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Radio 2 "glitch" leaves listeners baffled.

 
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Ian Robinson
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Joined: 11 Dec 2006
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Location: Chorley, Lancashire

PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2013 10:51 am    Post subject: Radio 2 "glitch" leaves listeners baffled. Reply with quote

Sounds like the tapes all went wrong when the clocks went back on Saturday. Typical of the slapdash approach to things nowadays...

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/oct/27/radio-2-glitch-listeners-baffled
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Colin



Joined: 26 Sep 2013
Posts: 916

PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2013 11:02 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Tapes? The use of tape would suggest that somebody has to be there to hit the "Play" button. Clearly no such person was present and so it was all left to the automated playout system.

I agree though, it's slapdash and unfortunately symptomatic of the lowering standards in broadcasting today.
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xanadu



Joined: 17 Oct 2013
Posts: 70

PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2013 3:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The BBC is like British Leyland in the 70s, the nightshift turn up with sleeping bags and an alarm clock: they wouldn't want to sleep into their own time.
The sooner the licence fee is done away with the better.
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Colin



Joined: 26 Sep 2013
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2013 7:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

xanadu wrote:
The BBC is like British Leyland in the 70s, the nightshift turn up with sleeping bags and an alarm clock: they wouldn't want to sleep into their own time.


That simply isn't true. Today, thanks to continuing political interference, the BBC has been forced to dispense with many hundreds of highly skilled and experienced technical grade employees (some of whom have given their all to the corporation for many years) who have been put onto short-term freelance contracts to the point where crewing "families" on TV productions in centres that were once exemplars of broadcasting (such at BBC TV Centre) have now been disbanded and freelances are brought in who might have been working for an ITV company earlier or an indie. Good old fashioned "team work" has largely gone. Every branch of the BBC has been affected.

Of course, this has come at a time of unprecedented technological change - largely around automation and server-driven acquisition, production, distribution and even archiving processes. The problem experienced by Radio 2 the other night is symptomatic of the fact that robotics have largely replaced humans - hardly the "British Leyland" syndrome! The reason for BL's downfall was primarily because the top management were utterly useless and didn't have a clue. Moreover, they assumed that people would continue to buy the same old crappy cars indefinitely. They were blinkered and that's why they collapsed. You can't compare that situation to the BBC; the quality of programming of TV, radio and web content is in general excellent - and where technology is concerned the BBC is an innovator. Just look at iPlayer - acknowledged by the industry worldwide as being at the leading edge. And it shows - because competing systems just don't work as well.

I have known and worked with lots of BBC people over the years and I can honestly say I've never been acquainted with a more professional and friendly bunch of people anywhere. Many good BBC staff had been treated appallingly by successive managements and meddling, stupid politicians who should keep their noses out but can't - witness comments by that idiot Grant Shapps yesterday. The Daily Mail loves it, of course, and that's why he said it.

xanadu wrote:
The sooner the licence fee is done away with the better.


I couldn't agree less. I'd love to know how to finance a Public Service Broadcast organisation (that is respected around the world) in a way that enables it to remain free of commercial pressures and yet which keeps it at arm's length from direct political control as is the case in many other countries around the world. That was Reith's original vision and in my view it's still relevant today.

The alternative is to hand the lot over to the Murdoch Mafia. If ever that happens then I'll start the revolution!
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xanadu



Joined: 17 Oct 2013
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PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2013 9:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Verbose. Sorry, your answer is just too long. The point I was trying to make has been lost in the noise. It just doesn't matter. As long as the BBC is funded the way it is, it will be the way it is. Great if you work for the BBC.
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Colin



Joined: 26 Sep 2013
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 9:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

xanadu wrote:
Verbose. Sorry, your answer is just too long. The point I was trying to make has been lost in the noise. It just doesn't matter. As long as the BBC is funded the way it is, it will be the way it is. Great if you work for the BBC.


The short answer (given that you can't be bothered to read): You argument makes no sense and therefore I don't agree.
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xanadu



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PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 1:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So you think financing an organisation by threatening anyone whom doesn't want to chip in, with imprisonment, is a good model? Nice. There is no opt out even for people whom never use the BBC. Still, nice work, if you can get it. Easy money.
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Colin



Joined: 26 Sep 2013
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 1:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

xanadu wrote:
So you think financing an organisation by threatening anyone whom doesn't want to chip in, with imprisonment, is a good model? Nice. There is no opt out even for people whom never use the BBC. Still, nice work, if you can get it. Easy money.


Well, we either have a system of public service broadcasting that is neither funded from direct taxation nor unleashed to the ravages of commercialism (aka the Murdoch Mafia) and that's the model that was recommended by Reith and the one which I still think of as the "least worst" means of funding the organisation.

That's my opinion. Your link to the funding model and the cock-up involving server-based transmission playout systems is beyond me, however.

But you don't like reading too much so I'll leave it there.
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mark occomore



Joined: 07 Dec 2006
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Location: UK

PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 5:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm surprised there wasn't anyone in the studio over looking this? The station has had their equipment recently updated as Ken and a few others have been broadcasting from Radio 1 studios. Obviously the playout system didn't recognise the clock change or wasn't programmed in correctly?
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Colin



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PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 6:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

mark occomore wrote:
I'm surprised there wasn't anyone in the studio over looking this?


Only duty officers on the desk, probably. Anyway, the current playout system is accessible by remote login (on a highly restricted basis, obviously) but it's clear that the system didn't auto-update the switch to GMT, which itself is slaved to the master pulse generated in the bowls of the Old Broadcasting House.
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ruddlescat



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PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 6:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have to agree that the licence fee probably is the least worst alternative option for funding the BBC - in actual fact for the number of channels we get it's very good value - everyone knows my views about the Murdoch media - but that isn't to say that there isn't something seriously wrong with Auntie Beeb at present

After the Savile fiasco for which it seems nobody wants to accept responsibility we then have the disgusting issue of excessive pay offs for discredited high profile BBC elite executives whilst as I'm sure Colin well knows ordinary highly qualified and very competent employees are having their working conditions downgraded or even got rid of completely in favour of contract staff whose services can be dispensed with easily and at no cost

Really therefore I agree with both of you if that doesn't sound too much like sitting on the fence - ouch my backside Smile
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Colin



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PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2013 11:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

ruddlescat wrote:
I have to agree that the licence fee probably is the least worst alternative option for funding the BBC - in actual fact for the number of channels we get it's very good value - everyone knows my views about the Murdoch media - but that isn't to say that there isn't something seriously wrong with Auntie Beeb at present


The problems with the Beeb are only at the very top, in my opinion. Government meddling and manipulation over the last 10 years has resulted in people being chosen to run the corporation who, frankly, haven't been fit for purpose and are merely poodles of those in power. The last decent DG the BBC had was Greg Dyke and he was forced to resign after being made a scapegoat in the Kelly/Gilligan cover-up (allegedly, m'lud).

The other point about funding models is to think what Radio 2 would be like if it were forced out into the commercial world. It would be as unbearable as the vast majority of the UK's commercial radio stations today. Minority and specialist programming would not only be reduced but would be axed altogether. For evidence, just look at independent commercial radio. Radio 4 would be dead, too - some politicians who fear a grilling by John Humphries and James Naughtie in the morning would be glad about that! But isn't that what Public Service Broadcasting is for?

That's why I favour the current funding model, although I'm willing to concede that it will change on or by the next funding review. More's the pity.

Sorry about the length of the reply, Ruddles, but I'm sure you're happy to read more than one sentence.
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xanadu



Joined: 17 Oct 2013
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PostPosted: Wed Oct 30, 2013 1:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

What this place lacks, apart from a few hundred regular posting members, is a sense of humour.
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ruddlescat



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PostPosted: Wed Oct 30, 2013 5:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

xanadu wrote:
What this place lacks, apart from a few hundred regular posting members, is a sense of humour.


At times I have a wicked sense of humour but I never quite know whether others on here will relate to it - expect that applies to others so perhaps they tend to play it safe Smile
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