I don't get it. Yeah, OK, he was the queen's old feller, and a big deal, and famous and all sorts of stuff. But every channel the same news broadcast? WTF? Sounds like a committee decision with the committee being told what was going to happen by Richard Sharp.

Oh, keep up!
 
Wikipedia: ​​​​​​​

The BBC are great at going overboard like this.

I remember a few years ago being on holiday in a remote part of Scotland without Wifi or phone signal. After a nice walk, I decided to see what had been happening in the world by popping on BBC News 24. Turned on the TV to find out that Terry Wogan had died.

"That's shit" I thought to myself. Half an hour later, I had no idea if anything else had happened in the world, they were still going on about Terry and interviewing the sister of his friend's tennis partner to get her thoughts.

I do hate when they hijack the news just to go on and on and on about one story. Yes, things like this deserve to be covered - probably to a bigger degree than some stories. But they do like to take the piss and ignore anything else that may also have happened.

Yes, and this is exactly the time to keep eyes peeled for "controversial" government news being released.

One senses they have amassed a trove of such material (Phil's obit)  over the years, and they want to get their money back out of this sizable investment.

Wait 'til queenie dies, you ain't seen nuthin' yet!

Well, the Beeb has been so inundated with complaints about their wall-to-wall coverage and cancellation of numerous shows that they've set up a dedicated complaint link for it.

So, if you were pissed off at hearing/seeing nothing but Prince Philip everywhere, here's the link to complain: https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/death-duke-of-edinburgh-tv-coverage/#/Notification

That link is returning a generic 404 now, and the header on the complaints form is gone.

Still the Wayback Machine has copies of what they contained...
https://web.archive.org/web/20210409175919/https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/death-duke-of-edinburgh-tv-coverage/
https://web.archive.org/web/20210409215827/https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/complaints

Given the way the BBC responds to complaints in general, I'm not sure why people would bother.

The complaints from 2011 includes the following:

> Royal Wedding 2011, General coverage 09 May 2011
> Complaint
> We received complaints from members of our audience who feel that we devoted too much coverage
> to the wedding of Prince William and Miss Catherine Middleton.
>
> The BBC's Response
> The royal wedding was an event of national significance, which captured the public imagination both
> in the UK and internationally. We're pleased to have brought coverage of this celebration to audiences
> on the BBC. The fact that in the UK a peak audience of 20 million people watched the wedding
> service on the BBC and that more than 34 million viewers watched some of our coverage of the
> wedding across the day is testament to the considerable interest among our audience.

And:

> BBC News, coverage of Osama Bin Laden’s death. 04 May 2011
> Complaint
> We have received complaints from members of our audience who feel that we have devoted too
> much coverage to the announcement of the death of Osama Bin Laden.
>
> BBC News' response
> The discovery and death of Osama Bin Laden was by any standards a major news story. The
> operation to find him had lasted over a decade, during which time Al Qaeda has continued to mount
> attacks around the world. The details of his killing, his hiding place and the many political ramifications
> in the US, Pakistan and elsewhere fully justified the level of coverage BBC News devoted to the story.

They didn't give a shit then, and I doubt they'll give a shit now.

I wonder who's betting that the Tories have leant on them to take the easy link down...

Isn't their director a tory appointee?

42768.14
 

My pet hat with coverage like this is the same regurgitated parts of the story over and over, with the BBC reporters (and presumably this happens elsewhere, but I only tuned into the Beeb) re-hashing exactly what they said 5 minutes ago to keep the broadcast live until the next tidbit of info gets released. 

Then to plug the gaps they wheel out Nicholas Witchell who appeared on Huw Edwards' shift to give his guesses on what the family are feeling right now, where they are, who's there with them and then speculating on funeral arrangements in scenarios he's just made up.  :-S There's nothing new to report, so we're gonna resort to guesswork. :C

Another satisfied customer...

Yep, fully agreed. It's the same tosh and thoughts re-hashed over and over, meanwhile they'll try and find random people to interview and ask "what he meant to them" (not live of course, only the nicest interviews get broadcast). Overall, if you watch it you realise that after half an hour you've leant hardly anything apart from "what other people think".  :-|

Mehehehe. "Pet hat"...

I stand by what I said. :C

(hug)

He's just jealous because he doesn't have a pet hat like the rest of us...

(bounce)

I think it's the natural progressive step up from owning a rock. 

I wonder if people who actually /do/ have a pet rock impose any sort of limits on size. 

Does it have to fit in a drawer/room/house/garden? Or could someone adopt something like Uluru if so inclined?




 

Anyone who wants to be right would agree that Uluru is a land formation made out of rock, but is not a rock.

Also, if you can't take an entity home with you, claiming it as your pet would sit somewhere on a scale between inaccurate and meaningless.

I believe there's a whole bunch of people who have been owning Uluru for quite a while, now. They're the ones who have stopped people climbing all over it. Presumably it's rude to climb on a pet rock.

Does pet concrete count? I have a lump of pet concrete from when my office building of many years was bulldozed last year. Nothing wrong with the building, it was torn down because of the oil downturn in Aberdeen and to avoid business rates on an empty building after the company I contracted at relocated. :(