Desert Island Discs evokes strong memories for me. As a kid, when I was in the car with my dad travelling home after a weekend, it would invariably be on and I would be subjected to listening to people I’d never heard of being interviewed, choosing pieces of classical music I had no interest in.
In fact, the only time I ever remember someone not choosing a non-classical piece was when the boxer Alan Minter was being quizzed and he picked Boney M’s Brown Girl In The Ring, although I'm sure he wasn’t the first.
Those were the days when the dulcet tones of Roy Plomley would introduce the week’s castaway when Radio 4 seemed like the last thing on earth I’d ever want to listen to regularly.
But now, 30-odd years on, with the arrival of the weekly podcast, Desert Island Discs has become staple listening.
Part of the attraction are the mellifluous tones of Kirsty Young, who has the most soothing voice – a voice made for radio, dare one say it.
But the diversity of the guests are what makes DID so appealing. In the past couple of months you could have listened to Morrissey, Michael Caine, Professor Mary Beard, James Ellroy and Mary Portas to name but a few.
Often the names are household, but there are always a few less well-known guests – often the ones who end up being the most interesting.
While Desert Island Discs is not exactly the confessional box, the intimate nature of radio and the polite, yet incisive questioning of Kirsty Young mean you do get an insight into people that you probably wouldn’t get from, say, a Michael Parkinson grilling, or a magazine feature.
Sixty-eight years and counting – who wouldn’t bet on it lasting another 68?
Though Spaghetti Junction was bad? Pah, it only clocks in at No.8 in this list of difficult and death-defying global highways.
From the hairpin turns in the Italian mountains, to the almost impassible Lena Highway in the wilds of Eastern Russia, these are some serious roads.
I remember going along the Leh – Manali road back in 1989 during a torrential downpour and we very nearly came off a couple of times.
Our driver thought he was the Indian equivalent of Lewis Hamilton and raced along in a beaten-up jeep at breakneck speeds. I recall sitting on the left-hand side of the vehicle, giving me a perfect view of the sheer drop many times – a frightening few hours.
Having got so far, we ended up having to turn back and hole up in Leh overnight, after a landslide caused the road became impassible.
Such was the squeeze for rooms in the town, 10 of us ended up sleeping on the floor of a hotel manager’s office – not the most comfortable of nights ever.
The next day, the Indian Army did indeed get called out to unblock the road and the jam eased and we arrived at Manali a day late, but fortunately still alive.
The motto – if you can get away with driving yourself, do. Indian drivers are utter lunatics.
Posted via web from Rob’s stream of web
Last night saw the first Brighton Future of News meet up @theskiff with around 30 interested people attending.Â
The idea is to get a group of like-minded people in the same room and discuss innovative news for 2010 and beyond.Â
Last night,
Jo Wadsworth from the Brighton Argus gave a talk about how community journalism and blogs have evolved on the online version of the paper and the plan to roll this out further with even more community reporters, plus how this differs from 'regular journalism'.Â
That was followed by a totally different presentation from
Simon Willison, a developer at The Guardian who built the crowdsourcing application that was used successfully
to investigate MPs' expenses, as well as a brilliant site called
WildlifeNearYou. He showed how the idea of crowdsourcing is changing the way many websites evolve, also using
OpenStreetMap as an example.
The event and group was organised by Judith Townend from
journalism.co.uk and if initial reaction is anything to go by, looks like it will be a big hit in the future. Â Â
Posted via email from Rob’s stream of web
