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Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

theguardian.com

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Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#81

Post by noir_lord »

Asbostos wrote: post #65
noir_lord wrote: post #33

Next up, Privatisation of the Met Office then. Shame as while the BBC websites presentation of the data is pretty poor the MET provide open data feeds (hard to see that continuing if they are privatised) of 3 hourly forecasts out to 5 days for 5000 locations that are considerably more accurate and detailed. http://i.imgur.com/vuCklmn.png is their example usage of the data.

That sounds like a slippery slope argument. You might as well worry about the privatization of the NHS next. With this type of approach, arguments degenerate into political partisan rhetoric and achieve nothing.

Shrugs, in theory you could apply slippery slope argument to just about any conjecture on what will happen next.

However this Government has a track record of (badly) privatizing things and a fairly clear ideological bent.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#82

Post by DanBC »

Asbostos wrote: post #65
noir_lord wrote: post #33

Next up, Privatisation of the Met Office then. Shame as while the BBC websites presentation of the data is pretty poor the MET provide open data feeds (hard to see that continuing if they are privatised) of 3 hourly forecasts out to 5 days for 5000 locations that are considerably more accurate and detailed. http://i.imgur.com/vuCklmn.png is their example usage of the data.

That sounds like a slippery slope argument. You might as well worry about the privatization of the NHS next. With this type of approach, arguments degenerate into political partisan rhetoric and achieve nothing.

> You might as well worry about the privatization of the NHS next.

There's quite a lot of private provision already in the NHS.

Forensic Mental Health Units tend to be privately run hospitals, especially the medium and high secure units. There's a few privately run in-patient units treating eating disorder (especially for children). Drug and alcohol rehab is often provided by 3rd sector groups.

It's all free at the point of delivery, and paid for by the NHS, but there's plenty of private provision within the NHS already and it's only going to grow.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#83

Post by lotsofcows »

buserror wrote: post #67

As a photographer, I try to follow up weather when I'm out and about. As many people have reported, the met office is next to useless, even on the short term! One I've found works /wonder/ is the Norwegian weather service at http://www.yr.no/ . I'm not kidding, these guys not only give pretty accurate forecast, but they over england and they provide it in neat meteograms that are quite precise and easily read. Now, h…

My anecdata is the exact opposite. I find the met office very accurate.

One thing I have noticed is that the idiot glyphs they use don't tie into my expectations. I see a picture of the sun behind a cloud with a rain drop on it and I think "light showers". It actually means "40% chance of rain". A cloud with a rain drop and no sun still only means that there's a 50/50 chance of rain.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#84

Post by keithpeter »

keithpeter wrote: post #80
DanBC wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The met has bid for the contract, and lost the bid. The BBC and the met have both independantly confirmed tha. The met office isn't going to be providing weather data to the BBC. Some of the staff (the presenters tended to be real meteorologists workig for the met office) might transfer over; severe weather stuff is still going to come from the met office; the Shipping Forecast is not a met office thing so should be…

I stand corrected, thanks.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/bbc/11819164/Met-Office-lost...

Can this really be about an app and about including probability statements? Good heavens.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#85

Post by rlpb »

DanBC wrote: post #31
keithpeter wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup - you are somewhere on a fairly narrow island with warm water flowing South to North and a cold wind at high altitude blowing West to East (or is it East to West? I always get that mixed up). It is going to be slightly changeable. I'm assuming the Met will still bid for the contract, and we shall see who gets it. Pity them the first time they get it badly wrong!

The met has bid for the contract, and lost the bid. The BBC and the met have both independantly confirmed tha. The met office isn't going to be providing weather data to the BBC. Some of the staff (the presenters tended to be real meteorologists workig for the met office) might transfer over; severe weather stuff is still going to come from the met office; the Shipping Forecast is not a met office thing so should be…

> The met has bid for the contract, and lost the bid. The BBC and the met have both independantly confirmed tha.

Where does it say this, please? All the articles I have found say that the contract will be put out to tender, but none actually say that the Met Office will be prevented from bidding.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#86

Post by DanBC »

rlpb wrote: post #85
DanBC wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The met has bid for the contract, and lost the bid. The BBC and the met have both independantly confirmed tha. The met office isn't going to be providing weather data to the BBC. Some of the staff (the presenters tended to be real meteorologists workig for the met office) might transfer over; severe weather stuff is still going to come from the met office; the Shipping Forecast is not a met office thing so should be…

> The met has bid for the contract, and lost the bid. The BBC and the met have both independantly confirmed tha. Where does it say this, please? All the articles I have found say that the contract will be put out to tender, but none actually say that the Met Office will be prevented from bidding.

http://blog.metoffice.gov.uk/2015/08/23/met-office-in-the-ne...

> You may have seen reports in the media today that the Met Office won’t be the BBCs main weather provider when the current contract ends.

> Obviously everyone at the Met Office is disappointed that we won’t be supplying weather presenters and graphics to the BBC in the future.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34031785

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/aug/23/met-office-lo...

Someone from the Met Office was on a bunch of Radio Four news programmes (probably Today, World at One, PM) saying that they've lost the contract.

Re: Met Office loses BBC weather forecasting contract after 93 years

#87

Post by rlpb »

DanBC wrote: post #86
rlpb wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The met has bid for the contract, and lost the bid. The BBC and the met have both independantly confirmed tha. Where does it say this, please? All the articles I have found say that the contract will be put out to tender, but none actually say that the Met Office will be prevented from bidding.

http://blog.metoffice.gov.uk/2015/08/23/met-office-in-the-ne... > You may have seen reports in the media today that the Met Office won’t be the BBCs main weather provider when the current contract ends. > Obviously everyone at the Met Office is disappointed that we won’t be supplying weather presenters and graphics to the BBC in the future. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34031785 http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015…

That's fine, but where has anyone said that the Met Office can't bid in the upcoming tender? The Met Office blog post that you linked (thanks, I hadn't seen that) implies that they will no longer be providing services, but is this because they will decline to bid or because they are not permitted to bid?
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