[icebraining]

I'm pretty sure it's standard across most of the EU. Portugal also has its own (RTP - Portuguese Radio and Television). Personally, I don't find it any better than the private channels. Even the more cultural/alternative channel has plenty of crap (e.g. Two and a Half Men).

[josteink]

While the content may not be better, I find the non-commercial, state-funded stations to have better online solutions.

Their content is after all licensed for everyone to use as they see fit (it belongs to the people), and thus their main limitation is what technology can do, and not what the license permits them to.

We have the same situation in Norway with NRK, which has a fantastic web-offering, not to mention native apps for Android and iOS. It's at the point where you don't need a TV to watch (their) TV-content.

None of the commercial counterparts are ready to offer that, at least not with an experience at the same level of quality.

[icebraining]

Oh, yeah, they have mobile apps as well, but frankly, the content they produce is rarely good enough to bother to even install it.

Besides, nowadays you can get a DVB-T stick the size of a flash drive for less than 10€, so watching without a TV isn't exactly hard even without mobile apps.

[josephlord]

Most of Europe has some public broadcaster but both the level of funding and the model of funding varies widely. Many public broadcasters rely on advertising.

Also the funding available is also dependent on the population so even with other things being equal (and they probably aren't) the total size of a Portuguese service and its capacity to make programmes would be about 1/6 that of the BBC.