The media dinosaurs will never learn

I’m a big fan of the BBC. Their output is light years ahead of the commercial stations. Mainly because of the way they are funded, being completely detached from the need to please their advertisers.

Torchwood, Children of Earth, has just finished its 5 night run. The story, putting the plot holes that seem to plague modern science fiction was compelling, harrowing, adult and intensely engrossing. Unfortunately, because of the unbelievably myopic way the BBC and BBC America schedule their output, I can’t tell you much more about the story without spoiling it for the vast majority of you.

I’ve seen it but anyone outside of the UK won’t get it until July 20.

This means that Doctor Who and Torchwood fans outside of the UK have to make a choice. They can either wait, obediently, until July 20, or they can download the episodes in glorious high definition from any number of Torrent sites. Of course, the die hard fans are already downloading tonight’s episode as we speak.

What the dinosaurs can’t get through their heads is that most people will only seek out underground download channels if they are prevented legitimate access to the things they seek.

Make things available and the overwhelming majority of people will take them, or buy them, from the official channels.

Before I go any further I have a quick warning. The rest of this post contains contains spoilers. If you haven’t already seen Torchwood, Children of Earth, you might not want to read any further.

Of course, with the internet being open, fans have been talking on Twitter. The shows writers, the ones who are on Twitter, have been desperately running around, trying to put the genie back in the bottle after people have written spoiler laden messages such as,

Ianto! No!

and,

Why the hell are U.N.I.T going along with all this instead of attacking the 456?

and,

Jack turns into the bad guy as he sacrifices his grandson.

People were so shocked at poor Ianto’s sudden departure at the end of episode 4 that he even had his own #Ianto hash tag on Twitter!

The result of this is that viewing figures for the series when it finally airs on BBC America, or wherever it finally ends up, will be substantially lower than if the powers that be had the common sense to make it available to everyone at the same time.

Piracy flourishes in a restrictive market. One day the dinosaurs but wake up to that fact. But until that day arrives the Torrent sites will thrive.

Ashley Morgan is a UK jazz trumpet player and owner of independent record label 447 Records. Ashley Morgan is the trumpet player with Enormous.