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The biiiiig digital switchover: Don’t get ripped off

Santa hates the digital switchover

As regular readers of the Illarterate blog (yes, I know some of you do exist, even if only in my deluded mind) might have noted before now, one particular subject I’ve been particularly outspoken about is the analogue-digital television switchover currently in operation in the United Kingdom.

For the past few years, I’ve made it pretty clear that I am not in favour of this change, though mostly this has been for comedic effect and in a tongue-in-cheek manner. Nevertheless, I am going to miss analogue with its snowy reception and (relatively) lo-def resolution.

Seems I’m not the only one, either. For the benefit of those finding it difficult to cope with all this new fangled digital television thing, I present to you a series of mildly humorous articles — written by the very same person sat typing this post right now — which you may or may not find interesting.

  • How to retune your set top box: Having problems rescanning Freeview? Struggling to find the menu button because the label rubbed off in the first week? You’ll probably find this guide useful.
  • More tips for retuning your set top box: Still struggling? Here are some more tips, released just in time for the November retune. Many are still applicable, so act now before the BBC blow your box up without your permission!
  • The Great Digital Switchover Scam: How this whole thing is a conspiracy set up by the BBC to make us buy brand spanking new, state-of-the-art equipment we don’t necessarily need, just so they can fund more episodes of Strictly Come Prancing.
  • Teletext to meet early demise: Opinions on the news that Teletext will cease as of January next year. It should be noted that BBCi will still keep going, however, at least until they too deem their interactive text service no longer profitable.

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Autoglitcher: New old blog

A screenshot from the Autoglitcher blog

Just a quick word for a blog I started up months ago but never gave the time it deserved. Up until now, I’ve been posting glitched up stuff on the Illarterate blog, but I’ve decided to give Autoglitcher another chance, at least for a while. I’ll look to retrospectively post some of my glitch art excursions from the past few months if I can get round to it this weekend.

As the title suggests, this site’s all about interesting glitches in television, video games and general media. The idea of autoglitching relates to those glitches you seemingly stumble across or have little input in, especially those created completely by accident.

A must for all fans of glitch art, even if I do say so myself. ;)

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Thinking of creating your own Wikia wiki? Read this first

newmonacosuckspoo

As a bit of a follow up to my earlier piece on Wikia, I’ve gone to the trouble of outlining some specific things you ought to know when creating a Wikia wiki. Don’t see these articles as a personal attack on Wikia, who, on the whole provide a very good service. Consider them a rant against the general over-reliance on advertising at free content websites, something that’s becoming increasingly prevalent in this current economic climate, and something that cheeses me off slightly.

Look out for more posts on this subject in the future and perhaps some sort of archive bringing all my Wikia pieces together.

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Wikia, Wikipedia and advertising: a clash of ethics

wikia_in_a_nutshell

I’ve witnessed the downfall of Wikia due to its increased reliance on advertising first hand in the past year. Whilst I don’t want to dwell on the events of precisely one year ago, I decided to breifly revisit the subject with a general account of what happened from my point of view. It can be found here, and is the first piece I’ve published at HubPages.com, an online content hub (as it were) for writers and businesspeople to post articles.

It’s been somewhat painful, though I hope to have exorcised one or two demons. Hmm, I know that’s unlikely, but it was nice to vent my spleen again.

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Age of Umpires… in Polish!

Age of Umpires box art

As you might have read in the title, some rather enterprising person has translated my Uncyclopedia Poo Lit Surprise-winning article Age of Umpires into the Polish language. I’m kind of honoured, but at the same time nobody knows I wrote the thing. Excellente!

Excerpt:

Gracz zaczyna na stadionie w Wigan w District League, a jego celem jest awansowanie w krykietowej…

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