Tag: mediacity

What is it about TV people?

There is something about TV which seems to attract some of the people I personally don’t really like much.

I was on the 18:57 declassified train back from London Euston to Manchester Piccadilly. Declassified meaning the whole train is one class and you can sit in first class on a second class ticket. Anyway sitting on my reserved single seat, I couldn’t help but notice the people on the seats ahead of me making a bit of noise.

As the train wound its way up to Manchester, they got noisier and nosier. There was lots of bitching about collages and celebs (did they not understand they were in a public place?). They bought lots of wine/cava from the onboard shop and drink them just as quick. “Oh don’t worry I’ll claim for them” said the most senior one. They made it clear they worked in Media City and met celebs all the time in the studios.

What got me was, when we got into Piccadilly one of the quiet passenger sitting near me said quietly to another passenager.

Well I’m so glad our license fee is being used so wisely…

And who could blame her for saying so? I wanted to say, I don’t believe they are BBC employees, but choose to see what else would be said. However the carriage filled up with people getting ready to get off.

So I ask what is it about TV?

I’ve met many types of media people but TV just seems to attract posers, dicks and showoffs? Outside the obvious idea of the broadcast, I mean these people are on the wrong side of the camera. Maybe its a build up  Of course I’m not saying all the crew who work behind the camera are posers, dicks and showoffs. But it certainly attracts them.

Ok this is one time right? I’m very wrong right? Lets look at other times I’ve come across TV people… The Year of Making Love and that massive saga. Enough really said… And also lets not forget the Edinburgh TV UnFestival, great event but the TV festival events were something else. Although I have admit its Edinburgh in summer and its the end of the festivals. But finally its not just me, insurance companies put higher premiums on TV producers, as I found out when trying to insure my scooter. As soon as I changed my job title to almost anything but senior producer, the premiums dropped massively. If anyone asks, I’m a senior designer… Certainly not a TV producer…

Sorry to people I know who work in TV, I’m sure your one of the good bunch, your being let down by a vocal few!

TedxSalford biggest in the UK, don’t you know?

TEDxSalford

A few Sundays ago (10th November 2013), I had the somewhat pleasure of going to TedxSalford.

I say somewhat because although I enjoyed most of the talks, I felt strange about it. Specially after doing the first TedXManchester at the old BBC in Oxford Road. And then speaking at the second one in the cornerhouse.

The whole event is slick and a well polished affair. And thats my problem with it.

TedxSalford as someone said on stage, is bigger than most Ted Conferences! According to wikipedia the Lowry theatre holds 1730.  There were a lot of people maybe at a push 1400  as the lowry theatre wasn’t quite full but the ground floor and circle were packed solid. I got a seat in the private boxes which was lovely. Cheers iMartyn, Simon and Shane.

How did it get so big? I assume its the support from the University of Salford which helps make it possible. Thats not to take anything away from the staff and people involved in the whole operation. But I’m use to Tedx’s showcasing new and local talent rather than collectively getting people flown in from across the world. And with a line up including astronauts again its easy to see why its so popular.

TEDxSalford

Ok hands up I’m bias because having run the first TedxManchester1 with Herb Kim in the BBC Oxford Road, I do feel like we tried to do a number of things including highlight local talent and local concerns. TedxManchester2 was the same, but of course I would say that having the chance to tell my story on stage. I can’t imagine TedxSalford would let me anywhere near the stage. Yes they had a Manchester Utd player but to be fair he was pretty good for being nervous. You can’t help but feel they over stepped the local by having an international foodball player.

Please don’t get me wrong, its nice both TedxManchester and TedxSalford have each found there niche and they don’t overlap. I just think I prefer TedxManchester personally. There is something about genuine and authenticity which seems to be missing. I felt like we went from here’s a massive speaker to here’s another big speaker to yes you guessed it another massive speaker. Thinking Digital has big speakers but Herb balances them with themes to make proceedings a lot less choppy. I’d also look at what Imran does with TedxLeeds and TedxBradford. Well thought out lineup, with a narrative running from one to the other.

Saying all that… The whole event was very well produced except the sheer amount of people made getting lunch and the break out sessions a total nightmare. There were some fantastic speakers…the one which got me was once again Graham Hughes who talked about being the only man to travel to travel into every county by land only.

Other noticeable talks came from Lucy Siegle who talked about the fashion and the incredible waste it generates (one for my sister). Google Glass technical lead Thad Sturner for a great break out session i was able to squeeze into. Poet Lemn Sissay for some great slam poetry on stage. George Smooh for making my brain overload a little. Hetain Patel for his amazing art work and art direction.

Something I mentioned a lot in previous blog posts. Recorded from TedxSanjoseca, Steve Mazan’s look at life and death. Not to be missed…

So as a whole TedxSalford is well worth going to if you want the TED experience (I assume it might be like that, although I’ve never actually been). Just don’t expect anything local like the other regional tedx’s. That can be a good and bad thing depending on what you want or expect. This is a case of bigger isn’t always better…

Unofficial BarCampMediaCity interview

I’m interviewed on the unofficial MediaCityblog today for BarCampMediaCity.

Here’s a slice of the action…

Next month will see Media City host it’s first ‘Bar Camp’ – an informal conference with discussions, demos and activities all organised by the attendees.

BarCampMediaCityUK will take place at BBC North on the 17th and 18th September, and is the brainchild of Ian Forrester, Senior Producer at BBC R&D.

We caught up with Ian to find out exactly what a Bar Camp is, and what people can expect from BarCampMediaCityUK….

Q. In a nutshell, what is a ‘Bar Camp’?
A: BarCamp is an international set of user-created conferences (or also known as unconferences). They are open, participatory events and the content of is provided by the people who make the event. Everyone helps shape the event and make it a special event.

Q. What kind of activities and sessions do you expect will be taking place at BarCampMediaCityUK?
A: The nature of BarCamp is that anything can be discussed. People can give a presentation, lead an open talk, give a workshop or tutorial, almost anything goes within the allocated session time.

In the past there has been talks about how to mix the perfect cocktail, how to ride a segway, what is openness, how to inspire your employees to more practical things like a debate different modern programming languages, making use of twitter for marketing, working from home more effectively, etc, etc.

You can read more at the unofficial mediacityblog…

A few months into media city…

Its been about 2 months since we moved into Media City. Brendan created a video which give a nice overview of the great new space we have.

A couple of months ago BBC Research and Development’s North Lab moved into its new home at MediaCity UK in Salford. The old base at Oxford Road in Manchester had been home for a good few years for some so, while excited about our shiny new facilities, it was with fondness and some sadness that we bid the Outside Broadcast building, ‘round the back, in the carpark, goodbye. Above is a short film about the last days of Oxford Road and the start of our new working lives in Salford.

There’s no doubt, its great being in Media City. Specially when the sun is shining.

There are some downsides like the lack of a BBC Club but on the upside there’s a massive sense of anything can and will happen if we want it to. And to be fair the work I’m on, reflects that (more on this in the near future).

BarCampMediaCity

For example, BarCampMediaCityUK. After 5 years of trying to do a BBC hosted barcamp by multiple people, we finally got the ecstatic yes from BBC Workplace, who to be fair has been nothing but great with there lovely floor walkers and generally useful security guards. We hit them with the concept of the stay over they took it all in there stride. I swear if we said we want to run a barcamp for 7 days they would have considered it. The barcamp is just getting off the ground but there will be more details coming along soon enough…

Back to MediaCity, the downside of having no BBC Club has meant we’ve had to entertain ourselves. Its still early days but we regularly have Tuesday evening drinks in the canteen/cafe/restaurant, which is a great chance to meet new faces. Not quite sure how it will scale but we’ll iterate I guess.

The public zone

I’ve started a circus skills event outside on the grassy areas when its sunshine and there’s also the Salford cinema club. Others events and things are a foot including curry nights, yoga, the last friday club, etc…  And thats just the start…

More shops are coming and Salford University is going to open right next door so its going to be quite a hotspot.

New Islington Tram test

Getting to MediaCityUK has been pretty easy for me to date. I walk down to Picadilly Station and jump on a tram directly to mediacityuk if I’m in no rush or maybe a tram to Bury if in a rush. It takes about 35mins door to door and should get slightly quicker when the SportsCity/Ashton tram extension opens. I’ll be able to jump on a tram at New Islington and change at Picadilly. Its maybe quicker to walk down but with a yearly travel card and not in rush, I might as well make use of it. The line is believed to open in time for the new football season, but thats just hear-say, although its worth noting there running tests every night right now.

New ways of working isn’t just a saying, we’re really trying out new ways of working. I personally work from the Northern Quarter quite a bit. Not only that there’s a whole bunch of changes happening with regards to our machines. We already upgraded to Windows 7 a while back but dear I say it, Ubuntu and other gnu/linux operating systems are being somewhat tolerated. Of course in R&D, it has been for quite sometime.

My only complaints right now are, the lack of a cash machine in mediacity as the restaurant only accept cash (although they are going to put in place a credit system soon) and when it does rain, the run across the Piazza can be very cold and wet. Right now its amazing in the sunshine…

The move to Media City was a good move and I’m very glad I made the jump when I did. Now I look forward to do some amazing things in our new home and break all the rules with collaborations all over the world.

This is why the BBC faces a massive change

This is going around the Social media circles right now…

Jeremy Clarkson has blasted the BBC’s move to Salford – branding the city a ‘small suburb’ and saying he would quit rather than relocate.

The Top Gear presenter used his Sunday newspaper column today to take a swipe at the corporation’s decision to move a string of departments to MediaCityUK.

He described Salford ‘a small suburb with a Starbucks and a canal with ducks on it’ and said that he would resign if the motoring programme was moved north.

Clarkson – who reportedly receives a £2m-a-year salary from the BBC – claimed the decision to move five departments to brand new buildings at Salford Quays was based on politics, saying ‘it was a box that has been ticked’.

Clarkson, you can take or leave him. I’m not exactly a petrol head, so I’m only loosely aware of what he does on top gear… But some of his comments are just stupid and well ignorant

Some people simply have no vision and frankly need to roll over and let someone in who does have the vision and maybe the guts to give it a shot. This big head stand in the way of the people who will ultimately save the BBC. In actual fact if you read the whole thing, even with publication bias and all that out the way, its maybe the swan song of a long over-due industry on its very last legs.

First steps in Media City UK

Media City UK

Usually on Fridays I tend to work from home or rather from a lovely tea place (called North Tea Power) in the Northern Quarter of Manchester. Unless of course I’m required to be in for a good reason.

However my boss suggested I might want to try working from Media City this week? I thought about it and come last Friday morning after seeing my NHS nutritionist, I took a ride down to Media City.

Entering Media City was a little confusing mainly because I was riding and had to find a specific car park with spaces for BBC Staff. I found the right car park after a while and parked up in a car parking space. I’m really hoping they sort out proper motorcycle parking because I don’t really like the idea of parking my scooter in a massive car parking space. Car drivers have a tendancy to run over motorcycles and to be fair I don’t really want to use up such a big space. I don’t believe it will always be like that, thankfully.

Adhoc desks

After wonder out of the Car park and along to the BBC buildings (Dock, Bridge and something else) I headed to Dock where R&D North will be based. I was greeted by a friendly smile from BBC Workplace security guards. A lot of the security from Oxford Road are in the new Media City office, so its a familiar faces instead of whole new faces.

In the building, I can’t really express the feeling of new and shiny but at the same time the feeling of home. There’s a lot of strange but bold shaped furniture but I like the way its all pretty easy to move about and reconfigure. Most of them also include power points and Ethernet which means there very useful as places to plug in and get some work done.

Power and Ethernet everywhere

I was sat on one such table and had a couple of adhoc meetings with people on the desk. Nothing major just a couple of quick chats about upcoming projects… The furniture suits it perfectly. I know they won’t be everyones cup of tea but there pretty good for me.

At this time there is wifi but its locked down using 802.11x, which I have quite a bit of experience with when Ravensbourne College did the same 10 years ago. I didn’t really bother to see if I could get it working with Ubuntu directly but this guide makes it sound easy enough. There should be public-ish wifi at some point soon, but not yet. And of course R&D will have there own network along with there own wifi.

There’s some really nice touches like the welcome to your meeting room card, meeting room names based on BBC TV shows and the sometimes slightly odd wall paper

Its funny because Media City just like New Islington needs shops and services. Right now the Lowry outlet mall is the only place to get drinks or food but that will change. Talking about Food the restaurant isn’t bad, can’t quite see how it will be big enough for everyone once they move in but I guess there’s always the idea of having other food places in the other buildings. And of course there will be the usual food/drink outlets flocking into the area at some point.

I’ve added Media City UK to Wovox.com but so far its struggling with my picture uploads and the rotation. Hopefully I’ll get the shots on there pretty sharpish.

Our public gardens

The public zone is pretty nice and there’s plenty of seats for the summer months. Its nice having the tram so close but I do wonder how it will be day in day out. I’m already looking forward to riding it so I can finally regularly read my kindle and mix on pacemaker. But I don’t fancy some of the delays I’ve heard in the past. This is certainly why I’ll keep my scooter for those days when I need to get there quickly or the tram isn’t working so well.

The balcony

The Balcony areas look great and alot more useful than the ones at White City. I can’t wait to get some wifi out there and maybe a run of power and work out there all day during the summer months. Actually surprised there’s not already power of some kind out there?

Don’t get me wrong not everything is perfect, but I actually like the colour scheme and the general feel of the place. I’m still wondering how it will be when you have to run across to the canteen during the rainy months. Everyones skeptical about the hot water taps but I’ve seen and used them in Germany and Holland in hotels, and they are extremely effective and always hot when I need to use them. The lack of microwaves in the coffee area is a pain but they have there reasons.

Dock House signs

I’m sure things will change when it comes to Media City but I guess I won’t really find out till I’m settled in properly, which looks to be pretty soon. We missed the 1st wave because our floor wasn’t done for various reasons but we’re in the 2nd wave and we got our induction next week.

Exciting times… (you can see the whole set of photos on flickr in this set)

Join the BBC in the North

When I first sat down and thought seriously about going up north to Manchester, I kind of dismissed the idea thinking well its not really for me but after a few visits to Manchester I got a real sense of the excitement and passion which surrounds the North. I couldn’t help but sign up and be one of the first to go.

Anyway 2.5 years later (yeah I can’t believe it myself either) happily shacked up in my new flat and on the verge of moving into Media City mid next year. I can’t shout loudly enough that we’re looking for talented and creative people to join us on our quest into the unknown future.

Everything you think you know about the BBC, you should forget. This is the time to frame the BBC as you want it to be.

As Sean Parker played by Justin Timberlake (of all the people) says in the film the social network,

Photo by Merrick Morton – Columbia Tristar

It’s OUR time…

The economic climate means things are very tight and we will have to take more risks that in previous years/decades. The only way to do this is hiring the right type of people who are willing to try new things and calculate the risks.

As you’d expect there is a bbc website for people to learn more and hopefully apply. I’ll see you at the interviews