I鈥檓 the senior product manager for 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio.
We鈥檝e been making some changes recently to both 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio and 主播大秀 iPlayer and I thought it would be useful to summarise these below and talk about how we鈥檙e addressing some of the issues you鈥檝e raised.
On the 23rd of January we launched, improving on the range of features that were available before and matching the most used elements of 主播大秀 iPlayer. We carefully tested this new page with users of both 主播大秀 iPlayer and 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio before releasing it and found that it was easily understood and liked by both groups. You can find more information about the changes we made in
On Monday of this week, in line with our strategy announced some time ago, we closed a number of the radio pages in 主播大秀 iPlayer and redirected you to equivalent pages in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio such as our new homepage, network homepages (e.g. ) and category pages (e.g. ). A lot of these pages were being duplicated in 主播大秀 iPlayer.
A view of the Radio stations in the 主播大秀 iPlayer radio homepage
Since Monday鈥檚 change a number of you have got in touch to tell us about various issues. I鈥檒l go through some of the most common ones below and explain what we鈥檙e doing about them.
Favourites
I mentioned , that if you had added radio programmes to your favourites in 主播大秀 iPlayer you wouldn鈥檛 be able to access that list in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio. We appreciate that this is inconvenient and we looked really carefully at whether there was a way of transferring those favourites across, but unfortunately we couldn鈥檛 find a simple way to do it. 主播大秀 iPlayer favourites is built on technology which is now fairly old and fragile and the advice of our technical experts was that it would be too difficult to retrieve an accurate list and migrate this from cookie based favourites (主播大秀 iPlayer) to signed-in favourites (主播大秀 iPlayer Radio).
The list of radio programmes you favourited in 主播大秀 iPlayer is stored in an old programme information database. A request to retrieve your favourites from this database would not give a complete list, it would only return those programmes which are currently available to listen to. To get the full list we would then have to ask a different database directly, however that database doesn鈥檛 differentiate between TV and radio programmes.
Additionally, some users have different favourites on different browsers (on the same PC) and devices as they are stored separately for each browser and device, meaning we wouldn鈥檛 know which set of favourites to transfer across 鈥� the ones from your phone, tablet or PC.
If you need a reminder of your current 主播大秀 iPlayer favourites so you can add them in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio they will be visible for a period on .
You can add favourites in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio as long as you鈥檙e signed in to the 主播大秀, via 主播大秀 iD, and this has significant advantages. Firstly, it will help to make sure this problem with transferring favourites doesn鈥檛 happen again. Secondly, it means you can now access your favourites via 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio across any device on any browser when you sign in, making it easier for you to keep track of your favourite programmes. We will shortly be releasing a new version of the which includes favourites, meaning you can add programmes from a computer and quickly access them from your mobile device.
Some of you have had trouble with adding series to your favourites. It鈥檚 worth noting that if you add an individual episode as a favourite then the series that it鈥檚 part of will automatically be added to your 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio favourites . You can see your favourite seriesif you鈥檙e logged in with your 主播大秀 iD.
Another problem you鈥檝e raised is that the favourites page in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio should have clearer information and be easier to use. We take your feedback on board and are in the process of updating it to better display the series and episodes you鈥檝e added. For more on the changes to favourites please see
Pausing and resuming an episode
A number of you have noticed that the feature in 主播大秀 iPlayer which allows you to pause and resume an episode wasn鈥檛 working in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio. We鈥檙e glad to say that we have now fixed this so you can now pause and resume when you鈥檙e listening on episode pages in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio too.
Listening to Radio 1 and 1Xtra using Google鈥檚 Chrome browser
In the last week or so it wasn鈥檛 possible to listen to 主播大秀 Radio 1 and 主播大秀 Radio 1Xtra using the latest version of Chrome (version 32). We鈥檙e pleased to say that this issue has now been resolved.
What鈥檚 on
Two related issues you鈥檝e raised have been not being able to make a side by side comparison of radio station schedules and not being able to move backwards and forwards in time across schedules. In fact, it is still possible to see what鈥檚 currently on air across all the national and nations stations on one page if you click on 鈥楽tations鈥� . You can also see the full schedules for individual stations if you click on one of the station logos on that page and then click on the 鈥楽chedules鈥� link near the top of that station鈥檚 homepage. At the top of a radio station鈥檚 schedule page (for example: ) you can click on the dates to move forwards and backwards in time. We鈥檙e also planning to investigate the best way to show the schedules for lots of stations side by side on one page. I鈥檒l keep you posted on our progress. Some of you may have seen that we have done something like this in the 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio mobile app so we will look at how we can bring that to these pages.
We鈥檙e monitoring how people are accessing the schedules and will continue to refine these in response to your feedback and how people are using them.
Categories
Some of you have pointed out that the category pages we link to contain episodes or series that aren鈥檛 actually available to listen to. We鈥檙e planning to change these links within the next few weeks to link to programmes currently available and ordered by A-Z. In the meantime, there are a few different ways to look at which programmes are in a category. For example, if you want the comedy programmes on Radio 4 Extra that are available now for listening and you want to order them so that the newest episodes are at the top of the list, then will do that for you. Down the left hand side of that page are a number of links which you can click on to change the list.
Too many clicks
Finally, some of you have found it harder to get to the items you want. We鈥檙e monitoring how people use 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio and looking at how to reduce the number of clicks for the most common user journeys. We鈥檒l be working to incorporate those amongst the other improvements we鈥檒l be making to 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio over the coming months.
As I hope this blog post shows, we are listening to your feedback and trying to address the issues you鈥檝e raised where that鈥檚 possible. Some of these issues can be fixed relatively quickly whereas others may take more time and thought before we come up with the solutions that best suit the full range of ways that you want to use 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio. In the meantime comments on my previous blog post have been closed but I鈥檇 welcome further feedback here or via聽the
Daniel Bean is Senior Product Manager, 主播大秀 Radio iPlayer, 主播大秀 Future Media