The New Programme...can you name it? Blog Exclusive.
The New Programme is something you might remember from a previous posting. Starting later in the year, it will have a strong interactive content. It'll go out ever week for 7 weeks, at the weekend. You might find clicking on the link on the previous entry in this category will help. But it probably won't.
Anyhoo, there was a big meeting on Friday at which progress was made. A new site will be built and a name will be found. We'll post more audio this week which will keep you informed of our thinking. Or at least our "thinking".
As you may know, the working title for the programme is "The Blog Prog" which has its pros and cons and will probably not be used.
I rather like the idea of building on the PM brand, identifying the new show as something that individuals can shape more than PM - a more personal experience - and call it iPM.
I'm sure you can do better. Any ideas on a programme name?
I appreciate that having an opinion would be easier if we were clearer about what the hell it is. But any initial thoughts would be welcome. And feel free to come back to this page to add ideas as the mist clears. If it ever does.
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Eddie....you are asking US to a barnstorming session on a SUNDAY afternoon?
Oh......OK...how's about:-
'More Cheese Grommit?'
'TOTP2'
'PM radioactive'
'well i'll eat my shorts on line'
'Blogelicous'!
I may come up with more after the next couple of pints of Bishops F*nger!!
DIY ( a R4 serf)
'w4 - ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Radio 4's eye on what's out in cyber space: World Wide Web Watch (or w4 for short)'
clean, clear and simple. Does what it says.
BPM (Blog PM) but music people may get confused.
Journey through the sphere (an often used term is blogosphere)
Next Year's Sony Winner
Interactive Topical News (hmm, the initials might get you into trouble)
Drop the comment wars (DtDD reference)
Mmm... how about:
Active-Views
Beeb Blog..
pronounced Beeblog
..?
Or even: PPM
i.e. Personal PM
Beeb Blog..
pronounced Beeblog
..?
The Radio 4 Eddie Mair Bloggy Thingy?
I'm on a roll now....
The Chat Room
Fifi
Input 4 U?
DIY (serf and all round good guy)
iDea
(Sort of like Ikea, but where you acquire thoughts rather than unwanted candles, and where you don't have to find a parking space or quarrel with your partner)
Sid
i-Lights (Highlights - see what I've done there?!!)
Webviews -
pm online
1-4-all-&-all-4-1 - the musketeers of the cybersphere!
Hey, this is is good game - just let me open another bottle of shiraz ...
Sid
Blogroids.
I'm still sitting on that one.
Sid (13) : Never mind the prog titles, you is talkin my lingo!
* holds out suddenly empty g&t glass *
Cheers!
Fifi x
Fifi (15)
Glug glug glug glug glug ... say when ... glug glug glug glug ...
Hmm ... time to open yet another bottle ...
Cheers!
Sid
The glass does have a stem but it holds half a pint easily ... sorry, forgot to mention that bit!
Cheers Sid. :ox
Fifi
iPM?
My names weren't that bad! Why have they been banned by the mods? :-(
I had the same prob GM :-(
A couple of questions, which may influence the names people offer:
1. Will the programme go out at 5pm on Sunday (i.e. the PM slot every other day?) In which case, under current circumstances, I'll have to "Listen again" later.
2. Will you (EM) be the presenter, with Sequin, Carrie and Paddy as stand-ins?
Sorry all, I'm currently locked into a "writing the specification" mode since that is what I appear to have spent all last week doing.
DIY and Fifi,
The glass is neither half-full or half-empty, it simply needs a refil.
push!
xx
ed
Weekly for seven weeks? That throws out my previous PMT idea, then.
How about...
Are you being surfed?
I've thought of loads of possibilities, but they would be completely incomprehensible to anyone who didn't read the blog, and I assume you're aiming for a slightly larger target audience than that. If you want to keep the PM brand then iPM is probably the one. Can I make a plea that the content of the programme covers a similar range to the blog ? From the ever so serious Furrowed Brow stuff to the surrreal - as found on the beach? Its that combination which has made the blog a success - you can engage someone in a passionate and heated debate on a matter of great import one minute, and be talking to the same person about camels amongst the sand dunes the next.
"PM beta "? (whatever that "beta" business meant - I never understood it in the first place.)
"PM lite"? (I said that one before. Horrible)
DIY - I like your no. 8. 'Cos that's probably what we'll call it anyway, whatever they officially title it.
"Confused - EM with PM - and YOU" (Well I'm confused anyway) OK, what about "PM+U"
or "PM+u" whatever is more text-speak.
They're all rubbish really, aren't they? I really hate that use of small letters in amongst capitals. One of the orchestras does it, never ceases to annoy me. It's like someone shouting in the middle of a word.
"The People's PM"? oops, sorry, slipped back into Tony Blair-speak then. Doesn't it seem a long time since he was about?
I shall think hard, & try to come back with some even worse offerings. Brain a bit full of weddings at the moment. Busy weekend.
PMT
The T stands for Talk!
Just as I clicked submit, I thought of:
"Weblog-wise"
which, if you say it with a different accentuation becomes
"We're blog-wise".
Yeah - I know - equally meaningless. But it would be a challenge for the listener to work out which meaningless title it was meant to be. They might even email in to complain about the ambiguity!
I wonder why we're banned Jonnie? They'll never know what they missed now - one of ours could've been just The One they were looking for!
From Our Home Correspondent
Random thoughts:
PM Interactive
Productively Meandering
PM borderless
PM Audience
Listener PM
Acoustic PM
PM out of studio
PM - Public Musings
Blogarithim
Blogbook
Blogic
Blogical
PMBlogbook
Blogorrhea
Sorry, my head hurts now!
SPM - (Sunday PM) - then again, could be confused with "South Park Mexican" (a rapper, apparently) or Scanning Probe Microscopy. Of course, if you added an "a" between the P and the M... :)
PM Sunday - then again, maybe not...
Take the Apple approach, call it iProg (interactive programme) or i42 (or is that being a little pretentious?)...
Eddie Mair Interactive - again, you'd probably run into problems with the acronym...
i4 - could confuse people into thinking it was made by a TV company (between ITV and Five)
Arachnophilia :)
-oOo-
Here's another idea: as it's about technology, computers and the internet, then why not take a leaf out of the books of UNIX developers and choose an acronym with two alternative expansions. Perhaps the most famous example is PERL - officially Practical Extraction and Reporting Language, but the author claims it really stands for Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish Lister.
Or you could take the backronym approach (i.e. create the word first, then the expansion later) - you may have heard of "TWAIN" software that comes bundled with scanners. It's actually named after "Ne'er the twain shall meet" (the TWAIN software sits between the scanner and the program you're in - each can only see the software, but not the program on the other side), but it wasn't long before it attracted a backronym: Technology Without An Interesting Name.
Or, if you're *really* clever, create a recursive acronym. Take PINE - Program for Internet News and Email, or PINE is not ELM (it was originally based on a program called ELM: "PINE is nearly ELM", but eventually replaced all ELM code, hence PINE is not ELM). Or GNU - GNU's not UNIX. Or if you want to really confuse listeners, see what GNU called their freeware operating system: the GNU HURD. HURD = HIRD of UNIX replacing Daemons, and HIRD = HURD of interfaces representing depth. As well as being co-recursive and hurting your head before you even try to translate that into "ordinary" English, it's also a play on "Gnu Herd" (a herd of Gnus).
Well, Eddie himself gave three great possibles on Day One, so here goes:
"Testing, testing."
"If this works I'll think about actually writing something tomorrow."
"Thanks for dropping by."
My personal favourite of these would be
"If this works, I'll think about actually writing something tomorrow" as it has a "I'm sorry I haven't a clue" or an Angus Prune feeling about it. (G**gle Angus Prune if you don't know what I'm on about)
However, "Thanks for dropping by" or "Testing, Testing! possibly have a more universal sense to them.
How about "Web Wanderings"?
jonnie@ 20 - your comment has been approved...it went into the deferred file for some reason.
gossipmistress @ 19 - I've searched for your comment, and it seems to have vanished into cyberspace. No trace of it all. Apologies...
Or, FFred, "Spinning the Web"?
(PS Loved your contribution to Friday's letters!)
PM Gold (d'ya get what I'm referring to?) or even "PM Gold- Special Edition"?
"PM value" (as in the supermarkets "value " format, which means cheap. That one researcher you've hired is going to be earning his/her salary all right...)
"Blogorama" (like Panorama, but cheaper?)
If it's at 5 pm on a Sunday, then I'll probably call it MIST. Don't think I've been near a radio at that time since Down Your Way. Ah. Down your Blog? Maybe not. I'll get my coat.
Or 'web ponderings' Fearless?
I have requested the above post from me - under the name of (Sequin) be pulled.
This was in error as the name was still on one of the PC's
Well, I suggest we all bow to the inevitable and call it the Fifi Show - no matter what sort of show it turns out to be.
Its going to be stuff people have dredged up on the web like yesterdays papers?
Or the PM blog writ large? In which case 'Fifi's family and friends'?.
The podcast should be called 'Eating Drinking and Dreaming with Fifi' or 'Fifi morning noon and night'.
What about
The Old Familiar Faces,
though the last word could be mis-spelt creatively.
Thanks, BigSis! I still say the voice they used for me was rather posh!
Post Modern PM
Um
I like programmes to have a name that tells you what it is.
So perhaps if you could be just a teensy bit clearer, it may be easier?
Or maybe you're looking for a title that you can hang the programme on.
Or maybe I should do a lot more catching up.
Is it a programme about blogs?
Then why not call it
About Blogs
Then we wouldn't be so mystified,.. well, about the programme, not life in general.
This is a blog which I've often found interesting.
Howzabout:
"The Reluctant Blogger"?
or
"The Compleat Blogger"?
o
"Bloggering about in cyberspace"
Anut Dahlia - I think they, er, will know what the programme is about when we've given them a name for it. At least, that's what I've gathered so far.
In response to your suggestions - would a title like "If we knew what this programme was about, we'd tell you", make it any clearer? Thought not.
Nice to see you around again, btw!
Big Sis - I like "Spinning the Web". Very clever.
PM Plus...
"This is the Programme the Blog Built"
Blog Standard
Piper - "PM Plus" sounds like it's intended for the larger listener. Still, I suppose there's no harm in niche marketing.
PMT - the "T" stands for TENSION
Frog Spawn
The Global Village Pond (bit long)
Pond Matters (PM for short!)
To stone two blogs with one post:
Lets call the new prog
Fifi's Views and Views of Fifi
Mac - I can't work out if you are trying to be amusing about Fifi or snidely unpleasant. Whatever you intend, you seem to have spattered the blog with posts similar to this today and I don't like it.
Some ideas... for the usual fee, of course. :)
BlogWeek
PM Open Access
Open Air
World Wide Waffle
Feeds for Thought
Oh RSS (could by slyly pron. to sound like slang for a bottom (did that get past the censor?) by presentation, like they do with Cross Incontinence, I mean Crossing Continents)
PM Blogwatch
PM Blogtalk
PM Browser
The Browser
Blog Browser
PM P.S.
PM Trackback
PM Ping
Ping Me
Blog-casting House
PM Blog-cast
The Asylum (as in the lunatics have...)
Eddie Mair, Blog Bi-ch (seeing as most famous blogs need -itch in the title it seems)
Blog On
Blog-jam
Blogging all over the world
Blogger Off
Blog Blag
Blog Blah Blah
Blogroll
Not all of the above were serious, but that may be clear enough. :)
Steve
Does the Grauniad (other sp. prone publications are available) have a copyright on 'Comment is free' ? I think it neatly encapsulates many of the positives of blogging.
Or:
Current comment
(covers being up-to-the-minute but also hints at the IT involvement - well, kind of..!)
What the punters say
Welcome to PM: Please choose from the following opinions.
The first three could easily have the prefix 'PM:' if you want to keep the 'brand' - yes, bit of a cop out I know.
Blog Prince (35) thank you for trying! ;-)
Can't remember what I wrote but some of them might have been:
PM Websniffer
PM Blogdog
PM Webtwitcher
PM Webcomber
and
PMi Baby {which means nothing at all to do with the programme - I imagine anyway!}
New program -
PM Attachments
or
PMPS
Overwhelmed?
Love the show
More singing please
Steve (55) - I'm always amused by the way they carefully call it 'Crossing (pause) Continents'. 'FOOC' is a favourite of mine. But I digress.
OurSpace
FaceRadio
VoiceBook
i-tube
i-box
Nahh...
i4
R4i
R4u
i-frog
(I quite like 'frogspawn'. But those announcers would turn it into Frog's Porn, I know...)
Radio Interactive (ah, memories of that other R4 prog)
i-candy
i-wash
Steve@55 : I love your list, made me LOL - now there's an idea for a name.. Maybe the web page could (should!) be called "broadcasting mouse"
Frances@59 : I really never thought of hearing "frog's pawn" said on-air - very good!
How does a frog talk to the world? Using a broadcating mouse..
I'll get my coat!