Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2015 February 13

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February 13

BBC online

Does anyone here know how (or if) an American can access the British version of BBC's website can be accessed? I tried bbc.co.uk, but it redirected to bbc.com, which seems to be the American version. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:26, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

The BBC geolocates you by your IP address.[1] If you can change the IP address presented to that of a UK based one, you will see the UK version. Nanonic (talk) 00:36, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't know of any way to fake out my IP address. (I'm sure there's a way, I just don't know what it is - and maybe I'm better off not knowing.) ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:48, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Bar something like a VPN, I don't think so. But for the news site, there's little difference between bbc.com/news and bbc.co.uk/news (bar perhaps licensed content in news videos). Looking at the site from the UK directly and on a VM in the Nederlands, the only difference I can see is that the UK site's navbar goes "home .. world .. uk" and the international site goes "home .. uk". What's in the international site's "home" is the UK site's "world"; what's in the UK sites "home" is a mix of the stories the UK and world tab. But I'm not seeing any web news content that's available only in the UK. I've not looked at video news content (because the VM doesn't make that easy) - it's likely (again for licensing reasons) that less (or different stuff) is available internationally. So tl;dr - for web news content, I don't think you're missing anything by not being in the UK. -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 00:40, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

This has to do specifically with whether the UK version has anything to say about the recent murders of three Muslims in North Carolina. It's covered in the American version of the website, but I was wondering if there's any mention of it in the UK version. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:47, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

The same story ("thousands mourn chapel hill shooting victims") is available on both; the text and pictures appears to be identical for both versions. The UK site's "home" places it lower than the world one does, putting above it some UK stories (miliband vs fink, steve strange, uk inflation). -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 00:54, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

(ec) :::I don't believe the content of news stories is any different between the versions. Two articles ([2] and [3]) are on the UK main page relating to the murders and one of these is still in the top 10 most read articles in the UK.[4] Nanonic (talk) 00:56, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

OK, so the story is definitely linked from the British version's front page, right? Because some users at "In The News" were claiming it was not. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:04, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I read about it yesterday on BBC.co.uk, from Canada. First I'd heard about it, or that Americans can't visit the "real BBC". What's the point of that? Those countries share the same Internet data, they should share the same Internet sites. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:09, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

It doesn't make sense to me. Like why would they want to "censor" the British take on things? But I suppose they have business reasons for it. I wonder if I should link from ITN to here if the claim is made again? Or leave it be? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:14, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I just visited BBC.com and think I answered my own question. That layout, font and picture size looks more like CNN.com, "The Most Trusted Name in News". Familiarity. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:16, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

So it's strictly about design, not content? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:17, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Seems that way, except for the most viewed/shared stories. They skew the way you'd think. I mean, the way you think they would. Oddly enough, BBC.co.uk is much heavier on the red, white and blue (but not near as heavy as FOXNews.com). Actually, I guess that makes some sense. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:20, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Red, white and blue is good, either side of The Pond. :) OK, I'll say at ITN that the British version of bbc online not only links to the story, but that it's currently in the top ten most-read in the UK. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:23, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Number 6, at the moment. By my screen. The singer from a band I've never heard of has died. He's the champ. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:43, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

It is (or was when you asked); it's a headline only item on the home page (rather than a pic and a couple of sentences). Compare that to other UK news sites: The Guardian has it pretty prominently; the Independent has it as a line item; the Telegraph has a line item for a comment article; the Times doesn't seem to have it at all; neither does Sky News. The Daily Mail has its usual immigrants/pedos/celebrities stuff; if the story is anywhere in its gigantic list of sex mishaps and cancer factoids, I don't see it. It's a slow news day in Britain, and pedo hoodies are plotting to give the queen's swans cancer; ITN never covers that, I'll note. -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 01:24, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Also odd, FOXNews doesn't mention the story as trending on the front page or the trending page, but if you click the article, the trending box changes to show that article as the hottest thing online. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:30, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Answered myself again. When you click the article, it shows the trending in the US section box. Still, clicking all the other trendy stories from that section shows a "shoot or don't shoot" story at the top. This is the only article that makes itself look trendiest. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:37, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Least popular today? Amanda Knox to marry musician. Listed under "Homicide". InedibleHulk (talk) 01:41, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

There's a good chance they won't be honeymooning in Italy. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:01, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

I was wrong about the colours/colors. BBC News is just as RWB on both sites, and just as black and white on the main pages. The editorials look different, but maybe I'm wrong about that, too. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:14, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

According to BBC News Online, the American version is actually the "international" version. It notes it checks the IP origin to redirect UK people to the UK version, but doesn't say it does it the other way around. In the link Nanonic posted up top for geolocation, it says the point is to not show advertising to the British, who have special rules about that sort of shit. Also "Some content on the site is available in the UK but not internationally - notably certain rights restricted video." There's an "Advertise With Us" button at the bottom of the .com version. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:21, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

When I visit www.bbc.co.uk in Internet Explorer or Chrome it redirects me to www.bbc.com, but when I visit it in Firefox it doesn't. All profiles are basically clean with no extensions. So try Firefox, maybe? -- BenRG (talk) 04:59, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

I also use Firefox. Just tried it in Safari, goes direct there, too. Don't have the others to test, but I believe you. InedibleHulk (talk) 02:18, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Video of Obama or not

Is this[5] actually Barack Obama? Or just a look-alike? WinterWall (talk) 07:20, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

No, that's him. Apparently he thinks he can be a LOLcat, and it'll somehow translate into clicks. InedibleHulk (talk) 07:48, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Looking for a book

I read about a book on these reference desks, but I can't find it again...

An astronaut is stranded on Mars and almost starves to death. In desperation, she decides to try the teleporter, which is apparently dangerous technology. It works, but with one problem: she becomes obsessed with thinking she's an impostor, and that the "real" person was destroyed on Mars. The rest of the book is about the philosophy of teleportation.

Do any long-time Wikipedians know what I'm talking about? --98.232.12.250 (talk) 10:28, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

You might find it productive to look through the (rather many) different teleportation tropes at TV Tropes and see if any rings a bell. I looked through AlternateSelf in particular, but I don't see anything that quite matches your description. As always with TV Tropes links, it's only fair for me to warn that you probably won't find what you're actually looking for, and you'll spend all day enjoying failing. -- Finlay McWalterᚠTalk 14:14, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

The most relevant one appears to be Twinmaker. —Tamfang (talk) 08:25, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Semi-tangentially, the concern about teleportation destroying the original person and creating a copy was voiced by Dr. McCoy in one of the original Star Trek episodes, so in the moving media the idea has been around since the '60s. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 212.95.237.92 (talk) 14:20, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Then they had the original Star Trek episode where Kirk was split into two, one for some reason aggressive and the other not at all. Riker was split in two in Star Trek:The Next Generation, but without either being "evil". StuRat (talk) 20:43, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Which ST:TOS episode was that? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:18, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Hi Baseball Bugs. It was "The Enemy Within (Star Trek: The Original Series)". MarnetteD|Talk 01:21, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

There was also an excellent Outer Limits episode with that theme, again without the silly "evil twin" aspect: Think Like a Dinosaur (The Outer Limits) [6]. I think this version is the best true sci-fi, since here they scan a person and only send their pattern to the remote location, where it is assembled from atoms at the destination (leaving the original intact), while in Star Trek they insisted they were transporting the actual atoms to the new location, which is just absurd. StuRat (talk) 20:49, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Rogue Moon dealt with similar issues -but not on Mars. Rmhermen (talk) 06:24, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Definitely from The Mind's I. The story is online, here. It's the first time I've ever read a story written in the second person ("You will never again return to Earth, to the friends and family and places you left behind.") --Bowlhover (talk) 09:11, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Scale

I've encountered this scale in a music theory test, which I can't identify: F, G, A-flat, B-flat, C, D, E, F. It's not one of the church modes either because A-flat and B-flat can't exist together without E-flat. What would it be if it wasn't a mistake? --2.245.170.168 (talk) 18:46, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

An ascending melodic minor scale. ---Sluzzelin talk 18:58, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

But what is it called when it's the same scale descending?? Georgia guy (talk) 19:00, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Sometimes "Jazz minor scale". ---Sluzzelin talk 19:02, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

(I guess you could also call it a Dorian ♯7 or something like that, analogous to Lydian ♭7 and other synthetic scales). ---Sluzzelin talk 19:11, 13 February 2015 (UTC))

Thank you! I thought too complicatedly (church modes) that I forgot the different types of minor scales. --2.245.170.168 (talk) 19:35, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Here it is with the F minor key signature:

. Double sharp (talk) 15:47, 15 February 2015 (UTC)