currybetdotnet OFCOM archive

Chipwrapper and the Ofcom PSB review
It seems that quite a lot of people I'm connected to via teh interwebz over the last couple of weeks have been slowly making their way through the mountain of documents that Ofcom have issued as part of their second review into Public Service Broadcasting. Martin Moore, whilst praising the PSB blog, has been thoroughly bogged down in the detail: " The wonderful thing about the internet is that OFCOM can publish as much as it likes without worrying about...

Read the full post - Published April 26, 2008 in Chipwrapper, Newspapers, OFCOM, Search

Where do you go to complain about spammy Google adverts in the UK
Google AdSense has been a successful product because it manages to act seamlessly as the broker between publisher and advertiser, but one of the problems with Google's contextual advertising is that is open to abuse. Most of the time a judicious bit of common sense can steer you clear of the extreme cases, but on Friday I noticed some AdSense abuse that I was astonished had escaped the Google quality detection net. A post on a friend's blog featured...

Read the full post - Published March 12, 2007 in Google, OFCOM

OFCOM and the BBC Trust do not appear to have heard of games
If you've carefully read through the documents published in the last weeks by the BBC Trust and OFCOM about the BBC's proposed on demand services and the iPlayer, you'd be forgiven for misunderstanding one large element of the home entertainment landscape in the UK. OFCOM, in particular, look at several major media formats in the UK, and the iPlayer's potential impact on consumption, on secondary rights sales, and on innovation and investment in nascent markets. The BBC Trust for their...

Read the full post - Published February 7, 2007 in BBC, Media, OFCOM, iPlayer

Can we really quantify how much 'free' TV downloads distort the value of the market?
With the release last week of the BBC Trust's provisional findings into the proposed iPlayer on demand service, there has been a lot of focus in the places where I hang out online on the market impact of downloads and piracy. After several attempts over the last few months, I resigned myself to the fact that I was never going to be online long enough to BitTorrent down the Season 2 box sets of 'Lost' and 'Desperate Housewives'. Realising that...

Read the full post - Published February 6, 2007 in BBC, Media, OFCOM, iPlayer

The BBC's definition of "stackable series" in the iPlayer doesn't make commercial sense to me
I mentioned in my previous post about the iPlayer that I found I could not agree with everything that had been said by the BBC Trust in their proposed approval of the BBC's new on demand services, nor with all of OFCOM's submission about the potential market impact of the service. One area where I find the BBC Trust's decision mystifying is on the issue of series stacking. They have decided to divide BBC programming into series which can be...

Read the full post - Published February 5, 2007 in BBC, OFCOM, iPlayer

The BBC iPlayer's odd bookmarking restriction
At the weekend I bumped into an ex-colleague from the BBC at Stansted Airport, and one of the things we chatted about was the iPlayer project that they were working on - so I was even more interested than usual this week when the BBC Trust announced their preliminary findings about the BBC's proposed on demand services. Whilst I can't say I agree with all of the restrictions that are being proposed for the service, nor with the whole of...

Read the full post - Published February 2, 2007 in BBC, OFCOM, iPlayer

Entertaining reactions to BBC Worldwide's P2P move
There has been a lot of entertaining reaction across the web to the announcement that BBC Worldwide will be distributing some shows via the Zudeo service in the USA. On TechCruch, Michael Arrington sparked another U.S. vs U.K. flame war with his (tongue-firmly-in-cheek I'm sure) comment that: Under the agreement, BBC will license a number of television shows to U.S. users, including Red Dwarf, Strange and Invasion Earth, Little Britain, Doctor Who, Fawlty Towers, Coupling, Keeping Up Appearances, League of...

Read the full post - Published December 20, 2006 in BBC, OFCOM

OFCOM advertising (020) 3
I saw on the tube this morning that Ofcom have started an advertising campaign to back-up the roll out of new London phone numbers starting with the digit 3. Perhaps this will help to dispel some of the mainstream media disinformation about the issue of new numbers in London....

Read the full post - Published May 23, 2005 in OFCOM

London phone numbers change again, according to the Daily Mail
I've written about this before, but yesterday the Daily Mail again reported the inaccurate claim that "London is to have its fourth telephone number shake-up in 14 years" Sean Poulter's article states that: In 2000, London codes were changed again to 0207 for inner and 0208 for outer London. David Edmonds, who was the head of telecoms regulator OFTEL at the time, said this system was 'as future proof as possible' and there would be no need for any more...

Read the full post - Published May 21, 2005 in Daily Mail, OFCOM

London Phone Codes "Change"
Today's print Daily Mail screams that London is getting its umpteenth telephone code in so many years. Using digit graphics in case you don't get the point. As has been admirably pointed out by 2lmc amongst others, the London code hasn't changed - and Ofcom themselves were pretty clear about that being the case. It remains the three digits 020. When the code changed last time it was just that for convenience all the exchange numbers started with a 7...

Read the full post - Published July 14, 2004 in BBC, Daily Mail, Media, Newspapers, OFCOM, The Guardian, The Independent

OFCOM plan to use the web as their guidance communication channel

Published July 14, 2004 in OFCOM, Web