Tuesday 24 May 2005

The BBC: is this the beginning of the end?

Yesterday, hundreds of BBC staff went on strike over proposed cut-backs and inevitable redundancies. Even high profile figures like the lovely Natasha Kaplinsky made the effort (although not going to work doesn't technically constitute a great deal of effort). I doubt that Ms Kaplinsky was outside Broadcasting House with a placard in her hand, but I digress.

The thing is, if the great and good at the BBC are worried enough to down tools, so to speak, then things must be bad. When was the last time you can recall the Beeb's scheduling being disrupted by industrial action? No, I can't remember either.

The BBC (or British Broadcasting Corporation, to give it its full moniker) is, for my money, the greatest broadcasting agency in the world. Okay, I obviously seen every alternative globally, but I've been to enough countries and watched enough TV to know that the Beeb is pretty special, and should be treasured. Okay, so we have to cough up an annual license fee but compare the outlay of this to the spiralling monthly costs of a Sky TV subscription. Then consider all the new digital channels the BBC has launched (TV and radio) to supplement its existing output. Add to this the fact that, "due to the unique way the BBC is funded", you can actually watch a film on the BBC without being interrupted by adverts (bliss). And as if that wasn't enough, the BBC also provides, in my view, the greatest one-stop website you'll find anywhere - the volume and breadth of content is phenomenal.

So yes, I am obviously a fan of the BBC. As such, I am somewhat concerned about any plans to "streamline", "rationalise" or "modernise" the Corporation, and you should be too. Such buzzwords are often euphemisms for "muck up" or, worse still, "irreversably damage". So don't moan if your usual newsreader is off-screen for one day: support and understand their industrial action. Cherish the BBC: watch its programmes (easy, given the celebrity-obsessed dross on ITV), try out the new channels, explore the website. There's nothing else like it anywhere in the world, and you'll miss it when it's gone...

Sunday 22 May 2005

What's going on?

Okay, so I haven't written much lately. I guess I am in danger of going the way of so many other 'blogs... the novelty wears off, writing becomes onerous, the journal dies a death. But I've been busy, that's all. Laptop time has been at a premium. Still, I've managed to find a few minutes to write about the events of the last few weeks, and it seems the theme is... what the hell is going on?
  • Tony Blair is widely held to have lied to the "Great" British public so that he could take the country to war, acting as George Bush's lick-spittle in a conflict that was as much to do with oil as it was WMD and regime change. Still he is comfortably re-elected as Prime Minister with a bigger majority than I recall John Major ever enjoying...
  • Abigail Witchalls gets a knife stuck through her neck in an apparently motiveless attack whilst taking her toddler son for a walk in a sleepy Surrey village...
  • Television schedules are filled with inane dross like "Celebrity Wrestling" (notable for its lack of actual, Big Daddy-style wrestling) and "Celebrity Love Island"...
  • Some guy that no-one's ever heard of turns up at The Crucible Theatre and walks away with the World Championship trophy. If it's that easy, I think I'll have a go next year...
  • Top pop poppet Kylie Minogue, someone that all men of a certain age (like me) feel that they've grown up with, is diagnosed with breast cancer just a few weeks short of her 37th birthday...
  • Arsenal and Manchester United, two of the biggest clubs in world football, can't manage a goal between them in 120 minutes of normal play in the final of the world's biggest knockout competition, the F.A. Cup...

Honestly, it's enough to make you question your own world-view. Life is becoming unpredictable in a way that I'm not sure I like. In fact, it's not so much "what's going on" as "whatever next?"

It's reassuring, then, to realise that some things are less random. After weeks of the media stoking up expectation, the UK entry went into last night's Eurovision Song Contest with the nation convinced she was going to win. Never mind the fact that the song didn't actually go anywhere and was so unconventionally structured. Our Euro-playmates are certainly not ready for such, ahem, sophistication. Needless to say, we trailed in third from last and, if not for Ireland giving us eight points, we would undoubtedly have collected the wooden spoon. Some things never change... thank goodness.