Boing Boing reports that the desperate greed of the doomed AP organisation has now reached the level of demanding a fee (of $12) for the quotation of 26 words of the late President of the USA, Mr. Thomas Jefferson.
It seems from the context that all AP has to do to make Jefferson’s words its property [...]
Archive for the ‘media’ Category
Last act of a desperate man
Posted in media, tagged AP, doomed dead-tree press on 3 August, 2009 | 3 Comments »
Best of luck
Posted in media, tagged bbc on 29 May, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Mac the Knife has received what appears to be a well-used form-letter from the BBC, refusing to supply information and claiming exemption from the Freedom of Information Act.
I wish Mac the best of luck with his campaign but it remains my considered opinion that this organisation is well beyond reform and should be abolished forthwith.
BBC archgeek on taxing computers
Posted in media, tagged bbc on 14 May, 2009 | 2 Comments »
It says in The Register that the BBC’s archgeek (ex-Micro$oft) is now demanding that people who have no television set, but watch non-simultaneous BBC content using ‘iPlayer’, are required to pay the television tax.
The point of this, as ever, is not to tax those who watch the BBC using computers; it is to tax privately-owned [...]
Read all about it
Posted in media, tagged Daily Telegraph, newspapers on 8 May, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Anna Raccoon (evidently not a cardboard cut-out after all), on the ethics of journalism, i.r.o. the Daily Telegraph.
As an old git I am becoming accustomed to missing parts of the plot, but I am surprised to have missed the bit where journalism acquired ethics.
Once upon a time the sole purpose of journalism was to [...]
The final stages of starvation
Posted in Campaigns, media, tagged access charging, websites on 7 May, 2009 | 2 Comments »
It says in Computer Weekly that the days of our harrumphing at any newspaper owned by Mr. Rupert Murdoch may soon be over, as that gentleman is finding it so hard to make ends meet that he feels he may shortly be obliged to charge for access to his newpapers’ websites.
We’ll just have to harrumph [...]
Deviousness award winner: the BBC
Posted in media, tagged bbc on 21 April, 2009 | 4 Comments »
The loyal and ingenious BBC have come up with a new scheme.
Pretending as hard as they can to be ‘concerned’ about CCTV cameras, they asked shortly before the Radio 4 1800 news for people ’sharing’ this ‘concern’ to write in (naturally), giving a description of their route to or from work, school, etc., and the [...]
Four more days. Four more days
Posted in media, tagged bbc on 19 April, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Still on the subject of the BBC, this week’s guessing meme, from mummylonglegs:
I wonder, if the license fee was abolished, how many days do you think the BBC would stay afloat.
My guess would be ‘four’.
Not that I have ever worked for the BBC, but I have worked with some BBC people, and I think this [...]
Delenda est BBC
Posted in media on 19 April, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Samizdata refers to this and this from I’d Like To Sleep Now.
There is no television set in use at these premises and we have repelled a number of attacks from the BBC’s expropriation arm.
I would recommend that ILTSN dispose of her TV set at once. As should everyone subjected to the BBC’s appalling methods of [...]
Disgusted of Redneckshire
Posted in media, tagged Telegraph on 10 April, 2009 | 4 Comments »
A repellent bit of rabble-rousing from the Telegraph, which spends more than 20 paragraphs building up a horror-story of undetectable, infallible, superhuman Islamic terrorists in our midst, before in a short final paragraph attempting to justify the use of torture by British police of terrorist suspects.
The author, one Con Coughlin, ought to be ashamed of [...]
Mobile phone tax: tax collectors explain
Posted in media, tagged bbc, mobile phone tax on 7 April, 2009 | 2 Comments »
More on the application of television tax to mobile phones, from The Register:
Users of the BBC’s trial of TV-over-Wi-Fi networks will break the law if they plug in their mobile phones in locations not covered by a television licence, the TV Licensing Authority has warned.
Those affected may wish to read the entire article.
It’s home* computers [...]
