The first experimental BBC television broadcasts were in 1928, with a regular service starting in 1936. Services were suspended in 1939 for the duration of the war due to defence reasons.
Although there's been a lot of announcements recently about the BBC's Creative Archive, I can't really see it being launched for at least a couple of years.
One of the major issues with distributing BBC aired programmes, via the Internet, is rights management. A lot of BBC produced programmes use material that is not actually owned by the BBC. It may have been commissioned from independant produces who retain some rights over it, or even purchased from other broadcasters. For example, the BBC archive has no World War II footage. That's because the BBC didn't start broadcasting until the 1950's. So every time you see a documentary on the BBC that has original WWII footage incorporated, that material has been purchased from a 3rd party (say Pathe for example). So clearing all material from all BBC shows is going to be a total headache! This may be in part why only a portion of the archive, and not the whole thing, is going to be initially available online.
The other issue is of course digitising all that content. It's a big ask and not going to happen overnight. The whole process of getting the tapes from the Windmill Road archive, selecting the content that you want to use, encoding that content (let's hope for MPEG4 but most likely to be MPEG2. Although Creative Archive doesn't have to be broadcast quality for personal use, only VHS quality, they'd be crazy not to encode at a higher quality so that content could be re-used in a digital format for other projects), cataloguing that content with all relevant keywords and metadata and then publishing the content. As for storage we're talking several (tens) terabytes at least.
I think building the website itself if going to be the easy bit!
Creative Archive is a project I'd love to work on as I think it's going to be quite exciting, but the shear scale is also quite enormous.
It's on the way to lots of places! Narramine, Nyngan and eventually you could make it all the way to Broken Hill. From there the world's your oyster....
I'm currently working on another, different BBC project that involves digitising a portion of the extensive archive (only about 200 hours worth) and every single piece of footage we want to put online does have to be rights checked.
However, one of the main focusses of this new site is the US market. Therefore, the rights clearance process covers countries other than just the UK. If a customer wishes to purchase a high resolution (broadcast quality) version of archive material then the usage rights will be partially based upon their location.
To be honest, from the experience of the project I am working on, as long as the material has been cleared through the rights checking process, it is then available for anyone to download, anywhere in the world, a little sadly in WMV format - although QT will be available for a fee at a higher quality. This material will be BBC watermarked and therefore useless for business purposes, but fine for private consumption in that form.
I can assure you that the Information & Archive department within the BBC is pretty big and they know exactly what they do and do not own the rights to. Although checking sometimes can be a laborious process as it is still paper based.
On the other question of why only a part of the archive will be made available, as has been mentioned before it is to do with the TV licence fee. The BBC raised approximately GBP2bn from this every year. While the website will most likely be available to people anywhere in the world (that's the nature of the Net) it will primarily be focussed on the UK market as they pay the licence fee.
An increase in the NASA budget would be a very good thing for the future of Government lead space exploration.
However, the caveat I would add is that as long as this increased spending did not come from social welfare budgets, health, education etc.
The best place for an increased NASA budget to come from is military spending. If the amount of effort and money that is spent on creating items of destruction was put into space exploration I'd say we'd be in for some exciting times.
I was going to post something similar. With such a globalised marketplace and options such as "telecommuting" relevant for many, it would be useful to gather information from around the world. Surely a programmer in the US could potentially take on contract work from UK based employers? This is true for other professions as well, such as journalism and graphic design.
I think it would also be helpful to poll people who were recently unemployed, not just those currently out of work. For example, I was without a job between mid-October 2002 and late February 2003. Surely knowing that it recently took someone a little over 4 months to find another job could be useful in predicting current inductry norms?
I don't know about the firing side of things, but I have certainly seen CVs rejected during the hiring process for not having the right education qualifications.
An online auction company I recently worked for has a massive hang up about MBAs. If you want to do anything technology related that's not actually coding, for example Project Manager, then you'd better get yourself an MBA.
Also during recent reading of job advertisements I've seen a lot of ads that say something like "must have good degree from a red brick university."
Eventually I think it is going to have a lot to with the intended audience of the information. For example, I know that a company is allowed to have a Swedish website, that they derive income from, without incurring a tax liability in that country if they do not actively market in the Swedish marketplace. How exactly do you define that ? It's a fine line to draw.
Other similar cases include the sale of hate material on popular online auction sites. Both Yahoo (although their European operations are now largely in the process of being shut down) and eBay heavily restrict their members from buying and selling Nazi memorabilia. On eBay even though US based sellers are allowed to list Nazi memorabilia (as long as it is not inciting hate) in US Dollars, any member with a country identification of Germany is not allowed to bid on such items.
Moving the discussion in to the realm of access to all published information is going to prove very interesting. Eventually I think it will be up to the country, Zimbabwe in this case, to regulate the content users based their see. An almost impossible task but this is essentially what China is attempting to do.
Whether this is right or wrong is another question entirely.
Note the negative and neutral feedback. So many of the big name, blue chip sellers on eBay just can't seem to get it right when it comes to basic customer service.
"Bidding and Buying.
If you are the highest bidder at the end of an auction (meeting the applicable minimum bid or reserve requirements) and your bid is accepted by the seller, you are obligated to complete the transaction with the seller, unless the item is listed in a category under the Non-Binding Bid Policy (at http://pages.ebay.com/help/community/png-nbb.html) or the transaction is prohibited by law or by this Agreement. By bidding on an item you agree to be bound by the conditions of sale included in the item's description (or linked to from the description) so long as those conditions of sale are not in violation of this Agreement or unlawful. Bids are not retractable except in exceptional circumstances such as when the seller materially changes the item's description after you bid, a clear typographical error is made, or you cannot authenticate the seller's identity. If you choose to bid on adult items, you are certifying that you have the legal right to purchase such items."
The problem with this is, that I believe nobody has yet taken anyone to court over refusing to honour a bid. So, as far as I know, no precedent has been set. I'd be happy to know otherwise, then I'd be more likely to follow up on the joker that backed out on their winning bid for my 4WD.
eBay now has an integrated electronic payment system with Billpoint. So while PayPal has not been banned on the site, it certainly isn't getting any promotion from eBay as such. Billpoint is plastered all over the site. When listing an item, it is simply a matter of checking a box for Billpoint acceptance. There is no need to include anything in the auction description. I contend that in the long term Billpoint will ultimately replace PayPal for the majority of transactions on eBay.
As has been mentioned previously a number of times, PayPal does not handle international users. Billpoint is similar in that it only covers US based sellers, but can accept payments from people located anywhere in the world. Judging by the pace of change on the eBay Int'l sites with the take up of core features (see Regionals) I don't see Billpoint being available on the Int'l eBay sites, and therefore Int'l sellers, until well into 2001. If PayPal can move quicker than this then they may have that first mover advantage. However, Billpoint will always have the advantage of eBay backing. I am surprised that a major push wasn't made by eBay/Billpoint to have Int'l seller functionality available for eBay Australia in time for the 2000 Olympic Games held in Sydney. There is currently a lot of trade on eBay Australia in Olympic memorabilia, and likely to be be even more in the upcoming weeks.
One last thing - "limited auction description space". What's so limited about the eBay auction description space? The only limits I can think of is that theoretically it can only be one HTML page in size and that to include anything more than straight text a knowledge of HTML is required, or use of auction assistant software like that offered by Blackthorne. Essentially if you can write HTML then the auction description space can be as complex as you like or require.
Slashdot Mirror
I always thought that tossing involved a little tampering one way or the other. Not sure how to prevent it, I'm blind.....
You're right Paul, thanks for correcting me.
The first experimental BBC television broadcasts were in 1928, with a regular service starting in 1936. Services were suspended in 1939 for the duration of the war due to defence reasons.
1955 was the first colour transmission.
I should have checked my dates!
Although there's been a lot of announcements recently about the BBC's Creative Archive, I can't really see it being launched for at least a couple of years.
One of the major issues with distributing BBC aired programmes, via the Internet, is rights management. A lot of BBC produced programmes use material that is not actually owned by the BBC. It may have been commissioned from independant produces who retain some rights over it, or even purchased from other broadcasters. For example, the BBC archive has no World War II footage. That's because the BBC didn't start broadcasting until the 1950's. So every time you see a documentary on the BBC that has original WWII footage incorporated, that material has been purchased from a 3rd party (say Pathe for example). So clearing all material from all BBC shows is going to be a total headache! This may be in part why only a portion of the archive, and not the whole thing, is going to be initially available online.
The other issue is of course digitising all that content. It's a big ask and not going to happen overnight. The whole process of getting the tapes from the Windmill Road archive, selecting the content that you want to use, encoding that content (let's hope for MPEG4 but most likely to be MPEG2. Although Creative Archive doesn't have to be broadcast quality for personal use, only VHS quality, they'd be crazy not to encode at a higher quality so that content could be re-used in a digital format for other projects), cataloguing that content with all relevant keywords and metadata and then publishing the content. As for storage we're talking several (tens) terabytes at least.
I think building the website itself if going to be the easy bit!
Creative Archive is a project I'd love to work on as I think it's going to be quite exciting, but the shear scale is also quite enormous.
Also a Ducati 748R with Termis at Donnington Park, complete with downshifts into Redgate.
For my personal favourite listen to this one of the Ducati Desmosedici MotoGP bike. More of the same here.
Excuse the chicken strips on the tyres but I'd just bought the bike. Those, and the shitty Bridgestone tyres, are now gone.
It's on the way to lots of places! Narramine, Nyngan and eventually you could make it all the way to Broken Hill. From there the world's your oyster....
By sister lives in Nyngan you insensitive clod!
I'm pretty sure it's not a rights issue.
I'm currently working on another, different BBC project that involves digitising a portion of the extensive archive (only about 200 hours worth) and every single piece of footage we want to put online does have to be rights checked.
However, one of the main focusses of this new site is the US market. Therefore, the rights clearance process covers countries other than just the UK. If a customer wishes to purchase a high resolution (broadcast quality) version of archive material then the usage rights will be partially based upon their location.
To be honest, from the experience of the project I am working on, as long as the material has been cleared through the rights checking process, it is then available for anyone to download, anywhere in the world, a little sadly in WMV format - although QT will be available for a fee at a higher quality. This material will be BBC watermarked and therefore useless for business purposes, but fine for private consumption in that form.
I can assure you that the Information & Archive department within the BBC is pretty big and they know exactly what they do and do not own the rights to. Although checking sometimes can be a laborious process as it is still paper based.
On the other question of why only a part of the archive will be made available, as has been mentioned before it is to do with the TV licence fee. The BBC raised approximately GBP2bn from this every year. While the website will most likely be available to people anywhere in the world (that's the nature of the Net) it will primarily be focussed on the UK market as they pay the licence fee.
An increase in the NASA budget would be a very good thing for the future of Government lead space exploration.
However, the caveat I would add is that as long as this increased spending did not come from social welfare budgets, health, education etc.
The best place for an increased NASA budget to come from is military spending. If the amount of effort and money that is spent on creating items of destruction was put into space exploration I'd say we'd be in for some exciting times.
I almost thought there was a story about surfing on /.
http://www.quiksilver.com/
You know, water, sand, sun and all that outdoors stuff.
I was going to post something similar. With such a globalised marketplace and options such as "telecommuting" relevant for many, it would be useful to gather information from around the world. Surely a programmer in the US could potentially take on contract work from UK based employers? This is true for other professions as well, such as journalism and graphic design.
I think it would also be helpful to poll people who were recently unemployed, not just those currently out of work. For example, I was without a job between mid-October 2002 and late February 2003. Surely knowing that it recently took someone a little over 4 months to find another job could be useful in predicting current inductry norms?
And Germans call them "Handys" because, well they are......
An online auction company I recently worked for has a massive hang up about MBAs. If you want to do anything technology related that's not actually coding, for example Project Manager, then you'd better get yourself an MBA.
Also during recent reading of job advertisements I've seen a lot of ads that say something like "must have good degree from a red brick university."
"The expected £130m net annual income from the charge will be spent on improving bus services, which are disproportionately used by the poor."
"The expected £130m net annual income from the charge will be spent on improving bus services, which are disproportionately used by the poor."
'Nuff said
The poor are also the least likely to own a car and thus have to pay a congestion charge.
Latest estimations are that out of a population of 7.2 million approximately only 60,000 Londoners will have to pay the congestion charge each day.
For a good article see -
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2749187.stm
Eventually I think it is going to have a lot to with the intended audience of the information. For example, I know that a company is allowed to have a Swedish website, that they derive income from, without incurring a tax liability in that country if they do not actively market in the Swedish marketplace. How exactly do you define that ? It's a fine line to draw.
Other similar cases include the sale of hate material on popular online auction sites. Both Yahoo (although their European operations are now largely in the process of being shut down) and eBay heavily restrict their members from buying and selling Nazi memorabilia. On eBay even though US based sellers are allowed to list Nazi memorabilia (as long as it is not inciting hate) in US Dollars, any member with a country identification of Germany is not allowed to bid on such items.
Moving the discussion in to the realm of access to all published information is going to prove very interesting. Eventually I think it will be up to the country, Zimbabwe in this case, to regulate the content users based their see. An almost impossible task but this is essentially what China is attempting to do.
Whether this is right or wrong is another question entirely.
And this is IBM UK's page on eBay UK.
Note the negative and neutral feedback. So many of the big name, blue chip sellers on eBay just can't seem to get it right when it comes to basic customer service.
I think this "open standards" deal with IBM and Websphere fits well with the eBay community values - http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/community/values.htm
eBay can't be all bad......
Also worth noting is that Billpoint's UK operations are not processed through Wells Fargo but rather a third party, that I'm not sure I can name.
I'll have to chain my pen to my desk or PC to stop losing it all the time and prevent others from stealing it when they lose theirs.
What happens when I chew the end ? Do I got a cool buzz like off a 9 volt battery ?
What a great publicity shot!
And C) eBay also has offices and employees in France (and Germany)
Check out the rules on the eBay site:
t ml#bab
) or the transaction is prohibited by law or by this Agreement. By bidding on an item you agree to be bound by the conditions of sale included in the item's description (or linked to from the description) so long as those conditions of sale are not in violation of this Agreement or unlawful. Bids are not retractable except in exceptional circumstances such as when the seller materially changes the item's description after you bid, a clear typographical error is made, or you cannot authenticate the seller's identity. If you choose to bid on adult items, you are certifying that you have the legal right to purchase such items."
http://pages.ebay.com/help/community/png-user.h
"Bidding and Buying.
If you are the highest bidder at the end of an auction (meeting the applicable minimum bid or reserve requirements) and your bid is accepted by the seller, you are obligated to complete the transaction with the seller, unless the item is listed in a category under the Non-Binding Bid Policy (at http://pages.ebay.com/help/community/png-nbb.html
The problem with this is, that I believe nobody has yet taken anyone to court over refusing to honour a bid. So, as far as I know, no precedent has been set. I'd be happy to know otherwise, then I'd be more likely to follow up on the joker that backed out on their winning bid for my 4WD.
eBay now has an integrated electronic payment system with Billpoint. So while PayPal has not been banned on the site, it certainly isn't getting any promotion from eBay as such. Billpoint is plastered all over the site. When listing an item, it is simply a matter of checking a box for Billpoint acceptance. There is no need to include anything in the auction description. I contend that in the long term Billpoint will ultimately replace PayPal for the majority of transactions on eBay.
As has been mentioned previously a number of times, PayPal does not handle international users. Billpoint is similar in that it only covers US based sellers, but can accept payments from people located anywhere in the world. Judging by the pace of change on the eBay Int'l sites with the take up of core features (see Regionals) I don't see Billpoint being available on the Int'l eBay sites, and therefore Int'l sellers, until well into 2001. If PayPal can move quicker than this then they may have that first mover advantage. However, Billpoint will always have the advantage of eBay backing. I am surprised that a major push wasn't made by eBay/Billpoint to have Int'l seller functionality available for eBay Australia in time for the 2000 Olympic Games held in Sydney. There is currently a lot of trade on eBay Australia in Olympic memorabilia, and likely to be be even more in the upcoming weeks.
One last thing - "limited auction description space". What's so limited about the eBay auction description space? The only limits I can think of is that theoretically it can only be one HTML page in size and that to include anything more than straight text a knowledge of HTML is required, or use of auction assistant software like that offered by Blackthorne. Essentially if you can write HTML then the auction description space can be as complex as you like or require.