pearce:
" 'Altho a license to watch TV is very bizzaro..'
Better that than having your viewing interrupted by adverts every five minutes."

They who would give up an essential liberty for TV, deserve neither liberty or TV.

"The link PJF gave merely states that watching live TV on your puter/phone or whatever is covered by the standard licence."

Perhaps it was being overwhelmed by uninterrupted TV that caused you to miss the first paragraph in bold:
People who watch TV on mobile phones or computers could face a 1,000 fine unless they have a 126.50 TV licence.

It clearly states that watching live broadcasts on devices and services other than television requires a licence from the state TV company.

That is very relevant to this thread because of the way the law is interpreted. You do not need a licence to own a TV. Conversely, you do not have to actually watch a television in order to be required to licence it.

You can buy a TV and keep it sealed in its retail box. You can buy a TV, detune it from TV signals and use it as a monitor for watching movies on DVD, or for playing computer games. Neither of these circumstances requires a licence.

Yet - if you have a TV set tuned in and plugged into the mains but never switch it on, then you need a licence. This is because (despite what the BBC propaganda says) the licence is for having equipment capable of receiving live broadcasts, not for actually watching the broadcasts. For example, if you buy a computer from PC World that happens to have a TV card in it as part of the package, then you require a licence even if you never watch TV on it. People have already been prosecuted for this criminal offense of having a TV card in their computer.

So, if the BBC can convince the other parts of government that broadband internet services inevitably provide the ability to watch live TV streams (as they do) and so should require a licence - then anyone using the internet on broadband will be required to pay a licence even if they don't ever watch TV on it. They've already done so with mobile phones. Broadband is next.