NY wrote:
"Tim Watts" wrote in message
...
Pity the same standards are not applied to licensing a station now
as were applied even when Channel 4 was created though - we have 60+
channels of useless **** when instead the bandwidth could have gone
to making about 10 channels *really good* DTV quality.

Agreed. There are far too many dross channels (shopping, holidays,
docusoaps) which should be made to reduce their bitrates to allow
room for the mainstream channels. Even when additional multiplexes
have been introduced, they have been to provide more channels (eg HD
versions of SD channels) rather than to give existing channels more
bandwidth.

If the 'mainstream channels' wnated to broadcast higher bitrates, they
could surely do their bit to free up room by removing their largely
redundant and unnecessary +1 channels, which seem to me to be just a way
of channel-squatting as insurance against the unlikely event that they
find anything worthwhile to broadcast. Would they really be missed if
they were closed down?