BBC iPlayer

Due to the delightful internet speeds I get at home, the only really viable way to watch television online is to download the full show hours, possibly days in advance of watching it. Normally, of course, I would just stream the show, and after a certain point go "This is dreadful" and turn off, or finish it, rapt with excitement and tingling with the sensation of pure joy. However, once I download something, I feel, in some respects, committed to the programme. It's languishing on my hard drive, resentful and bitter that I have yet to finish it, mutinously muttering under its breath. I wouldn't be surprised if it randomly deleted data for fun at my expense. "Windows cannot find "Firefox"", etcetera. This is where the marriage metaphor ends.

So I end up watching the full programme, in bits, over the course of the week I'm allowed to view it for, then I feel somehow angry at iPlayer, like this is in some aspect their fault. "I wouldn't even be watching this if I could stream it! Ugh!" flicks through my mind repeatedly.

And why would I blame iPlayer, the service is unimaginably excellent. It is a constant joy for me to browse the site and view videos and so forth. I can scarcely imagine my chaotic existence without it, shambling aimlessly around youtube in search of entertaining television. Occasionally it demands I have to install the desktop thing again to download a programme, but that is hardly a gigantic inconvenience given how utterly superb the service is. And it's not just "Good for a television site", it's a good site overall. Easy to navigate, delightfully easy and clear to understand, and generally well-built. The only problem I have ever had is when I assume something has been broadcast on TV and it was not, and I begin to wonder where it is on iPlayer. Basically, iPlayer's only real fault is that I am inept.

And yet, sometimes, due to broadcasting rights (I imagine), some stuff doesn't go up there, which annoys me a tad, but not so much as to detract from the overall experience.

In comparing this site to other television broadcasters' online services, I have used very little of Five and itvplayer (I briefly remember Five asking me to pay to watch House on their site, and realised the internet probably has House floating about for free. And itvplayer is relatively good, except it only shows itv shows.) so in this comparison, it's primarily "4od" versus "iPlayer".

Briefly, I was a 4od man, back in the good old days, when it had full series of shows it formerly broadcast like "Black books", while iPlayer only had last week's shows. Then 4od, in what I can only imagine was a fit of childish rage and a curiously selfish nature, decided that their online video sharing service was not the best place to show online videos, and took them all down. In that single moment, I was distraught. Then I tried to find them again by clicking through all the menus on the site, going to a series of useless pages. It was like a maze, except, cunningly, they are all dead-ends. Then iPlayer embraced me. It said to me "If you don't forget to watch within a week of broadcast, we've got it, right here for you. Waiting, and easy to find" and I swooned. They even have "Series catchup" where they have every episode of a series up there.

Conclusion: iPlayer is magnificent, 4od is acceptable, itvplayer is ok at showing itv shows, Five's online service is probably ok, who knows, I don't really watch channel 5.

Chris Moyles' Quiz Night

As part of my recent trend to discuss self-harming with you, I sat down and watched Chris Moyles' Quiz Night. I viewed it with much the same trepidation as I would if I were to sit down and watch a horse trample a man: I feel like I should step in, but I can't do anything.

Glued to my seat with a combination of horror and whatever monstrosity poured out of my arse the second I saw Chris Moyles onscreen, I idly imagined what acts of atrocity I must have spent my past lives committing to culminate in this moment. Initially, I went with "removing the screws from key points on Ikea furniture, causing marriages to fail as quickly as that wardrobe", but then I decided this was nowhere near severe enough to inflict this level of karmic retribution upon me, so eventually, I settled on "Spending a previous life absent-mindedly drowning kittens and beating puppies", which seemed just adequate enough to make Chris Moyles appear on the television.

I will admit, I had a certain morbid curiosity about the show, but then Jimmy Carr went on it and I thought "Hey, it'll have at least one redeeming factor, so I can watch it now!" and, with eager delight, pressed on.

And this delight was, oddly, not massively misplaced. Initially, of course, I found myself almost wishing Peter Sutcliffe was in the room with me, since this would be better justice than any prison sentence, and also, he could possibly kill me and spare me the pain, and probably be more exciting by chasing me around the room, humming the Tetris theme tune to add a sense of peril (Because, obviously, one man chasing you armed with a hammer isn't perilous enough without an eight-bit classic in the background, right?).

Eventually, though, I found myself warming to the show. I believe at one point, I laughed, then glanced furtively around to check no-one had heard this. It would be less embarrassing to admit that I have nightmares where I menstruate than to tell people I laughed at a Moyles joke. However, slowly but surely, throughout the programme, I found myself watching, almost engrossed and becoming slightly enamoured with Jimmy Carr.

Fundamentally, even though my respect for Chris Moyles has gone up at least 60-fold, he can't really carry the show alone, and is so dependant on having interesting or good guests, if the show has terrible guests, it will completely collapse, and fail to work at all, and I imagine, become the hour of television I assumed it would be.

Still, better premise than "The Bubble".