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Post by Jason Richardson on May 30, 2004 0:22:46 GMT
he's just being a realist. missing episodes will not fall into your lap. you have to get off your arse and do something. surfing the net isn't enough and neither is the concept of bothering professional archives. so get on with it or stop all this rhetorical crap that floods this forum week in, week out. if you have an idea - act on it!
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Post by Steven S on May 30, 2004 4:02:44 GMT
Hi Jason,
A missing episode fell into my lap this afternoon -- while I was reorgnaizing my film storage area... :-)
(Well actually, it's not missing anymore...)
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Brian D not logged in
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Post by Brian D not logged in on May 30, 2004 15:40:45 GMT
he's just being a realist. missing episodes will not fall into your lap. you have to get off your arse and do something. surfing the net isn't enough and neither is the concept of bothering professional archives. so get on with it or stop all this rhetorical crap that floods this forum week in, week out. if you have an idea - act on it! Hang on, hang on - has this site become the sole property of the collectors in the field? If so, you can count me out. I'm not likely to be in the position to find a lost episode, and nor I suspect are most contributors to this forum. I visit this forum because I find old television interesting, and like everybody, I enjoy a good detective story. If you think that the site is not for people like me, fine - say so! I'm sure then, having instituted a thorough purging by the Central Committee, the twenty people remaining can enjoy the site in the knowledge that only the pure will be visiting it. Whichever way you cut it, that comment to 'Lester' was downright offensive (unless of course the people concerned were known to each other, in which case that should have been made clear to the general reader).
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Post by Jason Richardson on May 30, 2004 17:29:45 GMT
I am not aiming at any one person on this site. Except for the ridiculous rhetorical suggestions that get posted time and time again. If you are offended by my comments, God help you if I actually decide to be offensive. There is something perversely pointless in trying to piece together clues on a subject which has no internal logic of its own. The speculation is often on a par with throwing a coin in the air. It will eventually land on the edge. The brutal truth is that a great many of the industry people can't or won't hunt down missing material. So, it is up to you, each and every one of you. If you want it badly, you'll go out and contribute. Otherwise you'll fan more hot air into an already over inflated subject. I get over inflated reading some of the mindless and badly written pap that passes for constructive comment.
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Post by LESTER on May 31, 2004 6:29:15 GMT
GENTLELMEN!!!!....This bickering will get us all no where...come on Guys....lets get on with some serious debate....and thank you Mr Brian `D`....Mr Steve Davis made some very good points...there is a lot of matrieal abroad, as i stated before, is possible to finance a body to do overseas investigations?, in my opinion there is a vast amount overthere, but at the end of the day it will come down to that old subject...£££££.....
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Post by steve davies on May 31, 2004 10:34:45 GMT
Thank You Lester, I feel very humbled that someone has taken the time to read my little piece and not dismissed it from the first couple of sentances. This is a very passionate subject as we can see from some of the postings.
A very chuffed Steve
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Post by Lester on May 31, 2004 11:48:29 GMT
Mr Davis also rasied another interesting point, what we do need is another appeal for matrieal...it seems the only way at the present time for locateing missing episodes....i recon theres a few ex-employees out there that might have the odd one or two, it was mentioned on a previous thread, that perhaps a prodoucer/manager might be holding something, the thing is then to track them down, then start negotiations....hope i`m not sounding silly here...but thats the way i see it, if not the people on this board are doing an excellent job of communicateing with overseas/home stations.
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Post by Jason Richardson on May 31, 2004 16:00:30 GMT
What is all this 'I think there might be episodes in a Producers collection' and 'I think overseas stations might have....' crap? If it came from Steve Bryant, Dick Fiddy or some other person with insight, it would bear some weight. But as a guess from a layperson it's about as effective as picking the chance that Martians might land on Earth tomorrow afternoon. There is no logic or much point to thinking something exists soley on the merits of your convictions. It doesn't make for good debate either. Of course old staff members have missing films, that is an established fact. Stating on this forum that a few more might have films is wish fufilment because you have no hard facts. Conjecture! You can argue to doomsday on issues of cash and management, but you won't be any nearer to recovering a single inch of missing footage. And funnily enough there aren't a legion of benevolent philanthropists reading this forum as we'd possibly have heard from one before now!
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Post by lfbarfe on May 31, 2004 16:29:53 GMT
Mr Barfe, you seem to be a peculiarly sarcastic and cynical individual, I'll hold my hand up to accusations of sarcasm and cynicism, but I fail to see anything peculiar about me or what I've said in this thread. Yes, isn't she a sweetie? Well, it seems appropriate to me. I couldn't be more serious, Brian, old chap. Some of the posters here are intelligent people with a serious and realistic approach to archive television, and missing material. Then there are the likes of Lester and William - whenever I see a post on here from either of them, I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Each post invariably consists of a 'lead' - presented as a startling insight, but more usually a statement of the bleeding obvious - that, in any case, neither of them has the nous or inclination to follow up themselves. Perhaps this is a blessing, as their semi-literate ramblings are such that anyone who received a communication from them would probably throw it straight in the bin. "Your an archive. Got any missing programmes their!".
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Post by lfbarfe on May 31, 2004 16:31:26 GMT
Mr Barfe....is that your first visit to the archives? First and only, so far, Lester. It'll probably be my last, as the friend in question no longer works there.
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Post by lfbarfe on May 31, 2004 16:54:12 GMT
Missing material is obviously out there, in this country and abroad. How much is debatable. You're bang on the money there, Steve. It is worth looking, but it's worth doing it properly and professionally. Absolutely. The thing is that I'm sure the serious missing episode hunters make focused approaches to various archives, based on listings of what was shown. An approach beginning "I see from such-and-such a listings magazine that your network showed Broaden Your Mind in 1971. Do you still have copies of any of the shows from this series" is much more likely to get an informed response than one beginning "Got any missing episodes of anything?". As Andrew Martin said, the archivists are doing as much as they can as they go about their business, and also no doubt in their own free time. Cheers to them for that. And as I suggested, not from any expert position, but with an informed view of BBC realpolitik, the chances of any serious money being spent on a project which might turn up little of real value are slim, especially at Charter renewal time. Do the regions still hold their own archives? The last I heard was that the Pebble Mill archives had been transferred to Windmill Road, but this might be just because of the BBC's change of premises in Birmingham. I know that some of the programmes my father-in-law produced at BBC Bristol were kept at Whiteladies Road, but I'm not sure of their current whereabouts. I'd agree that periodic bursts of awareness-raising wouldn't do any harm. L
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Post by Jason Richardson on May 31, 2004 19:02:33 GMT
Louis speaks good sense. Why are some people on here so wooden headed they can't get to grips with common sense issues? Either that or their heads are in fairyland? A shame that it probably won't sink into certain forum people unless applied in a O'Brian/Winston Smith scenario. If it was, there would possibly be an improvement in spelling and punctuation too!
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Post by Lester on Jun 1, 2004 11:08:30 GMT
Semi-Literate ramblings Eh?...i never thought of that....oh well...I`m sorry you found my "words" offensive....I thought i was just being polite, in trying to find out information....but alas...it was not to your "standard"....o.k....heres another one for the "Bin"....
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Post by Jim Schwartau on Jun 1, 2004 12:26:48 GMT
Do the regions still hold their own archives? The last I heard was that the Pebble Mill archives had been transferred to Windmill Road, but this might be just because of the BBC's change of premises in Birmingham. I know that some of the programmes my father-in-law produced at BBC Bristol were kept at Whiteladies Road, but I'm not sure of their current whereabouts. As a general rule of thumb, with a few exceptions regional programmes are kept at the regional base, with nationally transmitted programmes kept in London. I couldn't be more serious, Brian, old chap. Some of the posters here are intelligent people with a serious and realistic approach to archive television, and missing material. Then there are the likes of Lester and William - whenever I see a post on here from either of them, I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Speaking as an industry professional whose posts I hope have been of use in the past, I have to admit my visits to this forum have become more and more infrequent since our resident pair of trolls set up shop. The lack of proper moderation hereabouts only seems to exacerbate the situation. Jim.
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Post by lfbarfe on Jun 1, 2004 17:00:55 GMT
Semi-Literate ramblings Eh?...i never thought of that.... That would appear to be part of the problem. Know thyself, etc. Not offensive. Just tedious, repetitive, obvious and presented as though they had been typed with one hand, for whatever reason.
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