How Lord Reith did us a favour
Jeremy BullmoreWPP
Britain's strict stance on TV advertising may be helping to protect trust in brands.
When, in the early 1950s, the idea of a commercially funded television channel was first seriously debated in Britain, there was only one country we could look to for guidance and that was America. And American television was almost entirely funded by sponsorship: popular programmes included Kraft TV Theater, Philco Playhouse and Colgate Comedy Hour.
So when draft plans for a possible UK commercial channel were first drawn up, sponsorship...