Box of Broadcasts

[Blue Jam]

Who here has access to this massive resource for academics? What's worth searching out on there? How did I only learn of this a couple of months ago?

https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ondemand

[Utter Shit]

Yeah we have it at my uni. I used to work in one of our media libraries and would often check on BOB if a student asked for something we didn't have...I think it actually had what they wanted maybe twice in the entire time I was there. It might have improved since then as it was a few years ago, but it seemed to have an awful lot of stuff that very few people would want to watch.

Then again that's no bad thing - physical copies (VHS, audio tapes etc) of old stuff doesn't get much respect and there is a constant push to get rid of materials that 'no one wants' in order to make space for new stuff, without acknowledging that there's a decent chance the materials you're throwing away are the only copies still in existence, so even if you go ten years without anyone accessing it, it's still worth keeping. Gradually transferring this vast collection of media to a digital space like BOB is an enormous job but should at least protect it from disappearing completely.

[iamcoop]

Me and my partner have had it for years as she's an academic.

To be honest all we've really used it for is to watch the episodes of Come Dine With Me that were pulled from 4od (presumably due to someone having a melt-down they subsequently didn't want to show) but it's real wheelhouse is good documentaries.

If we go to a cool museum or something and get home in the evening and say, decide we want to watch a documentary about Hadrian's Wall or whatever then it's a great resource for that.

To be honest haven't explored it half as much as we should've but there's an astonishing amount of stuff on there.

[Blue Jam]

it seemed to have an awful lot of stuff that very few people would want to watch.

My impression is that it now has a ton of stuff worth watching but you have to seek it out and be very specific in your searches. You can't just browse categories like on Netflix because it's for edumacation, not entertainment.

Loads of snooker and lesser sports on there though. A search for a term like "comedy" also turns up lots of results but you then have to wade through them.

[Magnum Valentino]

I used it when I was at university to look up the time a dazed, late Liam Neeson referred to his Battleship costar as "Rihanno" on Graham Norton, as well as spending HOURS looking for the clip of the woman on This Morning who was addicted to eating sponges which is now on YouTube.

I miss it though. It's a shame there's no way to access it outside a uni account.

[Minami Minegishi]

It has been very helpful for my research in terms of finding old interviews and features that are included in TV shows that would simply never be uploaded to youtube.

Slavoj Žižek on a French daytime TV show? Don't mind if I do...

[drummersaredeaf]

Yeah, it's delightful. I've been recently turned on to it as a tool to operate a 'flipped classroom' - meaning sticking on a film and fucking off for a coffee like the days when the teacher wheeled in the Betamax.