Podcasts, Radio, TV, Books, Cycling, Photography and More
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Edison Research Top 25 UK Podcasts – Q4 2025
Edison Research has just published their Top 25 Podcasts in the UK for Q4 2025. As ever, this chart is based on recall from 2,000 online interviews with weekly podcast listeners in the UK. As ever, I’m going to take the long view on this and show how the chart has changed over time. This…
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Alcohol Ban on Kids Football Shirts
Wow – finally football clubs are doing the decent thing, and withdrawing alcohol sponsors’ logos from their kids size football strips. Other sports including cricket clubs are doing the same thing. Well – I say “football clubs” and “cricket clubs” when I actually mean the Portman Group is doing it (they’re the people who are…
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Alan Johnston Video Released
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6710863.stm
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Neon Saturn
In this false-color image, the Cassini spacecraft captures Saturn’s glow, represented in brilliant shades of electric blue, sapphire and mint green, while the planet’s shadow casts a wide net on the rings. The colors represent different wavelengths: red is thermal heat originating within the planet; in blue, icy ring particles shimmer in sunlight scattered through…
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Scoop
I love stories set in newspapers. Evelyn Waugh’s Scoop is quite probably my favourite ever book – riotously funny. TV has had its fair share of programmes set around plucky newspaper reporters; most recently State of Play, but I even remember Lytton’s Diary! And then there are films. Another favourite is The Day The Earth…
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Z. for Zachariah
I didn’t actually know that Z for Zachariah was actually a book. I remember it as a Play For Today back in the eighties (1984 to be precise – ah the power of the internet). I remember it starring Anthony Andrews (late of Brideshead) and not a great deal else. Anyway, my interest was piqued…
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Dalek I Loved You
Nick Griffiths is a writer on the Radio Times amongst other places, and this is a memoir interspersed with Doctor Who. That sounds a bit strange but it all makes sense. Sort of. He begins with Jon Pertwee and takes us through his early years and Tom Baker. He misses out ther rest, largely, which…
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New Versions of Classics
Why do we keep getting new versions of TV and film classics adaptations? Every Jane Austen novel has now been adapted on countless occasions and you just know that there’ll be more. Even “definitive” versions of the classics don’t stop someone else making the same story again a few years later. So we had a…
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No Idea
Read this. This is quite easily the single worst “scientific” article I can remember ever reading. I really simply don’t know where to begin. Why is it acceptable for journalists on a national newspaper to write about science when they clearly have no qualifications, background or plain and simple knowledge of the subject? In any…
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As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela: Underground Adventures in the Arms and Torture Trade
Anyone would have thought I’d stopped reading, given that it’s ages since I’ve written up a book review. Rest assured that’s not true. I’m just a little behind. Look to a flood of reviews over the next few days. You’ve probably seen Mark Thomas on Channel 4. Well not latterly, since his brand of political…
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Great Reality TV
In this age of terrible “reality” programming, this week sees the return of a wonderful reality show. As ever, this series sees the housemates couped up inside their newly designed structures. But you never know exactly what’s going to happen next, and there’s minimal interference. Yes, Springwatch is back. And in a completely genius idea,…
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Serial Competition Winners
Here’s a little known fact: it’s easier to win radio competitions than you might think. Most people assume that there are thousands of people phoning in to try to win tickets, cash, a holiday or maybe even a car. But the truth is that it can be easier than you think to get through. I’m…
Hadrian’s Wall
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