just saw this re the chain

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/andrewbaker/b...c_f1_theme_tune

Has anyone noticed that on the announcement page there's only a picture of Lewis? It's like they're obsessed with him or something. Don't they know there are other Alons...drivers out there? I'm sick of this jingoism.








(Subtitle for the hard of thought ----> )

I'm going to have a try recording interactive "live" (I'm with Virgin+), the only probably flaw with that is the feed won't be available until it's available (if you know what I mean) thus if I pressed record when the feed starts it may indeed work, but if I press record on BBCi at 7am before I go to work, all it will record is the menu screen all day. Hmm.

ITV at least used to show a few minutes highlights of practice on their website, I can't find any mention whatsoever of the BBC showing anything pre-qualifying as highlights or accessible as a recording (even if for just on the day it happens) for any practice sessions.

Cheers for the Freeview suggestions, but our media-unit-stand-thing is already bursting out with various players, recorders, consoles etc, it wouldn't have anywhere to go!!

This sounds excellent - at last a real use for the picture-in-picture feature of my Humax digital terrestrial box!

British Broadcasting Corporation.

a thought on recording red button/iplayer stuff without watching it

hook the pc to av3, record av3
you'll still need to start the content on the pc
so you'll need to be at home or you may be able to use gotomypc or something like that

I would pay for this kind of service. Oh, wait, I do - the license fee.

The license fee is finally worth it now (for me)! Well done BBC!

listening to martin brundle on radio five live he has just confirmed that the beeb have agreed that formula 1 programmes will start with Fleetwood Mac's 'The Chain'

the world has returned to normal roll on march 27th at whatever time of the day or night you watch the race

brundle on five live atm. has been on a while apparently, so check iplayer.

I have a PC with a twin digital free-view tuner (Vista Ultimate) and I can record two channels at the same time. I also have a PS3 with Play TV (HD free-view capable, but free-view is not broadcasting in that yet) so I can record on a single channel on that too whilst watching another channel. Also, my TV has a built in free-view tuner. Further, I have a laptop with a USB free-view tuner and I usually have that with me on the sofa whilst watching the live TV stream on the telly so that I can have the live timing from the web at the same time.

So I have more tuners and recorders than I can shake a stick at!

I for one am looking forward to all of this, no doubt people will complain about it not being at a good enough standard from the get go, but no adverts, no Allen and more options is fine for me.

To be honest I am totally happy with the commentators and presenters and the lack of ads - and so long as there is an online timing screen in addition to improved web content to have a look at at work - I will be happy as a pig in shit.

All this talk of interactive buttons is a bit 'whatever' for me, in a 'you can over-egg the pudding' kinda way.

That's not a complaint, I'm genuinely satisfied!

JA's views: http://allenonf1.wordpress.com/2009/02/24/...cs-f1-tv-plans/

Thanks to CyberCD on DS for the following:
For those that missed it and don't want to listen back to the 25 minutes or so Martin was talking to Simon Mayo, here's some of the highlights.

* No HD because FOM won't supply it.
* 'The Chain' is back. The Beeb would have been stupid not to.
* He was pretty frustrated with the constraints that adverts put on ITV's coverage and is looking to a more free-flowing programme.
* He's probably a better pundit than he was a driver because while he could compete with the best on some days, he wasn't consistent enough.
* He mentioned the multiplatform benefits of the BBC - and included BBC World in that (not sure what coverage if any is planned for that?)
* Didn't say whether he'd be covering the practice sessions.
* Fears for Jenson Button's career and would advise him to get out of his Honda contract rather than drive for a lame duck team.

Regarding support races, absolutely nothing has been mentioned. Same goes for rolling highlights for Practice on BBC Red Button as well as F1 themed shows - Top Gear; Inside Sport; AQoS.

Only thing that I am unhappy about is Jonathan Legard.

Have you heard him commentate on TV before?

Thanks again D.M.N

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/sporteditors/20..._season_on.html

Roger blogs on F1... suggest you keep eyes on replies.

The coverage will be great and Legard will surely prove to be a very safe pair of hands. Wish it was Ben Edwards though... The Beeb have certainly missed a trick there.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00hr...ayo_24_02_2009/ about 2:04/5 in

Interesting article on Autosport. http://www.autosport.com/news/grapevine.php/id/73410

Nice to see it won't be the Hamilton show.

without the live timing. They should have added that option instead of just a leaderboard that shows drivers positions.

I fear that ITV's overexposure has done irrepairable damage to Hamilton's public image. I can't imagine anyone in the near future saying, "It's all very well showing Sutil, but where's Hamilton?! I want to see more of Hamilton!"

Kudos to the BBC for returning us to a state of normality.

I could not belive that there would be no adverts during translations
But James Allen said:

ORF

jb26 said this late last night on DS: "The main area of confusion seems to revolve around that statement in the press release in relation to Red Button streams. That relates to the minimum you will receive no matter which platform you use, there'll be a lot more on DSAT and Cable. With Freeview only being able to accomodate 2 extra streams, something had to be thought of to keep everybody happy."

Good news, for us Freesat viewers. I'm still hoping for a no-commentary stream that we can have really loud, with a commentary stream at a lower volume through another amp.

"We want to personalise these guys because we don't know who they are. The British public knows who Lewis Hamilton is now, but there are 17 other drivers that we need to get to know as well." - Mark Wilkin

And next year? I think while some people quite liked following Nick Heidfeld when he was buying art, or Mark Webber when he was training or Klien and Liuzzi when they were buying furniture together but it is it's largely irrelevant to the race weekend.

I think 1 hour before and 1.5 hours afterwards is a lot of time to fill. Seriously it's an enormous amount of time. I'm very much looking forward to seeing what they do with the it, at least for Melbourne, but I wonder how many will be switching off after a few races? 1 hr build up, 1.5-2 hrs race, 0.5hr chit chat, 1hr analysis. That's a time investment on a sunny Sunday afternoon in July of up to 4.5hrs.

I had a twitter back from Lee McKenzie who told me: "Lots of stories throughout the race are often missed and now we have time for lots of driver interviews and analysis post-race." Well I just keep thinking 'but...but...Barcelona!'

Don't misunderstand me, I think they are starting at the right place. Give us more than we need and then consider cutting back if that doesn't work. It will be fantastic if they can make it entertaining for the entire time but I have my reservations.

I've always disliked ITV's overbias of first Jenson Button and then Lewis Hamilton, and would agree with your point of view. However it is a view that is very specialised. The audience that buys specialist motorsport magazines have in general been interested in the sport well before Hamilton came along and as such follow the racing from love of the sport and don't just focus in on one aspect. (i.e national hero)

Yet, I don't think that the vast majority of the TV audience watch F1 because of a deep love for the sport, a heck of a lot of them only really follow it because all of a sudden they have a countryman who is winning. And inevetibly this type of viewer does focus pretty much on that one man.

Most people who know me in life (outside of Internet forums etc) know that I love F1. And as such most of them are utterly convinced that I must worship Hamilton's every orifice (I assure you that I do not btw, my favourite driver is actually Rosberg). Mainly because they do, I actually hate talking about F1 with these people because it's just Hamilton this, Hamilton that etc.

I even got lambasted by them for sticking up for Alonso after his collision with Hamilton at Bahrain last year, one person shouted at me that he thought me a traitor, that I should be sent to Spain, and he isn't even British! It just perfectly illustrated how many people are vastly more influenced by patriotism than good sense.

It may be sad, but I think it's true that the vast majority of viewership is driven by patriotic fever and not a love of the sport, and it's probably the same in any other country. For example F1 probably didn't have a huge following in Germany until a certain Michael Schumacher picked up a habit of winning numerous races and championships, Alonso produced a similar effect for Spain.

Back in June during the F1 test at Silverstone, (they had some construction work going on) this Polish worker, took time out to grab my attention to ask me if Kubica was there. So I told him yes, and also all of the other drivers working that day.. but he didn't know any of the other names! The only one he knew was Kubica, for the Poles the only driver that exists is Kubica. And I think that illustrates my point quite well.

And the TV coverage is always going to cater for that type of viewer more, because there's a heck of lot more of them, and after all it's a ratings game for the broadcasters.

@ Jimages.

I'm well aware that there is going to be a bias. There always was a national bias with the BBC - it's to be expected. However ITV took it to a whole new level. Hamilton was getting so much coverage that it wasn't very long before it started grating. People I know who aren't F1 fans, but have watched some of the races, got really annoyed by the ITV coverage. It wasn't so much of a touch of national interest, but a fully fledged hero worship with ITV. That is what annoyed me.

The British media in general, and ITV in particular managed to ruin Hamilton's popularity within the general fan-base before he even took to the McLaren cockpit during testing at Silverstone in September 2006.

Very early on in the 2006 season (from the start of the GP2 season at least) they interviewed him every race, and hinted that the possibility of him racing in F1 with McLaren from 2007 wasn't simply a likely possibility but foregone conclusion, even though at the time it really wasn't.

The Chain will be back as Formula 1 theme song!!!

Superb!

Im not british, and never watched bbc f1 coverage, but this ''the chain'' intro is awesome

I am inclined to think this news deserves its very own thread and is more interesting then winter testing.

I think I will cream myself on the 29th of March as soon as I hear those first few notes...the excitement will be too much.

Some areas can't get Freeview yet. Where I live (Farnborough, Hampshire - not exactly out in the sticks!) isn't due to get it until the last days of Analogue in 2012 :\

It has it's own thread in TNF

Tell me about it!

You need to move. This will clearly affect property prices just like school catchment areas...

Get Freesat

Aren't all the extras online anyway? The way I understood it, all the feeds will be online too? So just watch normal BBC 1 on your TV and fire up the other stuff on a PC? Or am I missing something.

Havnt seen it confirmed that all feeds will be live on the internet yet.... anyone?

If net only has main feed live could watch that on therr and the red button one live on the TV

May I recomend downloading 'The Chain' as your mobile ringtone...

Maybe we should get all Autosport Forum members to do this so we can identify each other by secret code!

Surely only the end solo, the rest would make it rather cryptic.

We kind of take it for granted here, apart from everyone who grumbles about paying the licence fee. Not bad for £139.50 a year though, and we get Total Wipeout thrown in with that too.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/sporteditors/20....html#comment26

26. At 12:06pm on 25 Feb 2009, Roger Mosey - Director of BBC Sport wrote:

Thanks for the feedback. A lot of detailed questions about the red button/interactive, so I've asked my colleague Matt Millington who's in charge of that area to reply - which he'll do shortly.

A couple of quick notes from me. To Hackerjack in #22: the point of the blog was to alert people to the media launch we did yesterday and to share the press pack more widely. But you don't have to read it!

To WebbyFoxes in #19: you'll hear no criticism from me or my colleagues about the ITV coverage. They did a very good job. But all sports broadcasting has moved on in the past 12 years, and the BBC's more than most. We're now seen by audiences as best for innovation - which includes red button and this website, of course, and our Olympics coverage - which is a significant change.

Finally, on highlights: we think it's a strong combination in re-runs for early races on BBC One; a regular highlights slot in peak-time on BBC Three (which should be available in all cable packages, turbowomble in #21); and then on-demand on the iPlayer. But all feedback welcome.

-----------------------------

A lot of questions from people over at the blog. Over on DS, jb26 notes:

"I can confirm a senior colleague of mine will be contributing to the sport editors blog later on which will answer all your lingering questions. Most stuff is already known on this thread.

BBC New Media have today been given final details from the F1 production team at BBC Sport of what feeds are being sent to us and when. This is being dealt with over the coming days and will form the basis of what exactly will appear on each platform - DTT, DSAT, Cable, Online...

It appears to be a very busy week for the main F1 team finalising all their plans. More details later."

'Bring on the wall'

In terms of this thread, this may be considered "BREAKING NEWS": Support races will NOT be on BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/sporteditors/20....html#comment31

31. At 3:23pm on 25 Feb 2009, Matt Millington - BBC Sport Video Portals Editor wrote:

Matt Millington ? Interactive TV editor


Well, it's encouraging to see so much interest in the red button and online offerings! There are a fair few questions about the onboard/in-car stream, so I shall answer those first. Our stream will offer a split-screen composite which will include the main network coverage, the on-board coverage and a ticker-style leaderboard, the exact design of which is still being finalised. Our rights agreement prevents us from offering any extra data over and above the leaderboard.

The reason we have opted for this combined feed over a full-screen onboard stream is that we believe that it will make for a more watchable experience. Sticking simply to the onboard would give little idea to the viewer what is happening in the rest of the race. Our experience of similar offerings with other sports is that viewers quickly tire of 'restricted' views and tend to revert back to the main coverage. However, we note the interest in a full-screen option of the onboard and will review our position after the first few races.

In anticipation of responses asking why we cannot offer both options on the web, we are restricted to the number of streams we can offer at the start of the season, although we hope to extend the number of streams later on in the season.

Live coverage of all practice sessions will be made available on all platforms, with commentary supplied by the Radio Five Live/Sports Extra team. Radio Five Live commentary will also be offered as an option for qualifying and main race. Highlights will of course be made available after the race on the red button and online. If space permits we will also aim to offer full replays on the red button. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer coverage of the support races.

On race day, Freeview viewers will generally receive the onboard composite with alternative commentary, plus the rolling highlights, but we will occasionally have to drop the rolling highlights if it clashes with other events.


-------------------------------

jb says: I've hearing rumours that support races are to be farmed out to another broadcaster, they certainly won't be on interactive anyway. More later. I'll add more to what Matt Millington disclosed later this evening. A lot of things have had to be changed due to rights issues.

Plus it would have gone to answerphone by then.

Not sounding promising really. GP2 averaged about 80,000 viewers last year on ITV4, I doubt they'll be interested in picking it up - plus that probably means a return of Charlie whatsherface

Bet it ends up on EuroSport which I can't get on freeview.