tired fools

the bbc radio player has been “experiencing severe technical difficulties” for many weeks now.

“We have had a problem with the database that runs the BBC radio player,” said the BBC in a statement.

“The current issue has arisen in the last couple of weeks. We’ve rebuilt much of the software and have now fixed the worst of the problems. However, throughout the problem, all our programmes have still been available via ‘listen again’ on network’s homepages.”

scarily, when i went looking to see what was actually going on i discovered that

The radio player and the BBC news player will eventually be integrated into the iPlayer as a one-stop media shop for all BBC content.

ah good, that’s just great. the iplayer is a DRMd microsoft only player. i, and anyone else out there using macs or linux no longer get to listen to the bbc (like we have for years) unless we install a MS OS. bastards.
there was recently a protest outside the BBC. interestingly a lot of the BBC’s staff opened windows (no pun intended) and shouted out their support for the protesters. one even started placing apples on the window ledge. all this until a senior BBC guy came out and shouted for them all to close their windows (still no pun intended) and get back to work.

again i should say that the BBC is not a commercial service. it is paid for by the UK populace (including me), is not allowed to promote or advertise commercial companies, is the finest media org in the world, and and and they’re bastards.

i just got back from a trip to spain. i travelled back with three kids, 13, 10, 7. at the airport i decided to not pay the extreme amount for a cab (£95), but take the train, then 2 tube trains, then another train. london is a bitch to get about in if you have luggage or are disabled. the tube map station symbols show whether there is disabled access (lifts or ramps). there are very very few. our transfers involved more flights of stairs, escalators and longs walks than i can recall. so, with more luggage than could be carried effectively, this turned out to require effort and ingenuity. we could have got the cab all the way from the airport and arrived in a half-slumber, but we didn’t.

when we got to the final station we could have hopped into a cheap cab for a 3 minute final leg, but it was sunny and nice and we walked, slowly dragging bags and shifting them from should to shoulder, passing them around between us, piling them on top of others with wheels and steadying the resultant moving mountain. everyone arrived smiling.