Too much information

[redsturgeon]

Just watching the BBC news on BBC2 on the Khashoggi story.

As usual we had the main picture with the presenter interviewing another presenter in the studio.

Underneath that we had a grey title bar telling us some key fact on the story, this kept changing.

Underneath that we had the main BBC News footer with the clock and to the right of that a scrolling footer showing the other main stories of the moment.

You'd think that was enough but then to the top right quarter of the screen we had a picture in picture with library footage of Khashoggi in the top half of the PiP with bullet points of the story in the bottom half powerpoint style.

Is this too much?

Oh and I was watching all this in a window of my laptop while browsing the internet!

John

[Gengulphus]

Is this too much?

It certainly would be for me!

I find being presented with lots of extraneous information is the enemy of thinking about what the information one is primarily interested in actually means. I may well want some of that extra information in due course, possibly even all of it, but I want to be in control of when it appears in my field of view.

That applies especially if the extraneous information is moving or changing frequently - things that one's eyes instinctively focus on, doubtless because an unexpected movement is a potential threat. As a result, I find adverts on web sites particularly annoying if they're moving or changing, broker's portfolio displays annoying if they are 'streaming', etc, and will generally turn such features off if I can.

One other aspect of this is that I generally find televisions in pubs aggravating if they're turned on and their display is anywhere in my field of view. There's an exception to that if I've specifically gone into the pub to watch something, but that's rare; otherwise, I find my gaze constantly drawn towards the television and away from whoever I'm meeting no matter how uninterested I am in the programme... :-(

Gengulphus

[UncleEbenezer]

If you spot the telly before you sit down, find yourself a seat from which you can't see it.

Or, best of all, find a telly-free alternative pub.

[bungeejumper]

Ah yes, RS, it's bad enough on your TV screen but what about the dashboard of your car? How many extra digital inputs are battling each other for your attention while you're trying to navigate Hyde Park Corner in the rush hour? (Or substitute any stressfully lunatic driving situation of your choice, such as the M25 past Heathrow, or any part of South Wales.) I can cope with one distraction at a time (the satnav), but I don't want to hear even a peep out of the phone, never mind anything else.

My daughter tells me that her new car has a television in the centre console. I am old enough to remember when Saudi Arabia banned those things because of the unacceptable death rate that resulted from their use. It was in the 1980s!

BJ

[Gengulphus]

If you spot the telly before you sit down, find yourself a seat from which you can't see it.

Or, best of all, find a telly-free alternative pub.

Yes - both things I already do, and fortunately Cambridge isn't exactly short of pubs! But it's also not particularly short of normally-telly-free pubs that dig out a telly when e.g. the World Cup is on... :-(

Gengulphus

[WorldCupWilly]

Apologies, I thought this thread was going to be about the Mail on Sunday's promise last week to publish "the most intimate photo's of Eugenie and Jack's wedding". Eeeuch that's waaay too much information.

[dionaeamuscipula]

Apologies, I thought this thread was going to be about the Mail on Sunday's promise last week to publish "the most intimate photo's of Eugenie and Jack's wedding". Eeeuch that's waaay too much information.

We were visiting some friends of ours some time ago, to meet their new baby, their first. Husband excitedly says that he has some photographs courtesy of his new camera. He returns with an enormous stack, and they take us, one step at a time, through the whole birth process, from every conceivable (and I use that word advisedly) angle, in vivid detail. Suffice it to say I could never quite look his wife in the eye again.

DM

[bungeejumper]

and they take us, one step at a time, through the whole birth process, from every conceivable (and I use that word advisedly) angle, in vivid detail. Suffice it to say I could never quite look his wife in the eye again.

[/quote]
Excellent story. And sorry to be staying off the OP's topic, but you've reminded me of the "civics classes" that we were supposed to be giving our sixth formers, back in the 1970s when I was still teaching. One day we were assembled in the lecture theatre to watch a film which was billed as a discussion of the abortion issue. Together with about thirty lads aged 16 to 18.

As soon as the lights went out, we knew we'd been sold a pup because the film had been made by a prominent pro-life group, so we weren't going to get a balanced discussion. But, within the first minute, the film had switched to a maternity ward where a mother was giving full-frontal birth, all across the eight foot wide projection screen. Heaving and screaming, blood and gore all over the floor, and we were all sweating a bit about how the kids would weather it?

Suddenly there was a huge crash from the back of the room, and the projector was knocked off its table and smashed to smithereens. We were all plunged into darkness. And as the lights went up, it emerged that the head of games had fainted and fallen into the gangway. A great big bruiser of a bloke. He was never really allowed to forget it. The kids, OTOH, didn't seem to be the least bit concerned by any of what they'd seen.

BJ

[Lootman]

Is this too much?

Watch any business/finance channel like Bloomberg and you will be similarly assaulted with moving ticker tapes, windows showing the price of this and that, subtitles and so on. Evidently viewers want that or presumably they would not be there.

If I switch on Bloomberg I want to know the main numbers immediately and appreciate that they are always there, and in the same place so I know where to look.

And have you watched any sport in TV recently? There are little windows showing match stats, time elapsed, and of course a few ads (*). And I want to be able to see the current score immediately and not wait for a commentator to announce it.

Perhaps it is natural to want to go back to a simpler time, but it seems these days everyone is multi-tasking.

(*) Watching Premier League football on American TV is entertaining, not least for the way they manage to slip ads into what is otherwise a 45 minute slot with no ads (almost unknown in the US). So there is the Chevrolet injury time, the Pizza Hut half time show, the Progressive Insurance man-of-the-match, the Pepsi match stats, the E*Trade pre-match show, and so on. (I might have some of the names wrong but you get the idea).

[Slarti]

Is this too much?

It certainly would be for me!

I find being presented with lots of extraneous information is the enemy of thinking about what the information one is primarily interested in actually means. I may well want some of that extra information in due course, possibly even all of it, but I want to be in control of when it appears in my field of view.

That applies especially if the extraneous information is moving or changing frequently - things that one's eyes instinctively focus on, doubtless because an unexpected movement is a potential threat. As a result, I find adverts on web sites particularly annoying if they're moving or changing, broker's portfolio displays annoying if they are 'streaming', etc, and will generally turn such features off if I can.

One other aspect of this is that I generally find televisions in pubs aggravating if they're turned on and their display is anywhere in my field of view. There's an exception to that if I've specifically gone into the pub to watch something, but that's rare; otherwise, I find my gaze constantly drawn towards the television and away from whoever I'm meeting no matter how uninterested I am in the programme... :-(

Gengulphus

Ditto.

I won't watch the "rolling news" channels because of the way they display and if I can I avoid pubs with TVs on, especially those with 2 or 3, so you can't escape.

Slarti

[Slarti]

My daughter tells me that her new car has a television in the centre console. I am old enough to remember when Saudi Arabia banned those things because of the unacceptable death rate that resulted from their use. It was in the 1980s!

Friend of mine had one in his Rover 75, but it wouldn't work when the engine (ignition?) was on.

Slarti

[panamagold]

Watch any business/finance channel like Bloomberg and you will be similarly assaulted with moving ticker tapes, windows showing the price of this and that, subtitles and so on. Evidently viewers want that or presumably they would not be there.

Bloomberg? Ha, positively pedestrian. Checkout CNBC! It's 'Sponge Bob Square Pants' on steroids.