BBC Ceefax's Race Preview - Rubbish

[BootsOntheSide]

Jonathan Legard of Radio 5 live is a respected commentator, but his efforts at writing race previews for Ceefax leave a lot to be desired.

The first page of this one basically says "Michael will win, but the interesting thing is that Ralf isn't here" - which doesn't exactly boost anticipation of the race, adn sounds a lot like a Simpsons joke in which a presenter said of a Sandcastle-Building tournament "this year everyone is excited about one thing - the absence of Mark Rodkin.... oh wait, there he is"

Worse still was the final page, which said that Button is hoping BAR can return to the podium after his non-score in the US. Does BAR suddenly stand for Button Alone Racing?

[NiceGuyEddie]

"this year everyone is excited about one thing - the absence of Mark Rodkin.... oh wait, there he is"

[Kicking-back]

To be fair to Jonathan, Ceefax requires articles to be subbed down to a very few words in order to fit.

[Dutton]

Ceefax is always ******** for F1, always has been: doesn't stop me reading it and checking it all the time of course, this motorsport thing ain't that easy to ignore....:-p.

However, at least prior to Legard doing the previews there were a lot more pages to read. When it comes down to it, I wouldn't expect any more of an improvement from Ceefax.

I would gladly take an in-depth, accurate, truly comprehensive 50 pages mini-thesis for each race.....but that is clearly not a reasonable expectation. That is not Ceefax's purpose, therefore about 10 more pages of Ceefax's usual dubious standard would do for me.

[spider]

Here's a question: Why does Ceefax look so pony? Why, in this increasingly technological world can't Ceefax have photo's? Proper snaps, instead of Spectrum-style pixellated rubbish? I know it's there to serve a quick-read purpose, but surely it wouldn't be too diffcult to progress the technology?

[Kicking-back]

Ceefax is an analogue system and can't look any better than it does.

Digital (Freeview, Sky digital and cable) give access to BBCi - a much more modern version of Ceefax, with pictures, nice fonts and even video clips and feeds.

[ASCII Man]

I like it, sort of reminds me of the old Atari/Commodore games of the 80's.

[touringcarnut]

The old analogue Ceefax and Teletext are faster and more reliable than the rubbish 'digital' text services that sky and BBC also offer. They have pictures, but the speed is like trying to download a film on a dial up.

Until the poor service that digital text is improves, I'm happier with no frills analogue text!

[Kicking-back]

The www on broadband is better than both!

[Super Tourer]

Good job the 10 Tenths previews are so good......

[Kicking-back]

Indeed they are.

Well done

[Nina]

Try reading Jonathan's pieces on BBC sport Online
Ceefax is not exactly renowened for its Journalistic style and content!

[Dutton]

In defence of Ceefax, also, it should be remembered (unless I am ill-informed) that it uses the excess data potential that would otherwise be wasted in the TV signals of the analogue output-intake interface (hence why when the interface is compromised Ceefax can be unrelialbe - bad weather, for example).

That is to type: it takes what would otherwise be lost meaningless waves and transforms them into a usable information service.

I am grateful for its existence, warts and all, being the addict of it that I am.