Stats 22 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 71% (+2)      Forum Posts :   1,506 (+8)
  (Due       : 80%)

  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 27098  (+86)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    40   (+5)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   125         People      :     0  Total      : 27263         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  1 Show

Today I have been mostly fixing duplicate IDs. One of the advantages of presiding over so many dead guides is that I get instant approval of half of the corrections I make! Meanwhile, I have acquired further show guides with my third ID. I only use this one to correct people guides created at TV.com, and to reassign credits assigned to duplicate people guides, but it only takes 40 corrections to acquire a show guide.

There's a lot of incorrect data out there, so kudos to those who do what they can to avoid creating these, and to those who correct them where they find them.

Stats 21 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 69% (+1)      Forum Posts :   1,498 (+10)
  (Due       : 78%)

  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 27012  (+52)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    35  (+17)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   125         People      :     0  Total      : 27172         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  1 Show

To change tack completely: this week's blog title theme has been brought to you by Siouxsie and the Banshees. Juju is that rarity, a favourite album that I have never got around to acquiring on CD. I have been playing a lot of The Banshees of late (weren't they great?) and I went out with the express intention of buying the album, and was delighted to find that the first four albums have recently been repackaged. (You know the form: the original album remastered and incorporating associated single tracks). All were on sale, too, at less than the store's on-line price, but price was no object.

I already have last year's deluxe edition of The Scream, but I bought the new editions of Join Hands, Kaleidoscope and Juju and promptly copied these across to my iPod, and having been listening to nothing else this week. The other Banshees studio albums are due to be rereleased in this revised edition later this year, as are deluxe editions of mid-period The Cure, so that gives me something to look forward to/dread, as the quality of output of both bands went into steady decline from 1983.

Now here's a conundrum. I am generally a completist, and have embraced the advent of CD releases of studio sessions that I spent hours (and lots of cash) tracking down and acquiring in bootleg form in the 1980s. Severin is quoted as having combed the archives and arranged for the release of everything available, and these emerged last year. Except that the sessions on The Scream omit a version of Love In A Void that had the now-regretted line "Too many Jews for my liking." Some time later, Siouxsie attempted to explain away the lyric by claiming that the line didn't mean Jewish people but fat middle-aged businessmen! (On the same basis, she explained that the swastika she used to wear in 1976 was designed to shock the establishment, and was in no way meant to empathise with the Nazi creed.) The Peel Sessions version of the song had "too many WACs" (huh?) and the official release had "too many bigots".

Over the past few years, Adam Ant and Marco Pirroni have been releasing a whole load of rare unreleased material, some of it of bedroom recording sessions of academic interest only. However, the so-called The Complete Radio 1 Sessions, which manages to include Puerto Rican ("I'm gonna light up a beacon on a Puerto Rican/Gonna put a matchstick to his head") and an unsound version of Deutscher Girls ("Camp 49" "O why did you have to be so Nazi?"), both of which had been too politically incorrect for The Peel Sessions CD, still omits You Smell, presumably because it's a bit, well, rubbish.

The upshot is that I have to retain two old cassette tapes for tracks that will never be released on CD. My question then is: should we let artists get away with airbrushing their early history, either on artistic or political grounds?

Stats 20 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 68% (+1)      Forum Posts :   1,488 (+6)
(Due       : 77%)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26960  (+84)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    18   (-1)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   125   (+1)  People      :     0  Total      : 27103         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

So what is it with the bizarre approach to contributing people data taken by some editors? I have hitherto refrained from contributing to one show because it is in such a mess. This is a current and popular British show, with a new season coming later in the year, and every person credit added by the current editor is wrong, wrong, wrong. He has revised the show stars list, which had season numbers appended to the character names, and replaced these with episode number notations (!), but in doing so has removed all of the true IDs and added a whole sequence of duplicate IDs at summary level. Some episodes have the original IDs, others have the duplicates. Some co-stars have been added to the list of stars (again with duplicate IDs). Several series regulars have been allocated reverse name (Surname, Forename) IDs. One co-star has four IDs: his real one, his show star one, and three guest star ones.

When suggestion and persuasion fail, there is no means of persuading a sitting editor to follow the basic rules, and there are no means of removing an editor for incompetence. I can amend the cast credits for each episode, but the show stars for each remain incorrect as these can only be sorted at summary level, and it is really those that I want to address, and this cannot be done by a non-editor for a show with an editor. I cannot legitimately accumulate enough points to unseat the editor, as he has already accumulated more points than I could legitimately gather for a show I never watch – 5+5+2+(8+2+1*no. of episodes) – even if I rewrite the more incoherent show summaries. However, I can turn a blind eye no longer, and shall do the best job that I can of correcting the guide, running the risk of a welter of rejections.

On the subject of rejections, I got another today, the first in ages. I tried to delete a Note telling us that a particular actor was in a particular episode, at the same time as I added the actor to the cast. The editor for that guide rejected the Note before approving the cast addition. Oh, well.

Stats 19 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 67% (+1)      Forum Posts :   1,482 (+2)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26876  (+21)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    19   (+4)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 27019         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 18 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 66% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,480 (+11)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26855  (+28)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    15   (-2)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26994         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Back on track after all the recent trials. The people search has been fixed, the WSoD has fixed itself, and I have uncovered further rich seams of duplicate person guides created by (other) contributors who use Manually Add a Guest instead of Search For Actor Name. I'm not after any editorships at the moment, but will need something to keep me busy once DoDG is completed.

Stats 17 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 66% (+1)      Forum Posts :   1,469 (+4)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26827  (+18)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    17   (-5)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26968         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Levelling is working fine. That's what they say. Only there was no increase for anyone on 28 June, or 7 July, or 15 July. Me, I got no increase at all from 28 June through 13 July, and erratic increases since.

I'm at Level 54, where every accepted submission corresponds to a 0·02% increase. No more and no less: it's been that way since I hit 54 on 11 May. My total submissions (as recorded in the stats box to the right, and in the blog below) from 29 June to 17 July is 609, which corresponds to an increase of 12·18%. My actual increase since 28 June is 3·51% (1·01% and 1% on 14 July, 1·11% on 16 July and 0·39% on 17 July). None of these increases corresponds to any combination of daily submissions, so I have to ask: on what are they basing these adjustments?

Stats 16 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 65% (+1)      Forum Posts :   1,465 (+8)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26809  (+34)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    22   (+7)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26955         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 15 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 64% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,457 (+4)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26775  (+35)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    15  (-28)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26914         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Searching for a solution to the problem of the huge number of person IDs that disappeared from search last month, I carried out a detailed study of this area, and confirmed some long-standing theories. As I went through a long-running show from the 1960s and searched for cast members to add, I made reference to literally hundreds of duplicate IDs nestling in a handful of British shows. These duplicates were caused by contributors who do not to use the Search For Actor Name feature when adding a star or guest, preferring to use the Manually Add a Guest Star/Manually Add a Show Star for every submission.

As you recall, for several months after launch, TV.com was adding a blank as a notional middle name to manually-added cast and crew. During this time, manually added credits did not match the true TVTome-era ID, and a new ID (in the range 372597-410906) was created.

Since the blank-as-middle-name bug was fixed, if a contributor adds the actor using the Manually Add a Guest Star/Manually Add a Show Star feature, manually added IDs match the true ID (unless the original ID has a blank-as-middle-name). If the actor has more than one of these, the system will determine which one is attached to, normally the highest numbered one, I believe, although I haven't had occasion to test that theory.

Since the blank-as-middle-name bug was fixed, however, the contributors to those shows are still managing to create duplicate IDs using Manually Add a Guest Star/Manually Add a Show Star feature. This is achieved by leaving a trailing space at the end of the First Name field when they copy and paste the name.

That's all rather complicated sounding, but here's the important bit. Every now and again, actors disappear from search. We can continue to add the credits to the correct ID even if it isn't searchable. If the search doesn't yield any results, or if it throws up some results but not the one you are looking for, find the true ID by Googling. (Personally, I Google whenever the search throws up only TV.com-era IDs from 372597 up.) If the web address of the true ID has a single-dash between names, you can safely add the name in the Manually Add a Guest/Manually Add a Show Star feature, remembering to add the appropriate Roman numeral to the Last Name field if appropriate. If the true ID has a double-dash between first and last names, just add a space at the end of the first name field and it will match, although best practice dictates that we should submit a correction to remove the blank-as-middle-name for any true (non-duplicate) IDs.

In the fortnight that we lost a substantial number of people IDs from the search, I was able to attach credits to the correct (hidden) ID in a hundred and fifty or so cases where the search showed only a duplicate blank-as-middle-name ID, and many more where there were no search results whatever.

One of the benefits (drawbacks) of the recently reintroduced person ID hyperlinks on the cast submission pages is that, when I go in to correct a single credit, I find that it is one of a batch of consecutively-numbered duplicate IDs attached to the episode. My ongoing mission is to correct the credits for hundreds of further duplicate people IDs for this handful of problem shows without doing enough to acquire the editorships, and I have flagged my concern to the current editors of most of these show guides.

Stats 14 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 64% (+2)      Forum Posts :   1,453 (+5)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26740  (+37)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    43  (+18)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26907         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 13 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,448 (+9)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26703  (+35)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    25  (+11)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26852         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 12 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,439 (+5)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26668  (+16)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    14   (+8)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26806         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows (+2)             2 Shows

Stats 11 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,434 (+5)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26652  (+28)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :     6  (-14)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26782         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 10 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,429 (+5)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26624  (+35)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    20   (+3)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26768         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows (+2)             2 Shows

Stats 9 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,424 (+3)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26589  (+40)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    17   (+7)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26730         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 8 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,421 (+14)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26549  (+42)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    10   (-9)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26683         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 7 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,407 (+1)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26507  (+15)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    19   (+6)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26650         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 6 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,406 (+19)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26492  (+10)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    13   (+2)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26629         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 5 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,387 (+9)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26482  (+18)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    11   (+3)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26617         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 4 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,378 (+9)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26464  (+63)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :     8   (+2)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26596         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 3 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,369 (+12)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26401  (+78)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :     6  (-15)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26531         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 2 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,357 (+11)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26323  (+44)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    21  (+10)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26468         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 1 July 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,346 (+2)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26279  (+25)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    11   (-2)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26414         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 30 June 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,344 (+2)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26254  (+28)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    13   (-9)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26391         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 29 June 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54   Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,342 (-)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26226   (+8)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    22   (+2)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26372         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Stats 28 June 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (-)       Forum Posts :   1,342 (+5)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26218  (+20)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    20   (+2)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26362         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Of all the topics that have arisen over the past couple of weeks, the one I want to talk about today is censorship. Regular visitors to this column know me well enough. I am motivated by the desire to make the best contribution that I can to these pages. If I have two over-riding character flaws in the real world, these are an over-developed sense of fair play and an intolerance of dishonesty and incompetence. These inevitably spill over into my contributions to the site. There were times, in the early days of this site, when I was flabbergasted by the site's technical and communications failings, and I was commonly to be found criticising the site.

Those were the bad old days. Personnel changed, bugs were fixed, new functionality was added, and communications improved.

I'm not a huge fan of forums in general. You have to sort through a lot of chaff to get to the grain. They are full of ill-considered and intemperate posts. People ask pointless questions without bothering to read the information that is already there. The worst thing about being editor of all these show guides is having to police the guide forums: I have never had any interest in this kind of work. I do keep an eye on the main forums to find out about the latest happenings, and chip in with my tuppenceworth: procedural guidance, technical background, and the occasionally pithy comment.

I discovered, some months ago, when clicking on various tabs, that I had once been moderated for trolling. Someone had asked, in the forums, why it is always a a small minority that make it hard for the vast majority. I had responded

You mean the TV.com staff? Sorry! :D

Well, I thought it was funny! Some months later, I accumulated a cluster of moderations for "off-topic posting." In a thread entitled Some complaints with recent changes to the site...., someone had referred to the site as TVTome, someone had replied that this was TV.com, not TVTome, and I had posted

Unfortunately.

Apparently, contrasting corporate TV.com with user-friendly TVTome was no longer allowed, so I replaced the above comment with

Hurrah! TV.com is great!

That was deleted too, without explanation. In the Level 50+ Users thread (remember that?), at a time when the site was falling apart, I posted

You could apply for a job at TV.com. They seem a bit short-staffed at the moment!

This was deleted.

Someone suggested that the site being particularly buggy was sometimes a sign that they were about to launch a new feature. I suggested that it was often buggy when no new feature was being planned. This was deleted for being off-topic… in the Technical Support forum!

I am not making these up! I challenged most of these, and was told in each case that someone had complained, hence the moderation. I ask you! I would give you details of other moderations, but these appear to have been disappeared from my moderation history.

Now, in fairness, I haven't been moderated in ages. Partly because I now fight the urge to post. If I see an opening for a helpful response or, even more, a witty one, I think about it long and hard before submitting. When, as last week, I am attacked in the forums, I just bend over and take it. But one moderation the other week takes the complete biscuit.

There was a slight issue with levelling. missribs had pinned and updated an earlier post in which she said that the levels run correctly every day; if they don't run every day, they don't run for anyone, and everyone gets sorted at the next run. The levels didn't run on 28 June. Some people got an increase on 29 June, but this didn't reflect the amount due. I posted

According to the pinned thread, levelling is working fine. Either everyone gets a level increase, or levelling fails and noone does, but then we all get corrected at the next opportunity. That means that either

those who have claimed to have received a level increase have not, or
those who have claimed not to have received an increase did.

The alternative, that missribs is mistaken, is too horrible to contemplate, and I shall report anyone who dares suggest that it might be so!

Now, I knew it wasn't true. My lower level IDs got increases when this one didn't. I was moderated for "Moderator Discretion" – no explanation given. I challenged this and was told that I was moderated for use of threatening language. Let me restate: I was moderated for use of threatening language. Now, threatening language is not constitutionally defined, although in considering proposed State laws that have tried to proscribe the use of threatening language, the Supreme Court has referred to the "everyday meaning" of the phrase when considering the potential conflict with your constitutional rights (apparently. I'm British). I have no problem with the everyday meaning, which is similar to the British common-law definition of threatening language.

According to the moderator in question, saying that if someone does something, I will do something else, is a threat. (If someone doesn't prepare a pot of coffee soon, I will do it myself?) According to the moderator (someone who, until that point, I had deeply respected and with whom I have enjoyed civil, even friendly, exchanges) words that contain a threat-promise as defined by this moderator are, by definition, threatening language. Oh, and yes, he claims that someone did indeed complain about my post.

I did absolutely nothing wrong, and resent the right of the moderators to construct reasons for censorship, without offering an effective right of reply or recourse to arbitration. Moderation is important, but the old "great power, great responsibility" thing must apply here. The privileges of a moderator should not be abused.

Stats 27 June 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 62% (+1)      Forum Posts :   1,337 (+8)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26198   (+8)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    18   (+4)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26328         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

Much consternation about the newly-unsearchable people IDs. It's not quite a crisis as, if an actor does not appear at Search For Actor Name, you can add it to the hidden ID at Manually Add a Guest Star, as long as you format the name correctly, and as long as the system recognises the hidden ID as the default for that name. It is worth checking after posting that the submission has gone to the correct ID, but so far all of those I have treated this way have worked.

A cautionary note, however: sometimes the true ID may be hidden, while one of the duplicates is visible! A Search For Actor Name using "Reg Pritchard" yields Reg Pritchard and Reginald Pritchard, both of which are duplicates. You have to ignore those hits and enter "Reg Pritchard" at Manually Add a Guest Star to correctly assign the credit to Reg Pritchard, the true ID!

Stats 26 June 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 61% (+2)      Forum Posts :   1,329 (+12)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26190 (+100)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :    14  (+10)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26328         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

It's Monday night, and all is quiet on the received submissions front. I wanted to believe that we might have turned a corner, but will have to wait and see: the official synopses for The Bill haven't been published yet this week!

I stopped submitting at 100 last night: how I miss the suspense-filled days when I didn't know exactly how the levels were calculated! This was at least in part so that I might get some sleep before starting work this morning! I fancy a quieter night tonight after burning out on cast additions and corrections at the weekend.

Stats 25 June 2006

Rank       : Prison Warden  Level      : 54  Percentage : 59% (+2)      Forum Posts :   1,317 (+17)
  
  Submissions                Reviews  Accepted   : 26090 (+138)  Shows       :     1  Pending    :     4   (-4)  Episodes    :     2  Denied     :   124         People      :     0  Total      : 26218         Total       :     3

  Edited Guides              Trusted User  157 Shows                  2 Shows

I can't qute put my finger on the reasons why, but the latest season of Doctor Who is neither as good as the last season, nor as satisfying as Classic Who. The lead actor is every bit as talented as Eccleston, and is able (has been allowed) to portray a wider range of emotional responses, his character is much more in line with the Doctor's traditional English middle-class roots, and the production values are better than ever. Moreover, the season has included two of the finest Who stories ever, a comedy romp, trips to other worlds and a two-parter very much in the classic mould, and yet…

Pushed to an explanation, there are some major changes from last season to this.

• There are too many two-parters for a 13-episode run, especially when one lot of villains feature in two of these. And the fundamental flaw at the heart of the new "Cybermen" upset this purist beyond measure.
• A conscious policy shift away from last season's insistence on having the Time Lord in every scene has radically altered the feel of each episode. Last season, Eccleston dominated every scene while Rose looked on in wonder. We could go for long periods without seeing the Doctor in Classic Who, but the 45-minutes-including-recap-and-trailer format doesn't lend itself to this approach. When we do see the Doctor, it is commonly through the eyes of Rose or others, preventing us from getting to know this incarnation.
• There is no end to the Torchwood references. We all know that RTD has been creating a Who spin-off for post-watershed broadcast, in which he can indulge his broader sexual fantasies, but Captain Jack won't be back on our screens until 2007, so why reduce Doctor Who to the status of a promotional device?
• When did the screwdriver get its makeover? They got rid of the screwdriver in the 1980s because it presented too convenient a method of escape from locked rooms. Last season, Jack ridiculed the Doctor's equipment. (Ooo-err, missus!). The Doctor appears to have taken this criticism to heart, and redesigned the screwdriver as an all-purpose weapon. I'd like to see the odd episode in which the Doctor used his intellect or technical know-how to save the day, rather than have him use the screwdriver to blow things up, or else rely on rescue by the indefatigable and ever-resourceful Rose. Hey, give her her own show!
• An overemphasis on the relationship between Number Ten and Rose. Squirmy in its own right – he's an extraterrestial, FCOL, and we are as pets to him. The Doctor doesn't need to be saying "Ooh, you've threatened Rose, now I am going to have to really sort you out!" He is the Doctor, and meddling and interfering is what he does!
• Last, and by no means least, an experienced writer such as RTD should have been able to steer clear of such laboured foreshadowing of this year's "shock" ending.