Adrian Hon on the BBC

September 24, 2013 9:59 AM

Mefite Adrian Hon was a guest on the BBC's Start the Week. The episode is a discussion of various topics around technology's impact on society (pic).
posted by philipy to MetaFilter-Related at 9:59 AM (7 comments total)

I met Adrian Hon once! I am basically a celebrity now I think. That's how it works.
posted by phunniemee at 12:11 PM on September 24, 2013 [1 favorite]

Adrian's (H)on the radio, unless you're outside the UK. Congratulations on your stardom!
posted by arcticseal at 12:35 PM on September 24, 2013

Thanks! I was a little nervous that morning. I've been on live radio and TV before, but this was the biggest audience yet; helpfully, they said "Oh yes, two million people listen to this show," before we started. But they were all lovely people and I was impressed by the amount of homework that the presenter, Stephanie Flanders, had done; often they only get a cursory briefing but it seemed like she'd read quite a bit of my book.

The main attraction for the show, of course, was Beeban Kidron's InRealLife documentary about the effect of the internet on young people. While Kidron claims otherwise, her film came across to me as a rather late instance of moral panic. I had a whole load of notes and statistics to refute the idea that the internet is rotting teenagers' minds (I knew that I'd be called upon to defend technology) but I didn't want to go in all guns blazing.

Not sure I expressed my point about porn that clearly, but I was happy to get across the notion that if the internet was all that bad, we ought to be seeing negative effects right now - rising suicide rates, higher teenage pregnancy rates, worse educational attainment, etc - and that's just not the case.

They'd also warned me that they might not have enough time to get around to properly interview me. Thankfully there was plenty of time and I got a few minutes to talk about A History of the Future in 100 Objects, which was lovely!
posted by adrianhon at 1:51 PM on September 24, 2013 [4 favorites]

Thank goodness you believe that because you are correct. The idea of Digital Natives seems really panic-y to me in general.

Also whoa your book looks awesome. Hi 5!
posted by Potomac Avenue at 2:00 PM on September 24, 2013

Awesome!
posted by cortex (staff) at 3:37 PM on September 24, 2013

unless you're outside the UK

I think BBC iPlayer audio content is available outside the UK. It's just video that is not because of the costs that would entail.

You should be able to get the podcast of the series via iTunes or whatever, as well as use the iPlayer I believe.
posted by philipy at 6:28 PM on September 24, 2013

Oh weird. I was listening to that on Monday morning, and I was all like... "where the hell do I know that name from?"

You did good, Adrian. Both you and Beeban were fascinating.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:47 AM on September 25, 2013