Here is the news
I’m in BBC mode – as per usual. Must be something about working at the weekend.
And for some reason hearing the rhythmic beat of the news sting as I turned up for another 7am start this morning, reminded me of a track which I’ve been meaning to put up here for a while.
I’ve always thought that the beeb should release the music that they use for all their News Idents on CD (including all the rather wonderful local regional variations that you get around the country), in all its different formats and mixes so that you can then fiddle around with it to your hearts content, or maybe so that the completely sad amongst us can use it for their own productions or spoof news broadcasts.
So I was quite thrilled the other day when my friend Richard said to me “Oh.. you’ll like this” and proceeded to play to me a track called “Turn on the News” by DJ Nite. [4Mb MP3 download]
They’ve ‘sampled’ the main BBC TV news theme and turned it into a dance track, even including (as a nice touch) the opening words on ‘2Lo‘ the BBC’s first London based radio station.
Right, I’ll get my anorak …
Oh, and it’s remembrance Sunday today. Two minutes hush at 11 o’clock if you please, and don’t forget to buy a poppy today if you haven’t already got one.
After living in London for the first 33 years of my life and working for the 
So for ten weeks in June, July and August 2009, I drove 20,000 miles around the the lower 48 contiguous states of the USA visiting towns and places that shared the same name as places on The London
Don’t think we haven’t noticed that you’ve changed your titles to hide the two missing irrelevancies.
I’d expect nothing less from a man with observational powers such as yours, Ian.
Still .. at least I regularly get more than two comments.
I bet it’s not just me who has the full 90 second BBC News 24 countdown
Bill Bailey did the whole BBC News dance track thing, too.. I must download this song!
If you can find a link to it Anthony, whack it up here! Googling “Bailey” and “BBC” just brings up lots of NMT Buzzcocks references…
Back in my dim and distant teenage years of raving, there was a happy hardcore track that a pirate raido station we listened to would always play that had the news theme of the time (though, thinking, it might have been ITV, cos it had the “bongs” of Big Ben in it..) Would have been around 1992ish..
Oh, and Geoff.. having problems with typing comments in here using IE. The blue bar down the side of your blog (has the iThankyou image in it) runs OVER the comments box, so I can’t see what I’m typing on the right hand side of it!
Fimbo, yes – that’ll be because you’re using Internet Explorer 6 which doesn’t confirm to CSS2.0 properly! Either switch to Opera, Netscape or Firefox, or maybe write an email to Bill Gates, and tell him to hurry up with IE7!
Here’s a bit of the Bill Bailey thing.
Low quality, sttreamed (unfortunately): http://www.bill-bailey.co.uk/downloads/video.php
Click “Apocalypse BBC”.
Incidentally, while searching for the Bill Bailey BBC News thing, I came across, purely by accident, the following site:
http://www.petesipple.me.uk/latest.html
Look at the first blog entry!
Wacky internet fads…! pah… who needs ‘em?
I found a better version of the BBC Bill Bailey thing, with video!
Sending it to you now, Geoff.
It’s a sign of immense arrogance on behalf of any website to insist that that the reader changes their browsing experience. Particularly if their choice of browser is the one used by the vast majority.
It is the webmaster’s duty to ensure their site is compatible to most users, but it is impossible to cater for everybody, whether in terms of screen resolution, colour depth or otherwise. Some people still don’t have Java-compatible browsers!
The vast majority do still use IE6. Here are my browser stats from houseofsteel for one day about a week ago:
1. Internet Explorer 6 (71%) 50
2. Firefox 1 (10%)7
3. Default Browser (7%) 5
4. Internet Explorer 5 (6%) 4
5. Mozilla 1 (6%) 4
CSS 2.0 is going to become more and more widely-used as time goes on. Nobody should be using IE anyway, but that’s not the point.
Fimb, increase your screen resolution if you can, but if you’re still using IE6 and 800×600, it’s time for an upgrade!
I’ve just checked over all of Geoff’s pages and am unable to find any guarantees of (a) legibility (b) correct spelling (c) correct grammar. Nor am I able to find any legislation that states that reading Geoff’s pages is compulsory…Nor (as a private individual) is Geoff beholden to W3C accessibility standards. It’s Geoff’s world – if you don’t like it, invent your own.
It is true, but he has been sympathetic and helpful to those less able to view his site in the past!
Absolutely correct, Anthony. That is because he is a decent chap, and he cares (often far more than he really should do). He does it because he wants to, not because he has to. And he does not deserve to be called immensly arrogant.
Believe it or not, most people don’t care what browser they are using, and if a webpage doesn’t work for them, they will blame the website, not their browser. Firefox advocates are a technically aware, vocal minority. Telling people how they should browse the web is just wrong.
I use Opera.
Ian, I am in no position to disagree with your views on what is right and wrong on web technicallities, but going into somebodies web space and personally insulting them as you did in post 12 is simple old fashioned bad manners.
Excuse me whilst I put on the anorak here, but does anyone have a copy minus the woman singing over?
Also I seem to remember this piece of music, or variations thereof, were used on some BBC News featurette with Huw Edwards giving a tour around the (then) new BBC News centre at TVC and I remember one scene of him sitting in the studio and playing around with Anna Ford’s makeup case on one of the computers under the desk. So it’s definately around without the woman warbling over the top, but whether it’s part of the old branding package produced for the BBC national news I don’t know.
How about they release it and some other BBC music on some giveaway CD for TV Centre tours? Would be a nice touch for those tourists who come so far to visit the UK and it’d be nice for them to take a piece of the BBC away with them. Just an idea!
BBC World (the commerial funded international 24-hour news channel) did release their ident music in 2000, in response to the music’s popularity.
“This music was originally designed to play in the background over and over again, ideally not annoying too many viewers in the process. So it came as a really nice surprise when people around the globe actually noticed it, and wanted to know where they could buy it.. In response, BBC World asked me to create some special tracks featuring the music for this CD.”
– David Lowie
You can actually still buy that CD online (It’s only £3.36 each) on the composer’s website above!
…Phil
Interesting.. Here in Canada we celebrate Rememberance Day on the 11th. This year it was the Friday.
can’t … stop … smiling … !
about the litle tiff that’s gone here. how marvellous. how to make me smile at a quarter to six in the morning, fantastic!
yes, the non-flippant answer for those who seem to be taking life a little bit too seriously, is:
“yes i know, it even affects me when I use IE (at work), and it’s on my list of things to fix…”
still smiling!
To Amy:
In the U.K., people commemorate “Remembrance Day” on the Sunday closest to the 11th November (“Remembrance Sunday”)
I’m a Vancouverite myself, so couple years ago, I too was confused when they commemorated the end of WWI after the actual 11/11, but I soon found out the reason. Hope that helps!
—–
And about the browser types:
Analysis shows that 93% still using IE.
…My two cents on this issue =)
—–
Regards,
…Phil
My host kindly upgraded me to the rather good AWStats last week, and I can tell you that in terms of people looking at this site, the breakdown is as follows:
Internet Explorer – 81.4 %
Firefox – 10.6 %
Safari – 2.7 %
Opera Winfrey – 2 %
Unknown – 1.1 %
Mozilla – 0.9 %
Netscape – 0.5 %
NetShow Player – 0.2 %
Camino – 0.1 %
“Camino” ? WTF is that! Never heard of it … [Googles] Oh, it’s this.
I wish I could afford web space with the capability for ASP and Perl and databases and all that…
While we’re on this topic, does anyone know what happened in Week 36 (Mon 4 – Sat 11) September that would have made so many people view my website all at once?
My stats are here:
http://www.stealth.nl/usr/report.php3?name=houseofst0
Scroll down to “Bezoekers per week (laatste 20 weken)”; it’s the graph with the big spike right in the middle.
For some reason, I got over 1200 visitors that week, and other weeks I’ve been getting about 300-400. What happened then that would have given me that many hits? Was I featured in a newspaper or magazine? Did a well-known site link to me?
Anthony,
i) Why are your stats in German? Are you telling me you could only afford a cheap Germany based hosting?
ii) ClaraNet do excellent packages for just a tenner a month, but most other people like to wax lyrical about Dreamhost who also offer excellent packages at good value for money.
Maybe it’s time to move?
You probably got lots of hits because I linked to you…
I was grooving to that track the other day. Brings a warm Union-Jack-tinged glow to my heart, let me tell you. Will be a shame when I have to leave…
Apparently, the composer of the tune (David Lowe) is also known as Touch And Go, the guy who did the superlative “Would you go to bed with me?” dance track. Trumpets are always required on a dance track. Marvellous.
Anthony – here’s my theory – on the 6th September Annie Mole made a post aksing for people to list their favourite Tube songs
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2005_09_01_london-underground_archive.html#112598751925031523
On the 10th September you left a message in her comments linking to your home page with your song
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/themole/112598751925031523/#273223
Not much else seems to tie up with the dates you mention
Then don’t leave WE! I’ve /told/ you what to do many times … you know where you want to be really. Right?
Can I pick you up on trumpets as a ‘must have’. N-Trance’s “Set you free” is probably my all time fave dance track, no trumpets required!
Geoff!
My stats are in Dutch, and can be changed to English (although the helpful “Help” explanations can’t) by clicking the flag at the top. My hosting is the free Tesco.net webspace, which does the job nicely, but it would be nicer to have ASP capability, etc. Thing is, though, I can’t afford another tenner a month!! For the sake of my paltry site, it’s just not worth it.
Brinkster do ASP hosting for free, I think.
Alas, I don’t really have a choice in whether to leave or not right now. The only hope is I can trampoline somewhere else. Would you get a job for me?
i’d never heard the full version before but the news 24 tune is quality!
I use Firefox on MY laptop and computer, but I now have a work laptop, so use that mainly. And being a work laptop in the NHS, the buggers won’t let me have the admin password to be able to install Firefox.
Oooh.. wierd.. the window opened in 800×600, so following advice above, I just increased to full size (1024 etc), and the text box was nice and small. As soon as I started typing, it increased to slightly wider than the screen. That was interesting.
Wasn’t meant as a dig by the way Geoff, just thought you’d be interested in the strange happenings!