Owen Smith
Well-Known Member
I hardly think loss of Red Button counts as genuinely evil.
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BBC red button teletext
- Thread starter zwarder
- Start date
Black Hole
May contain traces of nut
Perhaps, but why are you so vociferous in advocating inaction? You might choose not to act yourself, but I see no purpose in persuading everyone else to be the same.
Owen Smith
Well-Known Member
Why are you so vociferous in advocating action? We're basically proposing the opposite view, neither of which standpoint is morally more right than the other.
I just don't want people to waste their time. This is a done deal. Red Button is on life support on the BBC and will be quietly switched off when they think no one is looking, many new TVs don't support it, and all the other broadcasters have stopped their Red Button service already. Fight the battles that are worth fighting, nothing is going to change the outcome here.
Analogue TV Teletext services (BBC Ceefax, ITV Oracle/Teletext Ltd) were pretty revolutionary in providing information to the Public (and Trade) in an era (1974-75 onwards) where there was no other way so universally available.
(Fax, ticker tape news feeds, telegrams and voice telephony being the alternatives?).
I seriously can't remember the last time I pressed the Red Button (for either MHEG or HbbTV). I have other ways, via the interweb, to get the information contained therein. {Even for the alternative video streams iPlayer can be called up directly on the TV or other devices as suits.} The EPG replaces the TV listing pages too.
Any complaint will just get a template letter response. But they will be logged and presented to 'The Management' of the BBC. They sometimes made very interesting reading when I had access.
(Fax, ticker tape news feeds, telegrams and voice telephony being the alternatives?).
I seriously can't remember the last time I pressed the Red Button (for either MHEG or HbbTV). I have other ways, via the interweb, to get the information contained therein. {Even for the alternative video streams iPlayer can be called up directly on the TV or other devices as suits.} The EPG replaces the TV listing pages too.
Any complaint will just get a template letter response. But they will be logged and presented to 'The Management' of the BBC. They sometimes made very interesting reading when I had access.
EEPhil
Number 28
True of BBC, ITV and C5 in my experience. If you're really unfortunate they add "no one else has complained". (Almost the Post Office Horizon defence)
It's not even something Ofcom could deal with. Even if it could, they are as effective as a chocolate teapot.
Black Hole
May contain traces of nut
Because you are! Anyway, your position is nihilistic. "You won't achieve anything so don't try" is not the same as "I don't believe the outcome would be to anyone's advantage even if you succeeded".
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Owen Smith
Well-Known Member
I'd rather the time was spent complaining about something that might actually get fixed or improved. For example complaining that iPlayer HD is in 720p when it ought to be 1080p, or complaining that no iPlayer service (SD, HD or 4K) has 5.1 sound even when the same thing broadcast on Freeview HD did. There is a non zero chance of actually getting some improvements there.
Your argument assumes we all have infinite time and might as well complain even when there is absolutely zero chance of a change. Maybe you have infinite time, I do not.
It is 1080p on compatible devices - as is UHD in the "trial".
That's been discussed and explained (almost ad nauseum, here and elsewhere).
BBC simply have higher expenditure and development priorities (as much as I'd also like iPlayer to be 5.1 surround sound system viewers are still in a relative minority). It'll happen eventually I expect. Possibly about the same time as UHD is out of the trial phase?
prpr
Well-Known Member
What defines a compatible device?
Surely any device which has current support can do 1080, so why not serve that to all?
I don't believe the outcome of this conversation would be to anyone's advantage even if you succeeded in getting the last word yet here we are once again.
Or when 8K Ultra HD is common place everywhere else and people with 5.1 have already moved to 7.1 7.2 or even 9.1 or 9.2. BBC will always be a dinosaur playing catch up and that is the reason they still have red button text when everyone else has moved on.
Owen Smith
Well-Known Member
On Apple TV 4K gen 3, the only device I have that I can run iPlayer on to feed my TV (on which iPlayer no longer works directly), iPlayer is limited to 720p. No 1080p and no UHD.
Lack of 5.1 sound on iPlayer has certainly been discussed. I wouldn't say it has been explained, unless the BBC saying "we don't want to" counts as explained. I've seen lots of feeble excuses and no real reason why it can't be done. My point remains that complaining about this to the BBC is more likely to be productive than complaining about Red Button slowly dying.
An awkward older man that refuses to budge on internet issues. I have said the service will close but he is persistent.Friend needs to get Internet installed?
HbbTV went live in 2017 and some sets still support both MHEG and HbbTV, I suspect.
Red Button | Help receiving TV and radio
The BBC offers two different red button services that you access by pressing the red button on your remote control when on a BBC channel.www.bbc.co.uk
Things move on... AM radio is ceasing... other (current) TV and Radio broadcasting will follow and be replaced by a modern alternative such as iPTV (Freely) and may well be received via mobile data as well as fibres or cables into homes.
So getting this friend into the late 20th Century and onto the internet is only about 25 years overdue.
I was originally tasked with repairing his old Philips TV & now wish he had not invested in new technology. This unfortunately is the case with the older generation & have come across it many times
RobH1
Well-Known Member
A bit of a generalisation eh? You may receive some feedback from the old codgers on this forum. I'm 77, do I fall in to your implied category?
I have no IT background but ditched Windows for Linux six years ago, still enjoying learning, but I don't think I'm an exception.
gomezz
Well-Known Member
The same older generation that was responsible for developing technologies that younger generations take for granted today?
Owen Smith
Well-Known Member
My mum is 81, my dad 87, my mum's sister 84. They all struggle with technology to various degrees. Mum can never remember which button on the remote control is Pause despite it looking the same across many devices for at least 50 years. My dad has a Windows 11 PC that he manages to use for web, email and youtube but he's never mastered emailing me a url he expects me to search for and find the same web page that he's on. And dad can't cope with a smartphone, "why is is so different from my PC?" is his complaint and honestly that's semi valid. My aunt can't handle any of this stuff, it took her 10 years to master her HDR Fox T2 using written down lists of button presses to do various things. She's completely lost with her new DECT phone and answering machine despite it being much easier to use than her old one that died.
Though age related memory decline can be a cause of difficulty in grasping how to use new tech I do not think age is the main cause. If you had any interest in the latest tech and gadgets in your past you tend to carry on that interest into your later years and already have some knowledge that will help when encountering something totally new but if you never did then new tech is so alien that you would not know where to start or have the learned logic of what to try. I remember when CSCS testing for the construction industry first started. I was on a large government site in London and they brought in a mobile testing unit, 5 PC's with a divider between each. It was a multiple choice test using a mouse and mouse mat. It started with on screen instructions telling you to move the mouse up or down to your chosen answer then right click on its box. I went into the test with a guy 10 years younger than me who had never owned a computer or even a games console. It could hear him mumbling and cursing then calling out to the test assistant " This ******* thing ain't working chav" I then heard the assistant tell him that he needs to roll the mouse up and down on the mat not wave it up and down in mid air.
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Owen Smith
Well-Known Member
Exactly. My mum and my aunt are not remotely interested in this stuff and they would much rather daily life were as it was 20 years ago and they could go into a bank to withdraw cash, open an account or pay bills. Similarly they would much rather they could still buy everything they want in a shop. The world has changed and no longer works the way they want, but they never had any interest in technology and find they can't cope.
My dad is a mechanical engineer by training and career so has more interest in this stuff, hence he's kept a PC and uses web, email and youtube. But he now finds it very difficult to learn anything new, hardly a surprise at 87. The change from Windows 10 to 11 was a jolt for him, it does all the same things but the buttons have moved around and he's struggling to find where some of them have moved to. I sympathise, a lot of the changes in Windows 11 are pointless window dressing.
Moving down a generation this site is the most up to date kind of social media I use. I am 59. I don't use tik tok, whatsapp, facebook, X or anything like that. I've just never needed to and still see no need. On day some vital service may move to those kind of platforms exclusively and it may be too late for me to learn.
At 66 I am much the same as you. I have never had whatsapp or instagram though I had MySpace back in the day for a while then Facebook for a few months but had no need to see pics of kittens or what people I barely knew had for dinner, I changed my name on there to limit the amount of dross and the junk e.mails I was getting suddenly started being addressed to the new name so I deleted it. I must admit that I do rarely go on TikTok but it is usually due to seeing something on another site that has come from TikTok that is blatant B/S and I cannot resist going there and commenting that is is and why it is. My main claim to being a Luddite is refusing to adopt internet banking or using my mobile phone to purchase anything, I simply do not trust the systems used so stick to telephone banking using my home phone and also refusing voice recognition.