5th episode of Stephen Fry on the Phone

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017clwx/Stephen_Fry_on_the_Phone_The_Chips_inside_Smartphones/

All mobile phones rely on hyper-intelligent silicon chips to run them. And the astonishing thing is: 85% of the silicon chips inside all mobile phones are designed by one Cambridge-based company, ARM. Stephen Fry talks to the pioneers who designed these chips. They needed some micro-processors to build a better home computer, but didn't like what they saw and decided to make their own. Strapped for cash, they designed chips that were small, cheap and exceptionally low power and, quite by chance, ideally suited to the next generation of pocket-sized mobile phones. Not to mention today's power-hungry smartphones.

4th episode of Stephen Fry on the Phone

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017cjmn/Stephen_Fry_on_the_Phone_Shrinking_the_Handset/

In the fourth episode, Stephen Fry talk to the engineers who turned mobile phones from hefty executive bricks into svelte fashion accessories. One man at Motorola dreamt of a mobile phone small enough to fit in a shirt pocket but it was Nokia , once more famous for making loo paper and wellies, that cornered the global market. In the early nineties, Nokia was on the brink of collapse. But the new chief executive, brought in to save the company from bankruptcy, made a bold decision to ditch the wellies and focus solely on mobile phones. Soon the iconic Nokia ringtone (extracted incidentally from a piece for classical guitar composed in 1902) was inescapable.

3rd episode of Stephen Fry on the Phone

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017chq0/Stephen_Fry_on_the_Phone_The_Accidental_Discovery_of_Text/

Stephen Fry meets the men who created the first texting facility, as well as other less commercially successful products like taxifones, payphones on trains and in-car fax machines. He hears how texting triumphed unexpectedly when paging was all the rage, partly because paging services never seemed to work on Friday afternoon. On the earliest handsets there was no way of replying to a text. Later, just in case someone might want to reply, they included a short list of possible pre-set answers: yes, no and later. In the mid 90s texting was just one of countless facilities embedded within the new digital mobile phones: no one thought it that important. Last year alone, a staggering 6.1 trillion text messages were sent. And most of them received a reply.

2nd episode of Stephen Fry on the Phone

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017cfkj/Stephen_Fry_on_the_Phone_From_Car_Phone_to_Executive_Brick/


In episode two, Stephen Fry meets the men who brought mobile phones to Britain. Thanks to Margaret Thatcher opening up the airwaves, Britain became a world leader in mobile phone technology in the eighties. Vodafone (short for voice-data-phone) competed fiercely with the BT's mobile baby, Cellnet (short for cellular network), to create the first mobile phone network in the UK which was launched to great fanfare on Christmas Day 1985. Coverage was truly patchy, handsets were seriously hefty and calls cost a fortune, but mobile phones quickly replaced car phones as the ultimate yuppie accessory. Voicemail, incidentally, was a good excuse to charge customers yet more for a service that was, in reality, rather poor..

New Charlie Brooker series on technology and society

Charlie Brooker (E4's Bafta-nominated Dead Set author) returns with Black Mirror, a new 3 x 60 minute scripted mini-series, commissioned by Head of Comedy Shane Allen and produced by comedy and drama producer Zeppotron.

Over the last ten years, technology has transformed almost every aspect of our lives before we've had time to stop and question it. In every home; on every desk; in every palm - a plasma screen; a monitor; a smartphone - a black mirror of our 21st Century existence. Our grip on reality is shifting. We worship at the altars of Google and Apple. Facebook algorithims know us more intimately than our own parents. We have access to all the information in the world, but no brainspace left to absorb anything longer than a 140-character tweet.

Black Mirror is a hybrid of The Twilight Zone and Tales of the Unexpected which taps into our contemporary unease about our modern world. The three stand-alone dramas will be sharp, suspenseful, satirical tales with a techno-paranoia bent - all audacious ‘what if' stories: some comic, some shocking.

Charlie Brooker says: ‘Growing up, I always loved The Twilight Zone and shows of that ilk. Black Mirror won't be anything like those, but on the other hand, it's closer to them than, say, Downton Abbey. It combines satire, technology, absurdity, and a pinch of surprise, and it all takes place in a world you almost - almost - totally recognise. It changes each week - like the weather, but hopefully about 2000 times more entertaining. If you don't like it, you will be beaten about the face and neck by Channel 4 executives.'

Head of Comedy, Shane Allen says: ‘This is satirical drama for the social media generation all rooted in the world around us now. A thought-provoking and gripping reflection and extrapolation of current social, cultural and technology-inspired trends and fears. Charlie's writing is imbued with a beautiful blend of emotion and intelligence that pulls you in to a thrilling projection of themes which surround our everyday. In a world where bloggers can communicate from beyond the grave and a world leader can watch an assassination in real time on the other side of the planet there is much to say about how we live and what values we share. Now, if I can just convince Charlie to introduce it all from a fireside chair we're quids in.'

Black Mirror will be Executive Produced by Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones and series produced by Barney Reisz for Zeppotron. The series will be filmed over the summer and is expected to air later this year.

Stephen Fry on the Phone

This 5x15 BBC Radio 4 series, hosted by Stephen Fry, explores the history of the mobile phone, from its very beginning of practical usage, to todays fashion accessories, highlighting the changes in technology and how society changed as mobile phones developed.


This is episode 1, I will keep posting the episodes as they come out, but watch them quick, its on iPlayer so they'll only be available for 7 days!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017cb0m/Stephen_Fry_on_the_Phone_Creating_the_Network/

Some Guardian articles

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/09/bbc-guidelines-bskyb

This one is linked into my previous post about the 5 levels of convergence. It is a demonstration of content sharing between two institutions. In this case, the BBC relaxing its rules on how much of its content can be used by Sky.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/10/steve-coogan-alan-partridge-sky

This article is an example of another level of convergence, cloning. The show following Steve Coogan's character, Alan Partridge, on his radio show, North Norfolk digital radio show is called Mid Morning Matters. It was originally aired online as a 12 part series of 10-15 minute programmes. Sky are re-editing the same content for airing on their Sky Atlantic channel. Same content, different platform.

5 levels

Found a paper that says that convergence, in terms of news content, can be split into 5 levels, cross promotion, cloning, coopetition, content sharing and true convergence. This can be easily adapted to apply to the media in general. Just change the news institutions for platforms and it's sort of the same idea.

https://docs.google.com/viewer?
a=v&q=cache:QI3cHlG8AkAJ:citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download%3Fdoi%3D10.1.1.130.4530%26rep%3Drep1%26type%3Dpdf+larry+dailey+convergence+continuum&hl=en&gl=uk&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEEShVs4I_iokYo9yvslBspFHu0pOflSIcYBnuB8dShIQIZp8OLFqkyNVy_aXo0oTOcneEhavRyt3kOKvAS70DozMddZZc6y3_FSkg_h6w51cBvWvu3TdD1p9kdDlavL5uxt-BiDKv&sig=AHIEtbSiCK7Gc-J-hOmahWeg-NCUP7yjEA

Convergence Culture

I was able to find the Convergence Culture book we were recommended at the beginning. Theres alot of focus on grass root media which can be applied to almost all the areas in media convergence, both negative and positive.

If you havnt had a chance to read it yet its at media city library, far right, bottom corner shelf