[Sniperfish]

This has always been my position, and seems common in the ex pat community. I would pay the equivalent license fee just to get access online via iPlayer in a heartbeat.

Some of the issues were touched on by QI creator John Lloyd, when they were trying to get QI licensed for the US(only source I found was dead link referenced by wiki). There are so many differences in licensing around the movie clips and songs used in episodes between countries that what the Beeb can play under fair use in the UK would be prohibitively expensive elsewhere.