Journalistic.co.uk - the UK digital journalism blog

The BBC has re-launched its online radio player to make the vast majority of its programming available to web users.

Once a programme is broadcast, it will then be made available for another seven days to listen to whenever someone wants to.

The Radio Player is a pop-up browser window that appears when clicked on and allows a person to then select from a range of programmes or genres and then listen to specific programmes.

The re-launch comes as the BBC has also revealed some stats about how people are using its online radio services. Among the highlights:

More than 10 million hours of BBC radio is listened to online each month

Over six million unique users visited BBC Radio websites in November 2004

Two would-be musicians who claimed they were signed up to a record label associated with rappers Eminem and 50 cent and got The Sun as well as other media to report about their deal have revealed it was all a hoax.

The Guardian reports it the story of TiiDA.

Under the headline “Straight Outta Scunthorpe” the paper’s Bizarre column splashed the story of how unknown duo Grant Harvey and Daniel Brooker had been signed to Eminem and 50 Cent’s new label G-Unit Soul. “Eminem and 50 Cent’s latest prodigy is an R&B singer from the mean streets of… Scunthorpe,” reported the showbusiness column pages, before adding: “50 believes Grant will be the first Brit to break into the massive urban market.”

The eager hack could and should have done a bit of searching via Google to firm up the facts, or even double check on whois.sc to see who was behind the domain.

It took me only a few seconds to find the domain was registered to someone in Italy, not the USA. And if you actually spend 20 seconds on the website, it is obvious that there is something not right about the site. There’s no copyright notices at the bottom of the pages and the only contact is via a webform.

Note to fellow journalists: Please use Google and tools like whois.sc to help you out.

Reuters is certainly putting money into building its UK site as a destination for consumers.

The news agency has started to target London’s City folk with a number of marketing initiatives to drive them to the Reuters.co.uk site including advertising across escalators at three London train stations - Liverpool Street, St Paul’s and Cannon Street.

Revolution writes:

The push will also see Reuters handing out branded Tube maps at a number of stations, and branded coffee cup sleeves in in-house and independent cafes across the City.

Travellers to Las Vegas can now take advantage of free wireless access at McCarran airport.

Now, if only UK airports could do something similar.

BBC News Online has a good piece on the growth of digital photography and the need to store images without running out of space.

The story says:

Many people’s hard drives are bulging with photos and services which allow them to store and share their pictures online are becoming popular.

So if you are looking for a place to store your images and the free webspace you currently have is not enough, then there’s plenty of links in the story to find a new host. These services are either free or very low cost but they manage the whole process for you without the need to configure the service yourself.

Of course you can always do it yourself. One of the best ways to store your photos is to get some web space, install a gallery package such as Coppermine and use that to host your photos.

Former Press Gazette, MediaGuardian and Evening Standard journalist Jessica Hodgson is to join Dow Jones next month as its new media correspondent for the United Kingdom.

Hodgson, currently media and retail reporter for The Business will start her new role at Dow Jones in March taking over from Ben Winkley who has left the company.

Journalist trade weekly, Press Gazette has finally given its website a new look.

Alas, this revamp looks half complete and not finished. Content is badly presented, the layout is not thought out. It is a mess.

Navigation on the left hand side is not exactly clear. There’s no link to news or indeed features/interviews.

While the centre content appears to be news lead, it is not obvious what sections articles are from.

Even when you click on an article it doesn’t say what section it comes from. There are no highlighting of sections to suggest where the article’s sub-section is.

When I recently viewed a story about Ken Livingstone clearing the way for another London paper to be given out at train stations, there was no link to the news index or other news stories. It could have come from anywhere on the site.

Bylines on articles are missing, so there is no indication who wrote the piece.

Unlike its previous web offering, where you had to be a registered user to read the content, the new site allows all users to view the site.

But sadly, that doesn’t make up for a site that appears to not yet been completed.

Maybe the version of the site I saw today was a mistake?

Future Publishing home to magazines such as PC Plus and Total Film has joined the board of the Association of Online Publishers.

The move is part of Future’s plans to expand its online portfolio by new launches as well as revamps.

“Joining the AOP is a significant step for Future and is a sign of our intent and our increased emphasis on new media channels,” said David Maher-Roberts, publishing director for Future’s new media group. “We will announce further initiatives throughout 2005 as our new media group develops effective and profitable digital media channels to benefit our core brands.”

Meanwhile, Future has secured a deal with Microsoft and its MSN.co.uk service. Future will be supplying content to its new technology section which will be called “Tech & Computing” and feature content mainly from its PC Format magazine.

If you have not made a New Year resolution, then here’s one you should think about - backing up data.

It is so easy to think that nothing can happen to you and all your data and your emails or word documents will never disappear.

But sadly, not all of us make sure we back up our data on a regular basis so that if the worse would happen, whether your computer was stolen, or your hard disk got corrupted you could then recover your work.

Backing up is not that difficult - the problem stems from not making it part of a routine and assuming either someone else will do it for you or there’s no need to worry because it “won’t happen to me”.

But of course, it does happen. Data can be lost, you might delete a file by mistake and then what? You need those back ups.

The cost these days for backing up is not really an issue. A back up to a pen drive offering 1GB of space can cost around £80 or remote off-site back up services such as PCFort can cost aound £10 a month and provide plenty of space for backing up your important files.

There’s some great deals at Morgan Computers offering 20GB back up devices for £100.

So get into backing up. You’ll find at some point in the future it a a very valuable thing to do.

Reuters has appointed a new online editor for its reuters.co.uk website.

Astrid Zweynert, who has been with the news agency for a decade takes over from Gavin Haycock.

Zweynert takes on the role a few months after Reuters revamped its website with more consumer facing content.

Thanks to Netimperative for the tip.

After six years of looking pretty much the same, This is Money finally gets a new look.

The site, under the direction of editor GuyDresser offers a better layout and easier navigation than its previous design.

It certainly is a busy site with plenty of content of interest to anyone keen to improve their personal finance.

As well as original online material, This is Money also uses articles from sister print publications including the Evening Standard and Mail on Sunday.

This is Money provides a great resource and covers just about everything you need to know about money from credit and loans through to savings.

The site also offers a series of message boards covering a range of interests from talking about shares through to mortgages, there’s even a RSS feed for people to take the site’s headlines.

With a site as comprehensive as this, it is hard to find any shortcomings. Well, maybe one. There are no blogs. Maybe a personal financial blog could be incoporated?

Verdict: Associated New Media has raised the standard (pardon that small little pun) for personal finance websites and This is Money delivers everything it promises on its home page. A useful resource for anyone needing information to better themselves.

With more people getting online via broadband, it’s looking good for broadcasting over the internet.

The BBC has announced that in November, “a record 6.15m unique users visited BBC radio websites in November, and 48% of them used the BBC Radio Player, amassing 6.2m listening hours.”

During 1999/2000 there were a number of internet only radio stations such as NetFM and Storm Live that launched and quickly shut down due to lack of advertising and listeners.

Maybe they were ahead of their time? But when dial-up was the norm, trying to listen to streaming radio wasn’t the best method with cut outs constantly happening.

These days, a broadband connection gives perfect broadcasting.

The other impact of broadband has been on DIY broadcasting as more and more people at home realise that its not that difficult to stream their own shows. A hosting account for £25 a month can offer everything a bedroom broadcaster needs to get started - web space, software and bandwidth.

With a choice of thousands of online “radio” shows, the web is the place to go for talk and music.

New Year, new free stuff to try out and see if I want to keep it on my PC.

A friend of mine in the States asked if I had Skype on my PC. I didn’t and he suggested I should try it out as it will allow me to talk to him via the internet.

This is the world of internet telephony.

A 10meg download and 15 minutes later and its installed on my PC. Another three minutes registration and final set up and its working. And I’m talking to him without the need of a telephone.

It works. It’s not bad quality when I talk into my laptop and listen back via its built-in speakers. There’s sometimes a bit of echo sound but if you buy a headset with mic, that will go away.

So I’ll be going out in the next day or so and buying a Plantronics or Creative headset. They don’t cost more than £30.

Skype is a great tool to have on your computer. It’s free, it does what is says it will and works well.

Give it a try.