Doesn't it all come down in the end to the presentation style of (a) the programme and (b) the presenters ? If we had no tweets, no exhortations to email or text, no quizzes, no email recommendations, no gushing sycophantic 'you will enjoy this', no artificially exact pronunciation of foreign names then would we be having this discussion? Isn't this what really sticks in the craw?
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Fewer Smart things. More smart people. -
I'm just about to compose a letter to the Trust (they did invite 'further discussion'!!!) to point out that their content analysis research didn't cover this at all. Yet as those who have read our survey will know, this is what has made programmes 'unlistenable' for a lot of people.Originally posted by Anastasius View Post
The analysis which compared the content of 'Breakfast' and Classic FM's programme can be read here (pdf). The length of the pieces (I seem to remember(?) R3's were slightly shorter) and the type of music (CFM's mainly orchestral) were valid points, but this never got to the bottom of the problem.
With Breakfast and Essential Classics there are aspects of presentation which may be suitable for some (excuse the phrase) 'beginners'; it is completely inappropriate for other types of 'beginner' and those who are already fairly-to-very knowledgeable.
The colossal mistake was the decision to target all the peaktime programmes on the type of listener who does want to tweet, guess the piece of music played backwards, phone in their personal anecdotes (having been invited to do so).It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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Remember how Angela Rippon used to pronounce "guerrilla"?Originally posted by Richard Barrett View PostIt isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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Absolutely ...Originally posted by Anastasius View Post
However, the crucial point here is that the presenters are clearly instructed to present the programme in a certain way. It is a management culture which pervades many areas of modern society. For example, there's previously gentle and quietly-spoken interviewers now desperately trying to out-shout Humphrys by constantly interrupting interviewees on R4. TV's Andrew Neil attempting to be even ruder than Jeremy Paxman. Supermarket till operators with a permanently-glazed expression saying to strapping youths 'can I help you pack?' or to clearly stressed-out customers, 'have a nice day!' It's much the same with those patronising 'tweet' invitations on R3 that one might expect from a school teacher in charge of a primary class.
Maybe there are a few who will respond to such nonsense by getting their names read out on radio or television, who think a supermarket cashier is genuinely interested in what sort of day they have, or that the best way to ask a question is to then shout down the answer. The powers-that-be certainly seem to think this is the best way to win friends and influence people.
Until this now deeply-embedded management 'culture' changes nothing else is likely to, I'm afraid ...Comment
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...or how Moira Stuart pronounced "Benjamin Netanyahu" - she made it sound like the title of an opera!Originally posted by french frank View Post
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Yes I do, but I don't see really what the problem is with trying to pronounce the names of foreign people in a more or less correct way. Why not try to get these things right instead of flaunting a lack of interest in doing so? (At least this issue opens up a clear difference between R3 and CFM!)Originally posted by french frank View PostComment
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I think the point about the newsreaders may have been that the names were over-enunciated in a phonetically correct way which would be crystal clear to UK residents but which would have been laughable to the people named. Just think of how you say your own name and then imagine how Angela Rippon or Moira Stuart would say it in a news bulletin. They would not be the same!Originally posted by Richard Barrett View PostComment
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I agree with you but there are ways and ways of doing this. There is a certain presenter who, although clearly having spent the morning with the BBC voice coach each day getting the pronunciation 'just so', it ends up coming across as very, very false and artificial. Each to their own but it grates on me. I'd rather hear someone making a reasonable fist of it then said presenter.Originally posted by Richard Barrett View PostFewer Smart things. More smart people.Comment
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That won't happen. Inauthenticity will now be the order of the day ad infinitum because the order that might one day have overthrown it has effectively been illegitimised and eviscerated by all powers that have been over the past 30 years. This is no mere matter of "party politics", as declared non grata on this 'ere forum, but one of a nation of yes persons, scrupulously crafted to do and say as they have been ordered and not ask awkward questions unless they're voicing the power structure and don't want to hear the answers.Originally posted by P. G. Tipps View PostComment
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George Entwistle on Today was priceless.Comment
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If only none of that were true! It sadly is, though...Originally posted by Serial_Apologist View PostComment
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Herbert Marcuse's One Dimensional Man has proved his prescience.Originally posted by ahinton View PostComment
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Rather as, it might be argued, has Robert Musil's The Man Without Qualities...Originally posted by Serial_Apologist View PostComment
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