BBC Descend on Wormshill for EastEnders spin-off

Having cleared the psychological log-jam of not posting, I’m now ‘in a place’ where I feel inclined to write a post every five minutes. Sometimes it takes posting an item to make you realise that it’s actually pretty painless and doesn’t take anywhere near as long as I remember it too. The biggest problem for me is hyperlinking. I always like my posts to contain a good smattering of contextual links, not just for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) but because I think it’s good practise.

Anyway, found out today that my lamented home village, Wormshill, has been taken over by the BBC as they film some nauseating spin-off show for EastEnders at the local church, St. Giles. They’ve also been up at nearby Ringlestone, a hamlet, as part of a storyline centred up Jim Branning and Dot Cotton looking for relatives (according to the village gossip). Of course, this being a Web 2.0 world I’ve already updated the relevant Wikipedia article.

I’m not an ‘Enders’ fan and actually feel quite sad that the sanctity and anonymity of the village has been compromised like this and I only hope that the Parish Council and, in particular, the church funds have benefited considerably from having the land and environment swamped in this way. I fully concede that this is a NIMBY (not in my back yard) approach and in other circumstances I have roundly praised the BBC for their output. At least they’ve chosen a great little location, and one that I think typifies rural Kent.

For those of you who do watch, the episode is due to be broadcast as some kind of spin-off special during Easter.

A provincial town reflects on the news

Tim Fenton, an Ipswich local and BBC journo reflects on the effect of the recent events in Ipswich on the townspeople: "Community faces unwanted glare"

I used to love going for a run in Levington in the summer, riding out through Nacton and looking out for Copdock off the A12 on my way home from my parents' and in-laws' houses at the weekend. All locations featuring heavily in the unfolding events. As Tim touchingly writes "These are our places and we don't want them on the news."

:: Back to usability and user-experience articles tomorrow.

Ipswich Murders

It's late at night and as I sit here typing away on my blog I'm waiting for my fiancee to arrive back from a Christmas party. Ordinarily these things are par for the course at this time of year and yet the recent news of murders in a town I grew so fond of in the past few years means that her trip home feels longer and more vulnerable than it should have done.

Of course, at present, the crime is restricted to a localised area and to a particular segment of society though this makes it no less obvious that it has been comitted upon young women lured into a situation in which they were compromised.

Tonight the airwaves resonate with phone-ins and new analysis about the implications and scale of such a local serial attack but for me, and for all its faults, I'm dwelling on the thoughts of the people of Ipswich. Derided tonight on the BBC as a "small market town", Ipswich has, in recent years, done much to shake off a crumbling reliance on industry and ailing agricultural manufacture. At a time when the town so desperately wants to stand out on the map of the British Isles with its committment to technology, sport and commerce, it hits the headlines for a sordid crime involving the oldest trade in the world, and the friendly Suffolk townies who competed admirably with the amiability I experienced in my years at York, are left mourning the loss of three daughters.

A Mouthpiece For The Enemy: Is It Right To Interview The Taleban?

I've just added a comment to Peter Barron's entry on the BBC News 'Editors' blog regarding the recent airing of an interview with the Taleban. In my opinion it is a fundamental part of a free media in a democratic country to report all sides of a conflict no matter how challenging and unsavoury. The proliferation of WASPish outrage in the Daily Mail readers' responses indicates just how blinkered we have become in our view of the Middle East. I am no sympathiser of fundamentalism but I am no fan of anachronistic fascist ramblings either or a return to the days when, as one commenter put it, people cheered at the bombing of Hiroshima in part because it was reported reported it as a military success. Honesty, transparency and accountability are only acheivable from a balanced perspective. Read every paper, watch a range of news programmes, absorb the views and make up your own mind.

UPDATE: 27th OCT

The debate on Peter's post now exceeds 100 comments, some of them erudite, others depressingly naïve but nevertheless reflective of an almost 50:50 split of opinion. Because this is my blog and I like to bolster my own opinions, here's someone who shares a similar viewpoint to me [hope they agree :) ] ... and here's a technorati log of recent blog commentary on the post. Finally, Norfolk boy and journalism professor Adrian Monck's has had a bit to say about it too ....

(copy of my BBC Editors comment)

Leaving Logs ... And Checking Them

Though I've had a good old moan about commuting in the past, I'm pleased to say my displeasure with the operator and subsequent criticism never developed into the scatalogical. This deranged individual has, however, served to highlight another curiosity, the British fascination with salacious and sordid news. The BBC's popularity tracker inevitably gets dominated by such stories on slow news days ... I'd love to see Auntie's server logs to see how deep into the site people go once reading stories like this, almost as if they're the hooks that get visitors in to the rest of the news content.