Podcasts, Radio, TV, Books, Cycling, Photography and More
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HBO Max and Paramount+: What It Might Mean For Sports
Today the deal was done, and Paramount took over Warner Bros. Discovery in a massive deal that has much of Hollywood quaking. There were some last minute wrinkles with a deal being struck a couple of weeks ago with a group of US Attorneys General, with the general view being that they folded and didn’t…
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Telling the Truth About Ages
Back in 2012, James Cridland wrote a very good piece he called Truth in Numbers, which examined how Facebook marketed itself. He showed that while the Office of National Statistics showed there to be 7,482,000 16-24 year olds in the UK, Facebook was somehow selling access to 9,155,804 16-24 year olds. I was curious to…
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A Sheringham Soundscape
Recorded along the coast during a near high-tide this morning. The promenade in Sheringham was quite badly damaged during December 2013 storms, and more than two years later, there is still work being carried out to repair some of that damage. The audio is a mix of different sounds with some “treatment” particularly to the…
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Nell Gwynn
Sitting down at the Apollo with a few friends, I realised that I didn’t know a whole lot about Nell Gwynn. I knew vaguely that she’d once been a prostitute, became a stage actress – famous in her day – and won lots of admirers including the King. Broadly speaking that’s right, and although I…
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Govia Thameslink Railways – Closing All Ticket Offices
I like to think I’m fairly on the ball. I pay attention to what’s happening, and that includes transport issues. So I was a bit surprised to learn only this morning that Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR), the operator of my local trainline, is busy trying to close pretty much all the station ticket offices on…
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Hail Caesar!
A new Coen brothers film is always a cause for celebration. That’s particularly the case when they adopt more of a screwball tone to their films. Hail Caesar! is actually more of a group of sketches than a fully fledged film – the plot is slight. We follow the action from the perspective of Eddie…
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February Books
My reading volume dropped a little in February, as will be noted below. The Good Liar by Nicholas Searle is a lovely tale about a con-man and his latest – perhaps final – mark. The book alternates perspectives, but mostly this is about Roy – who when we meet him is on a date with…
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The New Day
Well full marks for bravery. The New Day really is a different offering to the rest of the national news offering. It’s Trinity Mirror’s new national daily – and yet still feels a bit like a spoiler targeting the now Johnston Press owned “i” as the previous owner – the Lebadevs – take The Independent…
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Capturing MiniDV Tapes
Time flies in technology, and “old” formats get left behind frighteningly quickly. Here’s my problem. I have a box of perhaps 100 Mini DV video tapes. They were shot with a camera that still works, and I want to capture the files into a digital format for preservation (I will hang onto the tapes as…
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Trumbo
I’m fascinated about the period of the Hollywood Blacklist – that post-war period, as the Cold War was getting under-way, when virulent anti-communists including Senator Joseph McCarthy started “investigating” perceived pro-Soviet beliefs and output in Hollywood. Before I went to see Trumbo, I thought I’d watch Fellow Traveller, a 1990 film made by the BBC…
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DAB and DAB+: Some Testing Ahead of SDL/D2 Launch Next Week
Rupert Brun, expert on all things audio and late of the BBC, has been testing his radios at ahead of the Sound Digital (SDL) launch in a week’s time. The multiplex is in full test mode at the moment, so if you want to know if you can hear the new services, then a rescan…
Hadrian’s Wall
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