Archives for Television
Who's afraid of Ashley Highfield? (July 19, 2006) Today it was announced that the BBC's New Media operations are going to be restructured radically. At the moment most of the content creation parts of the organisation are kind of co-owned - for example, Simon Nelson who was the...
Cybermen are Human 2.0? (May 13, 2006) According to Doctor Who, the Cybermen are Humans 2.0 (or more specifically, Human Point Two, which... means... very little). But I protest! I'm not sure Human 2.0 means anything at all! It's just a stupid buzzword. Of course it...
It's all about K9 on Doctor Who... (April 29, 2006) It's really difficult to pretend that today is really about anything else than K9's reappearance on Doctor Who this evening. I'm a bit nervous about leaving the house at all, just in case the tube goes down or something and...
Is the pace of change really such a shock? (April 26, 2006) I've got Matt Biddulph staying with me and been hanging out with Paul Hammond a lot recently again and since they're both ex-BBC colleagues, we've inevitably found ourselves talking a bit about what's going on at the organisation at the...
The BBC's open programme information project... (April 26, 2006) Here's an interesting development from my old employers - the project that Biddulph, Loosemore and Hammersley (and others) have been working on at the BBC is now live and playable with. It's the full Infax archive of programme information...
A brief follow-up on TV distribution... (April 8, 2006) I wrote a post a few days ago called Quick observations on TV distribution in which I made a number of outrageous claims that I pretty much stand by. It was a bit of an off-the-cuff and not entirely digested...
Quick observations on TV distribution... (April 7, 2006) I observed today that it's now possible in the US to not only buy individual episodes of Lost via iTunes but that the Season Pass functionality now includes automatic delivery of all future episodes of the show for a massively...
Eagerly awaiting an Apple Media Hub... (January 7, 2006) While I'm on a roll and getting all my wanted-to-post-but-didn't-have-time stuff out in public, I thought I'd just put out my stall again with regards to what I think an Apple Media Hub should be like. With MacWorld only three...
Google become the latest to distribute TV... (January 7, 2006) A few months ago I wrote a piece called Will subscription media kill broadcast? in which I stuck on the internet my long-held belief that the six major players in the distribution of pay-for video content online (the long-term replacements...
On Space Cadets... (November 17, 2005) There's an article in the Independent newspaper today that I'm trying really hard to convince myself isn't true. If it is true, it sounds like one of the cruelest things I've ever heard of. A group of people chosen for...
Will subscription media kill broadcast? (November 15, 2005) I just got chucked a link to some video by Kevin Marks - an early pioneer of the technology that would eventually become podcasting - in which he talks about his time in broadcast as a cameraman, working at Apple...
More 4 "Daily Show" confusion... (October 17, 2005) So changing the subject away from how great I am for just one minute because frankly it's all a bit embarrassing, I'm watching the Daily Show on More 4 and suddenly - after a week - it's gone all Global...
Supernova '05: Chris Anderson on the Long Tail... (June 29, 2005) Quick apologies - my notes and write up of Supernova have been thrown out of whack by various unforeseeable pressures. I'm going to try and get through them very quickly now. This session was held last Tuesday at 11am. It's...
On future developments in home media centres... (June 2, 2005) A couple of days ago I was e-mail interviewed by a guy writing an article on future developments in televisions and home media centres who was interested in the piece I wrote on Social Software for Set-Top Boxes. For what...
More thoughts on Doctor Who and Bad Wolf... (May 30, 2005) There are a whole ton of theories all over the internet at the moment about all the 'Bad Wolf' references appearing in Doctor Who. In two weeks an episode called "Bad Wolf" will air, and it looks like it's the...
Weinberger on the BBC / Are presentations redundant? (May 7, 2005) So this is nice - via my boss I'm directed to a brief piece by David Weinberger on some of the work going on around the BBC at the moment and featuring some of the stuff we've been doing in...
Social Software for Set-Top boxes... (March 23, 2005) You can download the core part of the material that follows as a PDF presentation entitled Social Software for Set-Top Boxes (4Mb). A buddy-list for television: Imagine a buddy-list on your television that you could bring onto your screen with...
Celebrity, historical, fictional Big Brother... (January 13, 2005) So after due consideration over lunch at Benugo the other day, here is our fully worked-through and comprehensive list of our ideal celebrity / historical / fictional Big Brother: Germaine Greer Jessica Rabbit Gizmo Marcel Marceau Princess Peach Captain Nemo...
A really rough proposal for an Apple Media Hub (Illustrations) (January 11, 2005) This part is mostly about: Illustrations of what an Apple Media Hub might look like and how it might function. If you have not done so already, you should first go and read Part One and Part Two which do...
A really rough proposal for an Apple Media Hub (Part Two) (January 11, 2005) This part is mostly about: How to get a device into people's homes that opens up these markets and these possibilities and lets people do more stuff with their stuff. If you have not done so already, you should first...
A really rough proposal for an Apple Media Hub (Part One) (January 11, 2005) This part is mostly about: The drive towards digital media in the home, and changes in the media creation and distribution ecology: So I'm going to write this quickly because it's been stuck in my head for months, and even...
I have no opinion about this whatsoever... (July 13, 2004) I have no opinion about this whatsoever. Here are just four links in a row, presented in a reverse-chronological (most recent first) fashion with no attempt whatsoever to make a point, which nonetheless are prefaced with a proviso that any...
On pets... (November 12, 2003) So Queer Eye for the Straight Guy was apparently - woo - a tremendous success in the States and everyone was so happy about it and stuff because - ha ha - funny gay men patronising the dumbass straight men...
Third pilot of the week: Alias... (September 18, 2001) Third pilot of the week is Alias. When a young woman reveals to her fiancé that she works for the CIA, he is executed by a hit squad hired by her employers. How she deals with this, whether her employers...
A most entertaining pile of crap... (September 17, 2001) My second pilot of the day is Thieves, which was frankly the most entertaining pile of crap I've seen in months. The plot is totally ridiculous - two crack thieves - one male and one female - are foiled during...
In celebration of stroppier TV characters... (March 14, 2001) Much television is anodyne, unimaginative and without redeeming characters or plots. Even those which are imaginative and intelligently put together are often morally dubious. Take Ally McBeal for one. This is an imaginatively made TV series which celebrates and indulges...
On The Top 100 British TV Programmes... (September 15, 2000) There's a list of the top one hundred British TV programmes ever made over at the BFI's site [bfi TV Top 100]. I just thought I'd comment on a few anomalies as I read through it. 2) Cathy Come Home...
On Pottery Barn, Friends and Advertising... (June 24, 2000) Do you remember that episode of Friends where Rachel is obsessed by the Pottery Barn? Well when I first saw it I thought to myself - hmmm, what a strange premise for an episode. And because we don't even have...
Vile Stick-Insect Ally McBeal... (June 18, 2000) Today's briefing is brought to you through the tremendous power of absolute and total denial. The day has been filled with all the activities that help me distract myself from bad stuff around me. These include: Chocolate, Random Sex, Music,...
