Hacker Cinema
Watchdog
1985 · TV series · documentary · 30 min episodes · 42 seasons
Watchdog is a BBC television series that investigates viewers' reports of problematic experiences with traders, retailers, and other companies around the UK. It has had great success in changing the awareness consumers have of their purchasing rights and in changing policies of companies, closing down businesses, and pushing for law changes. It is shown on BBC One and is available for online viewing or download via BBC iPlayer.
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2 comments on Hacker News
> This is the sort of problem that solves itself.
Unfortunately it doesn't. If you've ever watched the UK TV series "Watchdog" you'll see time after time people set up businesses, rip people off, go bankrupt, rinse and repeat. Game theory trumps economic models here - and the rules of the game are whatever loopholes these people can find.
To be fair these cinema clowns haven't done anything much worse than a 'fair usage policy' on a mobile phone offering 'unlimited calls' would do. They were sly about it rather than upfront. They could have just introduced new terms as of the next payment. But the general point is about the free market sorting this sort of thing out doesn't work.
There was actually a piece on this on Watchdog (a BBC Uk consumer issues programme) just last night. One hotel owner (which provides free Wifi) said it cost them £300 to provide the Wifi, he had 150 rooms so £1.50 a month/5p a day. The cost of the Wifi equipment that needed to be installed? His reply was "it's like fitting toilets, it's a one off cost which you just need to pay". They were specifically looking at the cost of wifi when staying at top hotels, some costing up to £20 a night. Your argument was one they also raised :)
The reason for the extortionate costs? Probably to make up for the lost revenue streams from people not using the in-room phones any more. I hope at that at least in this instance the guy wasn't paying for the internet access, that would be taking the p*ss!
For those of you in the UK then the show is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01fhfw8/Watchdog_05_04_2012/