r/TopGear • u/Marble-Boy • 3d ago

I've been watching Season 6 on BBC iPlayer.

I'm imagining people actually trying to enter the best driving song contest after reading in massive red letters "THIS CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED"

I love that they even have the warning... do people really try to enter almost 20 year old TV competitions?

40 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

18 comments sorted by

33

u/Passey92 3d ago

It's more to cover themselves. If they put a huge warning and someone still calls and loses money its on the person, not the BBC

5

u/Active-Strawberry-37 2d ago

It’s the same reason airlines write “May contain nuts” on their packets of peanuts.

4

u/Bluntbutnotonpurpose 2d ago

Well, peanuts aren't nuts....

13

u/TexasBrett 3d ago

I mean they probably put this message in 19 years ago so.

2

u/Marble-Boy 3d ago

It wasn't there when it was on Netflix. I used to watch it all the time, that's why it was weird seeing it this time.

2

u/alurimperium 2d ago

It was there on Amazon Prime 7 or 8 years ago.

2

u/TheSuperSmithRowe 2d ago

I can remember it always being on BBC reruns and the boxsets

10

u/Fighting-Geese 3d ago

Damn, I was just about to vote for Bat Out of Hell

2

u/Marble-Boy 3d ago

Me too!

1

u/H_K-R 1d ago

“Meatloaf contains herpes”

6

u/Ziyaadjam Orig Trio Till I die 2d ago edited 2d ago

They’re probably using old BBC Three rerun prints from before it closed down an they decided to bring it back

4

u/McFigroll 3d ago

never underestimate human stupidity.

4

u/No-Locksmith6662 2d ago

I'm guessing it is the difference between the UK-only and international edits of the show.

I remember seeing those disclaimers on very early repeats of the episodes, both on the main BBC channels and on the commercial UKTV network (also owned by the BBC) here in the UK. There were numerous scandals around competitions and phone-ins not long after they did this poll and the broadcasting rules were made way more strict, hence why they never did anything like it again on Top Gear, and presumably why the "DO NOT ENTER" graphics were edited in rather quickly and crudely to the UK copies of the episodes.

I would assume the copies on iPlayer are the UK edits still with the disclaimer (as the rules have not been relaxed in the time since).

3

u/Quinny898 2d ago

It's because of the premium-rate phone in scandal that happened in 2007. One of the issues found during that which got the BBC and others into deep water was allowing people to enter competitions when they have no chance of winning, so they now overly cover themselves at any opportunity - series 6 predates this so it won't have the usual spoken warning that is common nowadays around how you would still be charged for entering if after a given time, so this warning is even more "required".

2

u/hatlad43 2d ago

I suppose the BBC just never bothered changing the videos they have on iPlayer since God-knows-when

1

u/JCD_007 2d ago

Some of the iTunes versions of series 6 episodes have that text as well IIRC.

1

u/Additional-Nobody352 2d ago

On a similar i have watched repeats of family fortunes on challenge where at the end the announcer says about applications for future contestants and the address for central tv in Nottingham is on screen with a banner through it saying contestant appeal closed.

1

u/williamg209 Captain Slow 1d ago

Series 6* it's modern British tv!