Baby talk on BBC daytime television?

As our dog likes watching television (day and night), she sometimes introduces me to the wonders of daytime TV.

In one of these shows - BBC's Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is - the random intonation of the unseen presenter's voice struck me as being bizarre enough to be worth a quick trawl through YouTube for a specimen:

My researches also led to a TV Guide, where the first comment on the show was headed 'Rubbish voice over'. Others included:

• Still same rubbish, inane voice-over on this new series.
• Childish voice over.
• Can anyone do anything about the patronising and childish commentary?
• An interesting programme which is spoiled each day by the childish voice over and empty nicknames.

So I wasn't alone in thinking that there was something odd about the commentary. Nor was I altogether surprised that some were describing the stresses on random words and intonational shifts up and down as 'childish'.

But I'm not completely convinced that it's quite the same as 'baby talk' or 'motherese' (HERE), which is supposed to help infants in language acquisition. That presumably involves exaggerating stress and intonation in ways that are relevant to the context and the particular words being used - which is not, as far as I can hear, the case with the voiceover in this show.

The only possible explanation I've been able to come up with is that he has perhaps been coached by the same person as Robert Peston and Rory Bremner:

Sepp Blatter lands on a racist snake

In previous posts on the snakes & ladders theory of political communication (e.g. HERE and HERE), I've made the point that interviews (unlike speeches) hardly ever generate anything but bad news for politicians.

Strictly speaking, FIFA boss Sepp Blatter may not be a politician, but his ill-chosen words about racism in football are a classic example of the way in which a few seconds from a ten minute interview (which, if you can bear it, you can watch in full HERE) can land anyone on a snake that becomes damaging headline news.

Nor, of course, is it the first time that this master of the gaffe has made a fool of himself in front of a mass audience. I still think that the way in which, having appointed himself to present the World Cup to the winners in South Africa, he pushed President Zuma out of the way should have been grounds for his instant dismissal (below - and for more on which see HERE).

But he's still there eighteen months later and is, I fear, likely to remain as irremovable as ever...

Rick Perry and the Spanish Inquisition

Last week, I was so busy preparing a keynote address for the annual conference of the UK & Ireland Toastmasters that I missed this spectacular failure to remember a third item in a list.

There are quite a lot of posts on this blog showing speakers making rather more effective use of three-part lists than Mr Perry, as well as a brief summary of the late Gail Jefferson's work on their recurrence in everyday conversation Why lists of three: mystery, magic or reason?

The above clip also reminded me that classic comedy shows have also sometimes played on a speaker's failure to remember all the items in a list, as in this excerpt from the Spanish Inquisition sketch in Monty Python's Flying Circus - where all goes well until Michael Palin makes the mistake of trying to add a fourth item:

Presentation tip: beware of flip charts on wheels

In previous posts (and books), I've written favourably about writing on blackboards and flip charts (e.g. HERE + links).

But on Saturday, in the middle of a lecture to 200+ people, I suddenly realised that there was a rather important point that I'd failed to mention, namely: if the flip chart has wheels, make sure you LOCK THEM before trying to write anything on it.

Disaster averted

As the chart began falling backwards, the screen (on which I was about to show video clips on which the rest of my lecture depended) started to follow suit. Total disaster was only kept at bay by the weight of the curtain behind the stage and the quick reflexes of one of the organisers, who pushed the flip chart back on to the stage and locked its wheels.

A stunt worth repeating?

The huge amounts of laughter prompted by its sudden reappearance have now raised the question of whether such a stunt might be worth developing (and rehearsing) for use on another occasion?

I'm pretty sure that my blood pressure isn't up to risking it again - but, if anyone else would like to try it for themselves, I'd be delighted to hear whether it achieves a similarly positive impact.

Murdoch, the Mafia and the manufacture of a misleading soundbite

There were two reasons why I was amazed to see the above highly edited clip being played on ITN's News at Ten this evening.

One was that ITN had cut out - without any mention of the fact that they had done so - two whole minutes of what had happened between Tom Watson's first and last question in this particular sequence.

The other was that, within seconds of the exchange, Twitter had been alive with news that this would be the sound bite from the 2.5 hours interrogation of James Murdoch by the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport select committee.

And so indeed it turned out to be.

But, for the benefit of those who only saw ITN's News at Ten (and/or anyone else who hadn't been following the whole story during the day), shouldn't there have been at least some indication that the sequence portrayed did not take place in quite the way they were making out?

You can compare ITN's version (above) with the full sequence (below) - in which the 'second' question from Tom Watson comes almost two minutes after the first one: