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Advice on accessing BBC News

bbc.com

101–110 of 117 posts

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#101
post #65
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously? Nobody beyojd a few OAPs actually thinks the BBC is a font of perfect vision. It's simply a but less crassly propaganda ridden then most other sources, and more centrist (if you believe in the 1d political tribalism meme). The anti BBC narrative is largely political posturing to discredit one if the few remaining sources that aren't bought by private individuals to further their personal objectives. It's a…

The BBC actually used to be independent and held the government to account. That all changed with David Kelly. It isnt bought by private individuals but if the rest of the media that is is bleating the same tune it will follow. The end result is the same. Every time they step out of line the government threatens to cancel the TV license. Theyre also lacking in sheer journalistic manpower these days. It almost doesnt…

The license has been set to end in 2027 already.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#102

> If you find it difficult to get the two applications above from AppStore or Google Play Store, please send a blank email to get@psiphon3.com or gettor@torproject.org, respectively. You will then be sent an email with a direct and safe download link. How safe is this? I don’t know much about email security. Can the ISP intercept and edit the email message?

Non-encrypted email in transit is a concern, but AFAIK most users should already be protected nowadays. (Google estimates [1] put it at around 9/10, tho probably not representative of Russia)

A bigger concern might be Russian-monitored email servers, especially given that around 70% of the market share is occupied by Russian providers [2], and email isn't considered personal data in Russia [3].

[1]: https://transparencyreport.google.com/safer-email?hl=en

[2]: https://help.returnpath.com/hc/en-us/articles/115001108411-C...

[3]: https://www.plesner.com/insights/articles/2016/01/data-local...

Update: as for transit, see adam-p's comment.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#103

I'm always a bit perplexed when people hold up the BBC as an example of a respectable, unbiased news source - a lot of their stuff is ham-fisted, and some of it is flat-out propaganda. I wouldn't say they are noticeably worse than other media staples - everything is biased - but they don't deserve to be on the pedestal they are put on.

I'm getting sick and tired of baseless comments like this being the top comment. I want to read about the real topic, additional information, different insights, ... a real discussion about the original article, link, project. Too many discussions are getting hijacked and turned into irrelevant clickbait and a waste of time.

Email hn@ycombinator.com, then, and let them know what you think. They're the ones with the power to change it.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#105
post #24

I'm always a bit perplexed when people hold up the BBC as an example of a respectable, unbiased news source - a lot of their stuff is ham-fisted, and some of it is flat-out propaganda. I wouldn't say they are noticeably worse than other media staples - everything is biased - but they don't deserve to be on the pedestal they are put on.

They go out of their way to try and represent both sides of a coin, to a fault. If it’s clearly raining, and they have a guest on to talk about the rain, they will also have a guest on who will try and argue “oh these precipitation levels don’t constitute rain” etc. A bit contrived but you get the idea.

Except for trans women in articles calling them rapists, which is interesting considering they had no problems interviewing a known cis porn actress who has raped multiple people on set.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#106
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The BBC actually used to be independent and held the government to account. That all changed with David Kelly. It isnt bought by private individuals but if the rest of the media that is is bleating the same tune it will follow. The end result is the same. Every time they step out of line the government threatens to cancel the TV license. Theyre also lacking in sheer journalistic manpower these days. It almost doesnt…

The license has been set to end in 2027 already.

The current agreement ends in 2027 and the current government has said they won't renew it. Whether they are still in power remains to be seen.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#107
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> BBC News is incredibly biased pro-government. If anything it's pro status-quo or pro establishment it has a bias towards liberal democratic values and the norms. As politics swings about, the BBC has a dampening effect which is valuable. So if you look at the extreme of Johnson's incompetance, you will see the BBC scrutinising it quite heavily - but similarly with Corbyn in the past. The fact that government cultur…

I gave my opinion on Dorries' approach further down on the thread. Interestingly, the heavy scrutiny only came after the govt's threat of "defunding" the BBC in 2021. It was never there for the 2019 election, for instance or the Brexit referendum. Also, the Tory party never accused the BBC of political bias, but rather "wokeness", so this is just an attempt to shift to the public debate to "culture wars", rather than…

I mean - you're wrong

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10373181/Tory-anger...

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/over-70-mps-w...

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1559812/BBC-bias-Brexit-To...

https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1527642/bbc-bias-cha...

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/watch-tory-mp-accuses-bb...

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/conserv...

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/8133800/tory-ministers-bbc-bia...

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/bbc-bias-open-letter-...

https://www.digitalspy.com/media/a339323/tory-mp-criticises-...

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#108
post #94
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's an encoded public key, identifying the service. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.onion#Format even "bbcnews" is part of that key, probably brute-forced until that prefix was found.

It must've been brute-forced. According to this one old brute forcer I found [1] but have not thoroughly vetted, it would've been one CPU-day of effort on 2012-era hardware [1] https://github.com/katmagic/Shallot

Adding onto this: I was able to use https://github.com/cathugger/mkp224o to generate my own v3 address with chosen 7-character prefix in just under 1 hour on my i7-8700k

I imagine an implementation that leverages a GPU could go much faster.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#109
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I gave my opinion on Dorries' approach further down on the thread. Interestingly, the heavy scrutiny only came after the govt's threat of "defunding" the BBC in 2021. It was never there for the 2019 election, for instance or the Brexit referendum. Also, the Tory party never accused the BBC of political bias, but rather "wokeness", so this is just an attempt to shift to the public debate to "culture wars", rather than…

I mean - you're wrong https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10373181/Tory-anger... https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/over-70-mps-w... https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1559812/BBC-bias-Brexit-To... https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1527642/bbc-bias-cha... https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/watch-tory-mp-accuses-bb... https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/conserv... https://www.th…

The incumbent government complains about "wokeness" and not political (party) bias.

Also, those are mostly examples of a hand-full of famously fringe hard-Brexit MPs, over almost 7 years now, that cry foul for anything. Even the 70 MPs open letter said:

"Some of the signatories of this letter shared many of the concerns about the economic impact of Brexit, but all are delighted to find forecasts of immediate economic harm were at best misplaced. So-called ‘despite Brexit’ reporting may be expected of a partisan press, but licence fee-payers have the right to expect better."

This is a vague as possible.

Re: Advice on accessing BBC News

#110

I'm always a bit perplexed when people hold up the BBC as an example of a respectable, unbiased news source - a lot of their stuff is ham-fisted, and some of it is flat-out propaganda. I wouldn't say they are noticeably worse than other media staples - everything is biased - but they don't deserve to be on the pedestal they are put on.

I'm getting sick and tired of baseless comments like this being the top comment. I want to read about the real topic, additional information, different insights, ... a real discussion about the original article, link, project. Too many discussions are getting hijacked and turned into irrelevant clickbait and a waste of time.

What was there to discuss about the original article? It was a series of very short instructions on how to access the BBC in English, Russian, and Ukrainian.

Maybe you can be the change you want to see in the world and start one yourself.

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