BBC1 and BBC3 were both aimed at relatively seperate demographics.

Ultimately I don't think it would be much of a loss. Apart from Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe, The First Men Inside the Moon and the adaptation of Dirk Gently I haven't really watched much on BBC4. I think it's documentaries would easily be sourced to BBC2 and the money saved from axing the channel could go into new programming.

On the same subject though, I found out that the BBC are selling the Radio Times! Blasphemy I say!

 

I agreed with you completely until your last line. By saying that, you're saying "I don't watch CBeebies, so why not get rid of that instead". Well, more people watch CBeebies than BBC4. And CBeebies also produces great educational material, albeit to a different market than BBC4. Given the choice, I'd rather the young be educated than adults - adults who want education can seek it out for themselves.

By saying that, you've undermined your entire argument I'm afraid.

 

My 3 year old prefers Super Why and Team Umizoomi on Nick Jr at the moment (which is great. He knows his alphabet and loves playing the relevant apps on the iPad). But we have soft spots for Something Special, Show Me Show Me, and Zingzillas. Great educational stuff.

 

Radio TImes is awesome, I hope the quality won't decrease if the BBC no longer produces it.

 

I thought that the whole reason the Beeb ditched F1 was so they could keep BBC4 going?

 

According to the Mail it has been saved as changes will be made elsewhere.

 

While I wouldn't trust what the Mail says, it is good if it is true.

I mean, if they really had to cut a channel, it would surely be BBC3. Now, I like BBC3, but it is mainly a repeats channel (Dr Who, Merlin, comedies that could be aired on BBC2 anyway) aside from Family Guy which could be moved to BBC2.

If they can keep it all then great.

The BBC really has to stop worrying about ratings, it shouldn't be doing that. It doesn't need ratings to get income like the advert channels do, so a show with minor viewing figures is hardly a problem to them. BBC2 was always the minority channel anyway, who cares if a show only gets 1 or 2million viewers? Surely that was the point of putting on BBC2, so the minority who like it can see it.
The more the BBC focuses on attracting viewers, the more rubbish it tends to make. If it focused on making good TV, people will watch it anyway.