BBC Radio gives podcasting a try.

“BBC Radio has for the last month been making some of its radio shows available for MP3 download. Is this news? Well yes, previously they’ve always streamed their content, so you had to be by your computer to receive it. With downloads you’ve been able to take it with you.” [via Scripting.com]

Our networks should be exploring podcasting but when I talk to people about it they think I’m nuts. The fact that BBC Radio is jumping in (and NPR and a shit-load of other pretty reputable broadcasters) is completely lost on them.

What did you do today? Nothing.

Just stumbled across this wonderful comic strip. I don’t know what percentage of American’s wind up in nursing homes but we all fear it. At least I do. Even the best nursing home is not a good place. Or so I concluded after my experience with my father (shudder). And by the time “they” have to put you in the home, you’re too far gone to blow your brains out or over-dose.

My standing joke has been: “Just make sure they have broadband.”

Numb3rs.

I’m a big fan of the movies of Ridley and Tony Scott, so I don’t know how I missed the fact they are brothers. The two are collaborating on TV series (that premiers on CBS in January) called Numb3rs:

“Rob Morrow stars as an FBI agent who recruits his mathematical genius brother to help the Bureau solve a wide range of challenging crimes in Los Angeles. Inspired by actual events, the series will depict how the confluence of police work and mathematics provide unexpected revelations and answers to the most perplexing criminal questions.”

I’d be much more hopeful about the series if it were going to be on HBO but I’ll be watching.

Photo journal.

Some friends of ours are making a quick holiday trip to see family in Florida and will be travelling at the peak. It gave me a wonderful idea. Take a photo every hour, on the hour, for the duration of the trip. Start with a shot of the alarm clock on day-one. Then, at the top of each hour, look around and take one picture. Nothing posed. Just shoot the first thing that catches your eye. And then go one with your holiday. If you’re awake 15 hours each day, for a fast 3-day trip… you have 45 images without having to think much about what you’re doing. If anybody tries this, let me know how it works. And I’d love to see the photos. If you don’t have a Fotki account, here’s a good reason to set one up.

Play-by-play on line two

Rick Bozich — a sports columnist for The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Kentucky– isn’t sure he needs radio anymore:

“I followed the final 15 minutes of the Louisville-Florida basketball game while I was in Freedom Hall on Saturday. The game, remember, was played in Gainesville. I was courtside for Kentucky’s annual Basketball 101 lecture against Indiana. I did not have a radio. I did have my cell phone. I connected to the Internet. Clicked to an ESPN site. Another click, and play-by-play from Gainesville flashed on my screen. Stats. Time. The works. Actually, that’s not true  no greasy bacon ads. So tell me again, for precisely what do I depend on WHAS radio?

From my perspective, the most interesting part of this story is that the cheif operating officer of our company brought it in to me. He gets it and that’s very important. One more thing… Radio is not going away. I don’t want it to go away. But broadcasters must find a way to embrace new technologies instead of trying to lobby them out of existance or deny that existance.