No good reason

Fearless radio critic Charlotte Runcie (whose dad, James, is part-funded by the licence fee) lays into BBC Sounds (prop. James Purnell) in today's Telegraph....

"The search function on BBC Sounds is labyrinthine. The app isn’t compatible with older devices. It’s slow to load and its orange colour scheme could stun a horse, but is presumably designed to entice teenage listeners.

In fact, it all seems to be aimed at some mythical youth demographic. I’m 30 years old but it makes me feel as if I’m from the Bronze Age. The app is always recommending me giggly podcasts about sex or reality TV star Gemma Collins. It’s all set up to promote its own podcasts and music mixes, not speech radio. When I actually, through a miracle, manage to find an episode of a programme I want to hear, at the end it tends to autoplay something completely unrelated. It’s a bit of a surprise to hear BBC Hereford and Worcester sports news when I live in neither Hereford nor Worcester.

I don’t want any of these things.  I just want to listen to the radio. This is apparently too complicated a desire. The iPlayer Radio app is fine as it is, but soon it will die, and for no good reason. Purnell has promised to improve Sounds and keep listening to listeners’ feedback. How kind.  I suppose we must all continue to provide it."