> Quite frankly it's ridiculous - imagine needing to pay a "fee" to CNN/Fox News/NYTimes/Yahoo just because you have a internet connection and web browser.

This comparison is ridiculous. The license fee is a little outdated in certain aspects but it covers more than just broadcast news as the orgs you mentioned do.

The BBC has a broad remit to inform, educate, and entertain. Not in itself radically different to a lot of other broadcasters, and typical for a public service broadcaster, but the universal license fee is a key differentiator.

In requiring everyone with a television to contribute, the BBC has a duty to serve the entire population of a country, regardless of their income or demographic. This enables the BBC to produce content that may not be commercially viable for privately funded broadcasters that in term can serve communities that would otherwise be overlooked. BBC's Three and Four channels tend to best exemplify this aspect with content that can often be slightly niche and, in the case of Three, regularly have casts and production crews that are far more diverse than the industry averages.

The license fee is also independent of the state budget. The Government does have the power and oversight to adjust funding every 5-11 years, but the royal charter ensures that funding is separate from typical taxation and avoids the Treasury. This also ensures (in theory) that there is more autonomy for accurate, fair, and unbiased news reporting.

The BBC has also for most of its existence operated and maintained a lot of shared broadcasting infrastructure (which admittedly is less key as viewing moves away from terrestrial broadcast and towards IP services, and to a lesser extent cable and satellite). In the previous charter they also had a responsibility to improve broadband infrastructure in rural areas.

There's also a final aspect to this in that the BBC performs a lot of public service open research into emerging technologies as well as the social impact of them and different forms of media. Most media organisations don't care about anything other than how much of a person's attention they can capture at the expense of everything else. More eyes on a media org = more advertising sold. The BBC's model means they can actually give consideration to what healthy consumption is and how to promote digital wellbeing etc., as well as ensuring younger audiences are better catered for (there's a great article on how YouTube Kids has severely let down its young audiences in the past here: https://medium.com/@jamesbridle/something-is-wrong-on-the-in... )

While you're certainly correct about the ideals of the BBC, there are enough people who have decidedly stopped consuming their content, either because of the terrible decline in quality (I stopped reading BBCNews because of the clickbait years ago), or preference not to consume it in general. Mandatory license fees, and any enforcement to collect as such, is therefore completely ridiculous in this day and age.

More than 90% of households in the UK watch/listen/read at last 1 things on the BBC every week.

A lot of people say "Oh I don't consume anything the BBC makes", and often they just don't realise that they do.

In the UK, the BBC is a secular religion, much like the NHS.

I'm not sure using CNN and Fox News as examples of how the system should work is a great counterpoint. The US has a massive problem with terrible quality TV and web news sources. The licence fee system at least attempts to create an alternative to that.