No such thing as no publicity.

The Big Idea seemed such a, well good , idea.

But it has been, and still does represent a roller-coaster ride.

I'm still cropping up in idents, though the latest had my picture linked to section on non-commercial ideas. Actually, the only real question I had from the panel was from Ruth Badger about revenue, and my answer was good enough for her to nod and put me through. Gotta love those editors.

Having watched the latest jaw-dropping show (As in, these are the best they could drum up??? I know there were better to choose.. beyond us), we got inspired by the spirit of 'out's better than nought' and decided to go for the £10k viewer prize. In some ways this is more attractive as it has obvious PR value but also is cash and run. I had not appreciated people got cuts of the winners when we set off originally. No way Jose.

So we duly submitted our entry yesterday. Or tried to. As you will gather by my having to leave this message on their forum page today:

"Have to add another voice to the frustrated online uploaders.

The deadline is/was midnight on the 12th (yesterday).

We tried all evening. The pitch was 1' 20". Admitedly it was over double the requested (but not mandated) size, but the subtleties of video compression are a bit beyond us.

Broadband to broadband takes only a few minutes (we swapped between PCs no problem).

Why oh why is it always a form with a 'browse' and 'submit' system. These things always clash. emails are so much more reliable and you know what has happened at the end.

We tried Mac & PC, Firefox & Safari and IE. On IE we at least got a 'failed' advice (not that we wanted one!), but the others just whirred away and we have no clue whether they worked.

With luck we'll get some joy from the contact number this morning (if the Voda customer service staff have a clue what this site is).
Otherwise it is to be hoped that there will be a solution offered to those of us who could not enter by deadline. At least an advice here.

Watch this space!"

I don't know whether to be encouraged or not that the total Forum had run up not much more than 100 entries in the whole show, but several were about the same problem. Thing is, it doesn't seem as if the organisers read their own Forum, as there have been no replies. I figure they read their texts, though.

Meanwhile a call to the help number has us now richocheting (how apt is that.. it's the production company now!) from one bored, indifferent or plain unaware Vodafone minion to another. 2 hrs and counting since 'we'll get right back to you'.

Not the best handled effort I have been with. And we have been with some shambolic ones! I'm not sure it is even legal, as a lot of folk have committed a lot of money (entering and voting), and the system seems very secretive as well as plain bad.

I guess the best thing to do is leave with this thought from a financial journalist:
Bigmouth Badger plugs in to TV flop

Can't really fault his analysis, but as it's their ball it's their game. But one has to wonder what machinations have been at work to structure the entries and/or winners, and those who billed it 'the Big Idea' have a lot of cojones.

Or maybe they have estimated the British Public's threshold for demanding broadcast entertainment precisely. Trouble is, where goes the common man, there follows business and government.