19 Jan, 2010, Idealiad wrote in the 2nd comment:

Votes: 0

OK, that's hilarious, but…Swedes don't really pay 25 dollars a month to use a TV….do they?

edit: OK. They do.

And check this out – in the UK:

Quote

Detection of evasion of television licences

In many jurisdictions, television licences are enforced. The BBC states 'television detector vans' are employed by TV Licensing in the UK.[67] Besides claims of (usually undisclosed) sophisticated technological methods (such as TEMPEST[citation needed]) for the detection of operating televisions, detection of illegal television sets can be as simple as the observation of the lights and sounds of an illegally used television in a user's home at night. Detection is made much easier because nearly all houses do have a licence, so only those houses that do not have a licence need to be checked.

Sorry to hijack this homage to Crat but it's just too weird.

19 Jan, 2010, KaVir wrote in the 3rd comment:

Votes: 0

Idealiad said:

And check this out – in the UK

Similar in Germany with the GEZ, except they charge you if you have any broadcast receiving device (such as a mobile phone, a computer with internet access, a radio alarm clock, a car radio, etc). The GEZ always assumes you have a TV, and if you claim otherwise they'll keep sending you threatening letters, and even send their employees to your house to try and 'trick' you into letting them inside so they can see if you've got a TV (fortunately, like vampires, they can't enter without an invitation). If you want to deregister it usually takes months of fighting with them, as they have a tendancy to keep 'accidently' losing the forms you're required to send them. Not even death (or being both deaf and blind) will get them off your back. Most people seem to view them as little more than a legalised mafia organisation.