BBC and Sky fight it out in Edinburgh.
Last week the Edinburgh international television festival became a hotbed of debate over the future of British TV when BSkyB boss Tony Ball opened the festival with a keynote speech in which he viciously attacked the BBC and claimed that the corporation:
- Is producing a load of old "bollocks." that no one wants to watch.
- Only has a couple of good programs "such as Eastenders and The Weakest link"
- Has been dumbing down it's programming so far that "it can't really get any more dumber".
He went on to reveal a detailed plan for "saving" the BBC by forcing the corporation to sell its successful programs to competing companies such as BskyB.
Later in the festival the BBC chief Greg Dyke used his own speech to reply point by point.
In a scathing defence of the BBC Dyke told the packed conference hall that:
- Eastenders and “The Weakest link” despite Ball's claims are, on the contrary, not good programs at all.
- That the BBC's other programs are “not a load of old bollocks” and that some of them are “actually quite good".
- That BSkyB's programs are "Complete Crap" and
- ITV is "even worse".
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