I've just seen the first season of this Porridge reboot. Not as funny as the original of course, but there was a lot of compelling character work. The new Fletch and Godber dynamic between Mark and Daniel was particularly interesting.

Spoilers for season 1.

I think there are a lot of really interesting parallels. I'd like to go into the one between Mark (Sean Bean's character) and Daniel (his cellmate).

Initially they are men in similar situation. Both were drunk, did something incredibly stupid, got someone killed and went to prison for it. They both face the same pressures to continue a criminal lifestyle in prison. They seek to apologise to the families of those they killed. Although significantly James stabbed his victim out of machismo, while Mark drunkenly ran a man over. Because of this , Mark is in four four years tops, while Daniel is facing 20.

There are mitigating factors for Daniel and Mark. His victim wanted to fight him, and was winning that fight. But Daniel chose to take a knife to the pub in the first place, and chose not to back down. Mark's kill was accidental, and he turned himself in, but he chose to drive extremely drunk after years of alcoholism. Like Daniel taking the knife to the pub, Mark made a conscious choice to drive to the pub before he got really drunk.

But the way those stories end is very, very different. Mark is freed in two years, has hope of being a better man. He still has a relationship with his mother and son.

Its Mark's literacy that gets him through many of the ordeals of prison. He can teach, which gives him hope and any degree of inner peace. It also allows him to curry favour with other prisoners, one of whom gives him advice and saves his life. High literacy gives Mark privilege in leaving prison to do speaking tours, work with at-risk-teens and this looks good at a parole hearing. Mark's level of intelligence and education is probably quite rare in this kind of prison. He is favoured by the chaplain for his ability to teach. A privilege he wasted in the outside world by coming to class drunk. 'I'm a teacher' becomes Mark's mantra, the prisoner sees himself as a good person because he was of value to the outside world.

Don't get me wrong, Mark still has to show remorse. Still struggles to do the right thing. For example in the finale he accepts taking a severe beating rather than smuggle drugs into the prison. He truly feels immense remorse to the victim and his family. But I don't think he'd be able to get out in two years if he wasn't so well-spoken and intelligent.

In contrast, Daniel is not smart or literate. He struggles to make amends, with words. Doesn't see all the risks of holding drugs or a phone for Jackson. Or maybe he doesn't care because his sentence if crushing.

Of course Daniel makes a lot of bad choices. Its clear that he's seeking to have his sentence reduced first, and making amends second. Its only when faced with the victim's family that he really lets himself feel the guilt. But he clearly does feel that guilt, express regret.

But Daniel also saved Mark from getting his legs burnt by Tommo. He didn't let Mark use the phone to call his mother, and that's probably because Mark would have suffered a longer spell in jail if he'd have used the phone instead of just not grassing on his cellmate. Or Jackson might have been able to use the phonecall to get to Mark's family.

While Daniel does choose to work with Jackson's smuggling ring, its only really out of despair rather than ambition or mean-spiritedness. I mean, he's a young lonely man facing a 20 year stretch.

I think the difference in their choices is far smaller than the difference in their endings. Mark leaves with a sense of freedom and hope. Daniel is a junkie, never tried drugs on the outside but now he's off his mind on spice. Probably completely in the pocket of Jackson's gang.

There are further parellels with Pete (Black, gambling addict, robber, loving father, stays locked inside) and Mark (White, alcoholic, manslaughterer, loving father, gets out early). But that's a whole other discussion.

I think Daniel's ending is a is a piercing if understated take on the justice system. The prison is profoundly broken. But its so much harder on those who are seen to have of value to society outside. So many prisoners don't seem to feel that they have anything to live for.

Please sign this petition to save Radio 4Extra!

Not the first time 💨😂. To clarify Trump means fart in our house.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c6ly09v09lnjo

Dear god. Just watched a saddening interview with Dame Judi Dench where she says because of age she can’t do a play, film or read anymore and can’t see the colour blue. The interviewer, Emma Barnett, then asks, “if aging’s any good?” Tactless. Dench managed a diplomatic, “Rubbish.” Why on earth would you pose that question?

Since yesterday the BBC websites for programs and schedules stopped working. Initially I attributed this to the PHP issue but it’s been 24 hours and they are still not back up. Now the main pages of both sites redirect to iplayer. Those websites were invaluable tools in terms of research and archiving and the BBC appears to be removing them under the guise of being temporarily unavailable. Does anyone know what’s going on there?

i’ve just been rewatching it as of late but holy moly some of the acting is terrible and the plots feel rushed like the production happened super fast i don’t know how tracy’s acting has gotten worse (i know she’s not a child anymore) and don’t get me started on her daughter saying “sean godfrey” all the damn time 😂

I read they want to make us pay the £180 fee even if we only watch YouTube or Netflix. Since TV Licensing can't legally track my internet history or router traffic, how on earth do they plan to police this?

​Are they just going to turn it into a mandatory tax for anyone with a broadband connection? Curious to hear your thoughts.

UPDATE: Steve has resumed his YouTube posts today.

Steve's popular Youtube channel mostly covering the Russian media has gone silent. He usually posts messages regarding absences and delays

If we want thje boost and money that the BBC brings to the UK’s creative and media industries, and we want freely-available news for the masses, we need a public broadcaster like the BBC, but the funding model is on its last legs. Could it be funded from general taxation without becoming a government mouthpiece out of necessity to secure funding?

Broadcasting “recording” time is wrong

Why is the BBC not covering this story?

Regardless of your political views this should be a concern to everyone. For the BBC to not think that this is news worthy shows how biased the BBC have become? Are they scared that this story will help Reform in some way?

The latest scandal involving Angela Rayner is being ignored by the BBC. IN fact most of the media are ignoring it.

But why?

Why is the MSM not even interested in reporting on the news anymore?

It is bad enough Rayner 'using tax payer's cash to fund 'anti right Wing propaganda' but why should the license fee payers also be paying for organisations such as the BBC to only run negative news stories against right wing candidates but ignore anything negative about the left?

This is not the first scandal that Rayner has been involved in and had this been reported it could be humiliating for the PM as it could show his poor judgement. By not reporting on it the BBC are therefore preventing a negative perception of the government and leaving the public with a false image.

This is just one of many times where the BBC literally will ignore a negative story relating to the Labour Party. The thing is the Labour Party know this which is why they are on very good terms with them and that ridiculous license fee gets to stay in place.

Thinking about this, you might have to put up with some advertising but YouTube will eventually pay the BBC for output, on the other hand, if the BBCs servers aren’t used the stuff that gets put up there that doesn’t make it elsewhere will be lost because of ‘economies’.

Excuse my lack of knowledge in this field ,with the new Apple TV supporting AV1, is this likely to make a difference wether UHD will be supported on bbc iplayer?

Anyone else find the Going Home show to be a really bad reflection on Radio 1 these days? One of many too, if we're honest.

We're only a few weeks in to a newly reshuffled daytime lineup, which kept Vic, Katie and Jamie as the permanent hosts of Going Home. You would be forgiven for thinking this meant that the three of them would host the Going Home show. However I think I can count on 1 hand the number of shows in the last year that have actually had all 3 of them on air.

I know they're all newly parents and so are balancing things still, but it's the lack of communication on the station throughout the day as to who will actually be on that makes the whole thing feel so chaotic and unorganised.

There's not a single one of the 3 on air today, with Emil and Lauren being the two seemingly picked out of a hat during the 3:30pm Newsbeat.

Add this onto GK Barry doing Thursday afternoons instead of Matt & Molly (who are the only ones outside of Greg I'd choose to listen to if I had more of a choice in work). It feels a little like Radio 1 are trying to lose listeners with it all tbh.

PBS SoCal airs BBC News at 5pm local, and it very frequently experiences audio drop outs, in addition to video freezes.

This is via Frontier/Verizon FIOS TV - that is, not streaming. Other PBS programs don't have the problem.

Is it just me? What can be done?