Generally speaking (perhaps universally speaking if one restricts one's sample to the "youth of today") people would rather watch a talkie to a silent movie, and will watch a colour film in preference to one in black and white. When James Cameron releases Avatar, you can pretty much bet that people will flock to it so that they can ooh and aah over the 3D, and perhaps one day we will all resolutely favour films with the illusion of depth over the flat movies of yore.
There is, however, good reason to suppose that just after entertainment technology makes its critical forward leap, some of the best work will be done in the antiquated form of the medium that has just been outdated. City Lights, one of Chaplin's most revered films, was a (more or less) silent film made in 1931: four years after The Jazz Singer had pointed the way to the future.
September 9th sees tranche of wallet-emptying releases by The Beatles and the most impoverishing part of it is The Beatles In Mono: a 13-disc boxed set that will set you back £200 (or about twenty euros at the current rate of exchange). That's right, mono ... what you bought the headphones for.
The argument runs like this. The stereo versions of early Beatles albums were only ever an afterthought designed to generate a little additional revenue from the few trailblazers who had decided to invest in the new flash-in-the-pan audio format with one extra speaker. Most of the studio time was invested in perfecting the mono mix. Moreover, the stereo mixes were not "true" stereo: what they did was basically split the mono instrument tracks between the two channels, so you get separation but no soundstage.
If you want to form an opinion on all this, it will cost you twenty euros, or slightly more if you are relying on our domestic and quantitatively-eased currency.
But here's the thing. The Beatles In Mono doesn't just cost a bit more than The Beatles In Stereo: it costs vastly more. You can't just buy Please Please Me in mono together with its stereo counterpart and give them a listen, because the mono version is only available in the boxed set. So you will need to buy the mono boxed set plus as many of the stereo releases as you will want to hear.
Which is as it should be, because elitism costs, and right here is where you start paying.
If you just want to, y'know, "listen to The Beatles", you will be fine with vanilla stereo. But - assuming that you have all this stuff already - you will likely be buying for a second, third or fourth time to take advantage of the widely-hyped remixes and their improved sound quality.
If that is your motivation, can you really afford not to have the mono mixes? Because I can tell you this right now. Very few of those who shell out for The Beatles In Mono are going to end up holding the opinion that stereo is better.
That's a luxury they really can't afford.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Monday, August 24, 2009
The Quality of Mercy
Readers with a long memory may remember the Guildford Four being released from court after their conviction for the Guildford pub bombings was quashed. The scenes outside the court were indeed jubilant, as indeed they would have been in the home of Daniel Day-Lewis had he foreseen at that moment that from this acorn the mighty oak of Academy Award nominations for himself and Pete Postlethwaite would grow.
The release was a significant one, because they came at the end of a long (seemingly interminable) campaign that many onlookers of the time had associated with a propoganda war being waged at that time by Sinn Fein, an organisation then considerably less respectable than it is today. There was a strong sentiment that the attack upon the legal process that had resulted in the convictions of the Guildford Four, the Macguire Seven and the Birmingham Six was the continuation of war by other methods. Those who favoured a successful appeal were on the Republican side, almost be definition.
History has tended to see these belated acquittals rather differently ... has tended to see those reversed evident miscarriages of justice as heroically fighting not only against the immediate obstacle of a corrupt police force, but also the more remote antagonism of the British Public.
Abdelbaset Al Megrahi will never have the sensation of walking free with his name cleared. The second appeal against his conviction for the Lockerbie bombing was repeatedly delayed by a number of ruses, both political and judicial. Despite the fact that the Scottish Criminal Cases Commission concluded in 2007 (after a four year investigation) that there was a prima facie case for the second appeal to be heard, no such appeal ever took place. Despite the fact that Al Megrahi's case is due shortly to be heard at a still higher court, no one seems to have felt that there was any urgency to hearing the case.
Nevertheless, although we do not know with any great certainty whether Al Megrahi is guilty or innocent, the pictures of his arrival in Libya are surely suggestive. No medal was pinned to his chest, no U. S. flags burnt, Colonel Gaddafi did not congratulate him on a job well done. The reception was, instead, entirely consistent with the celebrations outside the high court in 1989 when the Guildford Four walked free.
Far from honouring a killer, the Libyans acted as though they thought Al Megrahi had been the victim of a miscarriage of justice. Quite possibly they were wrong, but unfortunately we are unlikely to know if so.
Not surprisingly, in a culture where it is still widely thought that Saddam Hussein was guilty of the 9/11 bombings, there is an equally strong conviction that Al Megrahi was guilty. The U. S. has been immoderate in its condemnation of the release, not least as a consequence of its own catastrophic failure to bring subsequent terrorists to trial. Having made prosecution impossible by its enthusiastic use of torture, the U. S. has become a bystander to international law, shaking its impotent fist while other countries embrace due process.
Which leads me to a modest proposal.
With its unique approach to international law, why does the U.S. not simply fly a drone over and blow Al Megrahi up? It would after all not be the first time that the U.S. has bombed Tripoli.
Indeed, for a truly unrepentant bomber one need look no further.
The release was a significant one, because they came at the end of a long (seemingly interminable) campaign that many onlookers of the time had associated with a propoganda war being waged at that time by Sinn Fein, an organisation then considerably less respectable than it is today. There was a strong sentiment that the attack upon the legal process that had resulted in the convictions of the Guildford Four, the Macguire Seven and the Birmingham Six was the continuation of war by other methods. Those who favoured a successful appeal were on the Republican side, almost be definition.
History has tended to see these belated acquittals rather differently ... has tended to see those reversed evident miscarriages of justice as heroically fighting not only against the immediate obstacle of a corrupt police force, but also the more remote antagonism of the British Public.
Abdelbaset Al Megrahi will never have the sensation of walking free with his name cleared. The second appeal against his conviction for the Lockerbie bombing was repeatedly delayed by a number of ruses, both political and judicial. Despite the fact that the Scottish Criminal Cases Commission concluded in 2007 (after a four year investigation) that there was a prima facie case for the second appeal to be heard, no such appeal ever took place. Despite the fact that Al Megrahi's case is due shortly to be heard at a still higher court, no one seems to have felt that there was any urgency to hearing the case.
Nevertheless, although we do not know with any great certainty whether Al Megrahi is guilty or innocent, the pictures of his arrival in Libya are surely suggestive. No medal was pinned to his chest, no U. S. flags burnt, Colonel Gaddafi did not congratulate him on a job well done. The reception was, instead, entirely consistent with the celebrations outside the high court in 1989 when the Guildford Four walked free.
Far from honouring a killer, the Libyans acted as though they thought Al Megrahi had been the victim of a miscarriage of justice. Quite possibly they were wrong, but unfortunately we are unlikely to know if so.
Not surprisingly, in a culture where it is still widely thought that Saddam Hussein was guilty of the 9/11 bombings, there is an equally strong conviction that Al Megrahi was guilty. The U. S. has been immoderate in its condemnation of the release, not least as a consequence of its own catastrophic failure to bring subsequent terrorists to trial. Having made prosecution impossible by its enthusiastic use of torture, the U. S. has become a bystander to international law, shaking its impotent fist while other countries embrace due process.
Which leads me to a modest proposal.
With its unique approach to international law, why does the U.S. not simply fly a drone over and blow Al Megrahi up? It would after all not be the first time that the U.S. has bombed Tripoli.
Indeed, for a truly unrepentant bomber one need look no further.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Some Idiot Went To War And All I Got Was This Lousy Tee-Shirt
Like most of Britain's citizens, Sordel is content to fight his wars on the Home Front. I am not entirely convinced, however, that our Prime Minister should be allowed to do the same.
It used to be inferred from his sullen silence on the subject that Gordon Brown was no supporter of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. War, one felt, was incompatible with a man for whom prudence had become not so much a watchword as the nervous tic of a genteel Tourette. The mongering of war sits uncomfortably alongside fiscal responsibility, which is why many voters may have assumed that Brown would draw a line under the adventuring of his predecessor and quietly withdraw our troops from theatres of war with the discretion of an impresario closing a West End flop.
How wrong we all were.
Brown, it is true, is no wartime leader. One cannot imagine Churchill, or Thatcher, or Blair, presiding over a country at war without the occasionally morale-raising speech, the shake of the flag, the salute to the forces. Brown acts, however, like someone for whom war is conducted far away by strange and distant relatives.
It is an impression that can only have been fostered by Blair's own remoteness. One imagines Tony to have been like as a small boy at boarding school writing reluctant postcards to a disciplinarian and slightly mad aunt. "UN nice, food okay, send more money." "Thank you for the seedcake, dug out a rabbit hole on Saturday, send more money." "Met the president, going to war, send more money."
Sat at home with this collection of haikuesque epistles, the dismal Gordon could only have thought of statesmanship as something that happened to other people in distant lands. Mrs. Brown's little boy - admitted to Edinburgh University by the age of sixteen when most of his peers would have been getting their prefect badges and first serious girlfriends - continued along the sad little road upon which his feet had long ago been set.
No war for Gordon. No prefect badge for Gordon. Gordon excused school sport on account of a nasty injury incurred during rugby.
The result is a man gazing uncomprehendingly at war through a window-pane. When a crisis occurs for which he feels himself prepared (if, for example, someone is needed to pass billions of pounds across the table to the banking fraternity) Brown is the man for the job.
But war is something to which he takes no principled exception and to which he can make not the least practical contribution.
Helicopters? The brass might have more luck asking for seedcake.
It used to be inferred from his sullen silence on the subject that Gordon Brown was no supporter of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. War, one felt, was incompatible with a man for whom prudence had become not so much a watchword as the nervous tic of a genteel Tourette. The mongering of war sits uncomfortably alongside fiscal responsibility, which is why many voters may have assumed that Brown would draw a line under the adventuring of his predecessor and quietly withdraw our troops from theatres of war with the discretion of an impresario closing a West End flop.
How wrong we all were.
Brown, it is true, is no wartime leader. One cannot imagine Churchill, or Thatcher, or Blair, presiding over a country at war without the occasionally morale-raising speech, the shake of the flag, the salute to the forces. Brown acts, however, like someone for whom war is conducted far away by strange and distant relatives.
It is an impression that can only have been fostered by Blair's own remoteness. One imagines Tony to have been like as a small boy at boarding school writing reluctant postcards to a disciplinarian and slightly mad aunt. "UN nice, food okay, send more money." "Thank you for the seedcake, dug out a rabbit hole on Saturday, send more money." "Met the president, going to war, send more money."
Sat at home with this collection of haikuesque epistles, the dismal Gordon could only have thought of statesmanship as something that happened to other people in distant lands. Mrs. Brown's little boy - admitted to Edinburgh University by the age of sixteen when most of his peers would have been getting their prefect badges and first serious girlfriends - continued along the sad little road upon which his feet had long ago been set.
No war for Gordon. No prefect badge for Gordon. Gordon excused school sport on account of a nasty injury incurred during rugby.
The result is a man gazing uncomprehendingly at war through a window-pane. When a crisis occurs for which he feels himself prepared (if, for example, someone is needed to pass billions of pounds across the table to the banking fraternity) Brown is the man for the job.
But war is something to which he takes no principled exception and to which he can make not the least practical contribution.
Helicopters? The brass might have more luck asking for seedcake.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
The Old School Ties That Bind
There was much hand-wringing yesterday as the results of a report commissioned by the Prime Minister were published. It seems that far from being a land founded on the guiding principles of liberty, egality and fraternity, Britain is increasingly controlled by a minority that has a hereditary grip on society.
For example, if your parents paid for your education at an independent school while additionally paying tax to support the education of others, you are likely to do the same.
Moreover, if you are born into a household that bears a disproportionate tax burden, then you too are likely to pay higher tax throughout your working life. Conversely, if you are born into a household that is a beneficiary of social welfare schemes, you too are likely to become a beneficiary of such schemes.
It seems like the dynastic poor have the entire system rigged!
The real worry here is not the curse that the middle classes are passing from generation, however, but the way in which this curse is becoming yet more severe. If your parents attended university free of charge, you are disproportionately likely to incur serious personal debt attempting to obtain a similar education.
If you have a public school education, you are also likely to face an elevated risk of suicide as a consequence of your increased likelihood of entering the notoriously self-destructive health professions.
The bad news just keeps coming.
We could, of course, look to the government to alleviate the misery experienced by many middle class households. Perhaps parents could be weaned off their dependency on private education by improving public sector education?
Perhaps, but the resources required to effect such a change make it more likely that the government will opt for an alternative policy of alleviating the burden of professional affluence by a staged programme of economic attrition and increased taxation. While tough choices may be ahead for Britain's politicians (memoirs or directorship? House of lords or television pundit?) they are hard at work ensuring that deciding between two alternative jobs is a worry that no Briton need face in the future.
We cannot hope ever to be as lucky as those who inherited the path of truancy from their fathers and forefathers, but it is not beyond belief that we may one day be able to say that Income Support is available to all, regardless of educational background.
For example, if your parents paid for your education at an independent school while additionally paying tax to support the education of others, you are likely to do the same.
Moreover, if you are born into a household that bears a disproportionate tax burden, then you too are likely to pay higher tax throughout your working life. Conversely, if you are born into a household that is a beneficiary of social welfare schemes, you too are likely to become a beneficiary of such schemes.
It seems like the dynastic poor have the entire system rigged!
The real worry here is not the curse that the middle classes are passing from generation, however, but the way in which this curse is becoming yet more severe. If your parents attended university free of charge, you are disproportionately likely to incur serious personal debt attempting to obtain a similar education.
If you have a public school education, you are also likely to face an elevated risk of suicide as a consequence of your increased likelihood of entering the notoriously self-destructive health professions.
The bad news just keeps coming.
We could, of course, look to the government to alleviate the misery experienced by many middle class households. Perhaps parents could be weaned off their dependency on private education by improving public sector education?
Perhaps, but the resources required to effect such a change make it more likely that the government will opt for an alternative policy of alleviating the burden of professional affluence by a staged programme of economic attrition and increased taxation. While tough choices may be ahead for Britain's politicians (memoirs or directorship? House of lords or television pundit?) they are hard at work ensuring that deciding between two alternative jobs is a worry that no Briton need face in the future.
We cannot hope ever to be as lucky as those who inherited the path of truancy from their fathers and forefathers, but it is not beyond belief that we may one day be able to say that Income Support is available to all, regardless of educational background.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
It Shouldn't Happen To A Dog
The naming of dogs, as T. S. Eliot once so nearly put it, is a difficult matter.
BNP supervillain Nick Griffin was interviewed by resident B.B.C. intellectual Andrew Marr at the weekend, encouraging the viewer to believe that a great unmasking was in the offing and that those darned meddlesome kids would be blamed at any minute for the would-be Great Dictator's fall. Having softened Griffin up with some tedious policy questions, however, Marr steadied himself for that last question ... the coup de grace. What are the names of Griffin's dogs?
Those, like Sordel, who had heard the story before were one step of the drama unfolding before their eyes, for Griffin's dogs (at least, according to widespread assertion) are called Anne and Frank. Griffin's jet-shoes and discombobulator ray could surely not save him now. The Resident Intellectual had the "genocidal racist" parked upon his own petard on the cusp of detonation.
Except, it turns out that the Griffin hounds are called Bella and Otto.
Now, I'm not sure where I heard that thing about Anne and Frank, but in retrospect it always sounded rather odd. As a thought experiment, the idea of an anti-Semite calling something that he intends to love, feed and exercise by a name that will call to mind a young Jewess does not seem especially likely. Unless Griffin actually bought the dogs to beat - an imputation that even his many detractors have yet to suggest - it would have made more sense for him to have named the pets Adolph and Eva.
Or perhaps, in the light of his patriotism, Oswald and Diana.
The problem is that one is only too ready to believe the worst of Griffin. When a man, with sober rationality, proposes sinking the ships of would-be immigrants, the views that he will espouse in public invite speculation as to the ones that he is concealing.
Gordon Brown for example, speaks of a future increase in public spending, when everyone knows that he is lying through his teeth and intends to cut it dramatically. In the light of this shameless and transparent neglect of the truth by a "mainstream" politician, no great leap of the imagination is required to hop from sinking ships to Arbeit macht frei.
So, perhaps Griffin is lying about the names of his dogs. Or perhaps he is lying about something considerably more sinister.
Either way, the more that Griffin is perceived to have been smeared by his unscrupulous opponents, the more likely it is that the electorate will be to discount even those accusations that have a sound basis in truth.
Which is a worry, because the tag that Griffin used most frequently when referring to those opponents was Liberal elitists.
And, to be perfectly honest (delightful though it might be to meet The Resident Intellectual) Sordel would not wish to do so at the cost of the bring the first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
BNP supervillain Nick Griffin was interviewed by resident B.B.C. intellectual Andrew Marr at the weekend, encouraging the viewer to believe that a great unmasking was in the offing and that those darned meddlesome kids would be blamed at any minute for the would-be Great Dictator's fall. Having softened Griffin up with some tedious policy questions, however, Marr steadied himself for that last question ... the coup de grace. What are the names of Griffin's dogs?
Those, like Sordel, who had heard the story before were one step of the drama unfolding before their eyes, for Griffin's dogs (at least, according to widespread assertion) are called Anne and Frank. Griffin's jet-shoes and discombobulator ray could surely not save him now. The Resident Intellectual had the "genocidal racist" parked upon his own petard on the cusp of detonation.
Except, it turns out that the Griffin hounds are called Bella and Otto.
Now, I'm not sure where I heard that thing about Anne and Frank, but in retrospect it always sounded rather odd. As a thought experiment, the idea of an anti-Semite calling something that he intends to love, feed and exercise by a name that will call to mind a young Jewess does not seem especially likely. Unless Griffin actually bought the dogs to beat - an imputation that even his many detractors have yet to suggest - it would have made more sense for him to have named the pets Adolph and Eva.
Or perhaps, in the light of his patriotism, Oswald and Diana.
The problem is that one is only too ready to believe the worst of Griffin. When a man, with sober rationality, proposes sinking the ships of would-be immigrants, the views that he will espouse in public invite speculation as to the ones that he is concealing.
Gordon Brown for example, speaks of a future increase in public spending, when everyone knows that he is lying through his teeth and intends to cut it dramatically. In the light of this shameless and transparent neglect of the truth by a "mainstream" politician, no great leap of the imagination is required to hop from sinking ships to Arbeit macht frei.
So, perhaps Griffin is lying about the names of his dogs. Or perhaps he is lying about something considerably more sinister.
Either way, the more that Griffin is perceived to have been smeared by his unscrupulous opponents, the more likely it is that the electorate will be to discount even those accusations that have a sound basis in truth.
Which is a worry, because the tag that Griffin used most frequently when referring to those opponents was Liberal elitists.
And, to be perfectly honest (delightful though it might be to meet The Resident Intellectual) Sordel would not wish to do so at the cost of the bring the first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Just Like The Girl From Dr. No
Q: How many members of the government does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: Two. Gordon Brown to change the light bulb and Peter Mandelson to explain that the bulb hasn't been changed.
Sordel is something of a fan of The (Formerly) Red Baron. In the past, government apologists have always adopted a fixed and ingratiating smile: the physical memory of something passing for charm. Kenneth Baker always had that smile. Ed Balls and his Stepford wife have that smile.
Baron M. does not have that smile.
He conveys to all watching that it is his painful duty to tolerate the stupid questions put to him and then (with an air of high moral seriousness somewhat inappropriate to a man hawking rotten fish) to set the interviewer right on a few points. Like a lidless headmaster exhausted by the folly of his charges his body language indicates that patience is at an end but rectitude in plentiful supply. The man is unflagging, indomitable: like the shapeshifting terminator and just as Protean.
We are only just getting started on his virtues, however, for Baron M. is also the consummate survivor of British politics. If there is a global nuclear war the only things left alive will be the cockroaches and him, but the cockroaches will lack the capacity to celebrate their victory. When Baron M. goes home at the end of the day there must be some fleeting moment (perhaps shortly before, perhaps shortly after turning off the light) when he indulges in a stiff but passionate dance of victory. One can imagine him silhouetted against a window frame, gyrating in unholy exaltation at the thought of his perennial return to power.
Surely every jilted lover has dreamt of the moment when his or her lover would come crawling back for that moment of jubilant closure. Is there a line in Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" that would disqualify it as Baron M. personal anthem? Yet when The (F.) R. B. walked in and found Gordon with that sad look upon his face, he neither crumbled nor lay down & died ... nor declared that he was saving all his lovin' for someone who's lovin' him. The love of Baron M. is boundless, and extends even to a stricken foe.
He walked on the water while the sharks were coming for Brown.
So how can one not admire Baron M.? Here is a man who - given a sow's ear - attempts to make a silk purse: a man who never encounters excrement without having a can of Mr. Sheen at the ready. His attitude is Can Do. His personal motto is The Difficult We Do Right Now, Winning The Election May Take A Little Time.
What's not to like?
A: Two. Gordon Brown to change the light bulb and Peter Mandelson to explain that the bulb hasn't been changed.
Sordel is something of a fan of The (Formerly) Red Baron. In the past, government apologists have always adopted a fixed and ingratiating smile: the physical memory of something passing for charm. Kenneth Baker always had that smile. Ed Balls and his Stepford wife have that smile.
Baron M. does not have that smile.
He conveys to all watching that it is his painful duty to tolerate the stupid questions put to him and then (with an air of high moral seriousness somewhat inappropriate to a man hawking rotten fish) to set the interviewer right on a few points. Like a lidless headmaster exhausted by the folly of his charges his body language indicates that patience is at an end but rectitude in plentiful supply. The man is unflagging, indomitable: like the shapeshifting terminator and just as Protean.
We are only just getting started on his virtues, however, for Baron M. is also the consummate survivor of British politics. If there is a global nuclear war the only things left alive will be the cockroaches and him, but the cockroaches will lack the capacity to celebrate their victory. When Baron M. goes home at the end of the day there must be some fleeting moment (perhaps shortly before, perhaps shortly after turning off the light) when he indulges in a stiff but passionate dance of victory. One can imagine him silhouetted against a window frame, gyrating in unholy exaltation at the thought of his perennial return to power.
Surely every jilted lover has dreamt of the moment when his or her lover would come crawling back for that moment of jubilant closure. Is there a line in Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" that would disqualify it as Baron M. personal anthem? Yet when The (F.) R. B. walked in and found Gordon with that sad look upon his face, he neither crumbled nor lay down & died ... nor declared that he was saving all his lovin' for someone who's lovin' him. The love of Baron M. is boundless, and extends even to a stricken foe.
He walked on the water while the sharks were coming for Brown.
So how can one not admire Baron M.? Here is a man who - given a sow's ear - attempts to make a silk purse: a man who never encounters excrement without having a can of Mr. Sheen at the ready. His attitude is Can Do. His personal motto is The Difficult We Do Right Now, Winning The Election May Take A Little Time.
What's not to like?
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Hide & Seek
Occasional readers of this blog may have come to recognise that it is only with great irritation and self-reproach that Sordel condescends to respond to the Pervasive Evanescent.
Nevertheless, the P. E. is always with us, and so it is that I hang my head in anticipatory shame and turn my attention to: Wimbledon coverage on the B.B.C.
(Just be grateful that I am not watching Big Brother this year.)
The stereotypical depiction of an audience watching a tennis match involves the swivelling of eyeballs right and left at regular intervals, and so it is with the B.B.C.: from One to Two and Two to One the audience is invited to pop with the grace of every serve and volley. "Viewers hoping to see the end of this rally should turn to our coverage on B.B.C. Two" smirks the elusive Sue Barker.
Thank God for remote controls, or it would be more exercise than frail flesh can stand.
Worse still, however, is when the entire channel switches channels. You know that moment when a train pulls out of a station and it seems for a second as though the entire world is moving around you? During Wimbledon, that illusion becomes reality. Rather than switch tennis from 1 to 2 they sometimes switch all other programming from 1 to 2 instead.
Try complaining to the B.B.C. about this (go on, I dare you) and your whining, self-pitying epistle about missing The Supersizers do ... The Fifties because Crimewatch has broken & entered into B.B.C. Two will almost certainly be read out on the air. Shortly thereafter, a B.B.C. "executive" will explain (as one addressing a small and exceptionally dim child) that providing coverage of a live sporting event will inevitably mean adjustments to the schedule.
S/he will then go on to point out (as broadcasters have been very keen to do over the last 24 hours) that 12 million people watched Murray's so-called "epic" five-setter. (On which subject, tell it to the Greeks ... they were ten years outside the gates of Troy and knocking a fluffy ball over a net for four hours doesn't compare.)
12 million people can't, it seems, be wrong, even when four million of them are fruitlessly waiting for Crimewatch, two million of them are watching under protest having planned to watch The Supersizers do ... The Fifties and another three million or so are imprisoned by B.B.C. One having earlier thrown their remote controls out of the window in frustration.
Come to think about it, there must be a sizable proportion of the population who can only receive B.B.C. One. That's the only thing that would explain why anyone is watching it in the first place.
Nevertheless, the P. E. is always with us, and so it is that I hang my head in anticipatory shame and turn my attention to: Wimbledon coverage on the B.B.C.
(Just be grateful that I am not watching Big Brother this year.)
The stereotypical depiction of an audience watching a tennis match involves the swivelling of eyeballs right and left at regular intervals, and so it is with the B.B.C.: from One to Two and Two to One the audience is invited to pop with the grace of every serve and volley. "Viewers hoping to see the end of this rally should turn to our coverage on B.B.C. Two" smirks the elusive Sue Barker.
Thank God for remote controls, or it would be more exercise than frail flesh can stand.
Worse still, however, is when the entire channel switches channels. You know that moment when a train pulls out of a station and it seems for a second as though the entire world is moving around you? During Wimbledon, that illusion becomes reality. Rather than switch tennis from 1 to 2 they sometimes switch all other programming from 1 to 2 instead.
Try complaining to the B.B.C. about this (go on, I dare you) and your whining, self-pitying epistle about missing The Supersizers do ... The Fifties because Crimewatch has broken & entered into B.B.C. Two will almost certainly be read out on the air. Shortly thereafter, a B.B.C. "executive" will explain (as one addressing a small and exceptionally dim child) that providing coverage of a live sporting event will inevitably mean adjustments to the schedule.
S/he will then go on to point out (as broadcasters have been very keen to do over the last 24 hours) that 12 million people watched Murray's so-called "epic" five-setter. (On which subject, tell it to the Greeks ... they were ten years outside the gates of Troy and knocking a fluffy ball over a net for four hours doesn't compare.)
12 million people can't, it seems, be wrong, even when four million of them are fruitlessly waiting for Crimewatch, two million of them are watching under protest having planned to watch The Supersizers do ... The Fifties and another three million or so are imprisoned by B.B.C. One having earlier thrown their remote controls out of the window in frustration.
Come to think about it, there must be a sizable proportion of the population who can only receive B.B.C. One. That's the only thing that would explain why anyone is watching it in the first place.
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