[dbone]

I still wonder about 20 years ago when BBC was making this MAD rush to online services and then half of them got mothballed or archived, What was the point in that?

Some were forced to close (BBC Jam) by commercial entities that felt threatened that the license fee was being used to provide what they saw as commercial services. In many areas it was pure cost savings - some of the space has been since filled by commercial sites. If the BBC websites were able to have adverts then lots of these would probably still be active and making money for the BBC.

You can also pitch the idea that the trusted brand of the BBC was used to help the British public go online and part of the BBCs educational remit. Just the same as the BBC Micro in the 80s got people into the home PC.