Over the last few years, I’ve been using IMDB to keep a record of the movies I’ve watched by giving them a rating out of ten using the simple star rating widget at the top of each movie page.

By rating each movie, I have managed to create quite an extensive history of the movies I’ve seen which is publicly available on my personal vote history page.

The problem I’ve had though is accessing that data elsewhere for use on other websites, such as this blog, Twitter or Facebook profile.

Until now, I’ve been using a service called Dapper which can scrape any accessible webpage for data and output that data as a range of different source such as RSS, Atom, JSON or XML.

The RSS output has actually worked quite well but the Dapper service was quite tempramental at keeping up-to-date, sometimes taking a few weeks to update. It wasn’t ideal for a reliable source.

Well, I discovered this morning that IMDB actually offer a dedicated RSS feed directly from their website of this exact data.

If you have been publishing your vote history to a public page, you can see your feed by appending your unique reference to the end of the URL http://feed://rss.imdb.com/mymovies/list?l=[your id].

For example, my vote history would be accessible at http://rss.imdb.com/mymovies/list?l=5051158.

Unfortunately, the date saved doesn’t seem to be output as the timestamp for each RSS item but I’m sure a few pokes at the IMDB development team could sort that out.

No doubt there are other personalised RSS feeds available from IMDB such as your movie reviews and favourites. If I find any, I’ll add them to this post.

Maybe now, I can tap into the data and start building some useful widgets out of it.

Update: it seems there is already a Facebook app which taps in to your vote history called My Movies.

Photograph by Ian Chase

Television has changed drastically over the last twenty years.

When I was growing up in the 1980s, there were just four channels to choose from; BBC1, BBC2, ITV and (as of November 1982) Channel 4. The majority of children’s television was to be found on BBC1 and ITV - and that was at set times too, usually after school between 3.30pm and 5.30pm. That’s just two hours a night.

In the 1990s, the UK was introduced to several new options for television.

Sky dishes allowed easy, commercial access to satellite television.

There was also the introduction of fibre optic cables in certain regions which offered a similar service. Northampton - where I lived in the 90s - was going through a regeneration stage at the time who were involved in the early stages of cable television.

With this influx of new television channels came a huge collection of children’s channels inspired by the USA, such as Nickleodeon and The Childrens Channel (later to be rebranded Trouble). These channels offered kids a huge variety of new programmes, mostly imported from the USA, but none-the-less more programmes than any child could actually watch.

Over the last ten years, digital TV has become standard practise across the UK. At first, it was just an upgrade option from Sky and regional cable companies like Telewest but it wasn’t long before an additional digital service was broadcast using traditional radio waves across the country, available to anyone with a Freeview compatible television or a set-top Freeview box.

Digital television has revolutionised the way people watch television. Rather than being restricted to typical broadcast schedules, viewers are now able to create their own schedule using on demand and catch up services such as BBC iPlayer and 4OD. Viewers can pick and choose the programmes they want to watch when they want to watch it.

While this can be seen as a huge development and improvement for creating the perfect viewing experience, it has also made our society a lot more fussy and demanding. Viewing habits are moving away from traditional television channels, patiently waiting for our favourite programmes, and changing towards this bespoke pattern that can only be defined as fussy.

Recently, I’ve noticed my two year old son adopting this fussy nature (although it may also be seen as the infamous “terrible twos” stage).

This child, who can barely string a sentence of more than two words together, knows that there are hundreds of programmes that he enjoys readily available on demand. Not only can we switch between 30 odd channels dedicated to children - some simply created from those traditional formats in the 80s and 90s such as CBBC, Cbeebies and CITV - but there are also an endless supply of series from established brands like Bob the Builder, Postman Pat and Thomas the Tank Engine on demand.

While there are obvious advantages to this on-demand lifestyle (how else do you entertain an awake child at 5am on a Sunday morning?), does the impulsive, impatient nature digital TV is creating open all sorts of issues for the future of our children?

Our generation is used to waiting - dial up internet with “break neck” speeds of 4kb/sec downloads, rewinding video cassettes to play our favourite programmes, waiting for the UK to catch up with the latest Hollywood blockbuster - we have learned to adapt to a slower lifestyle.

The next generation are used to an “on demand” lifestyle - buying and listening to the latest music in meer seconds, playing the latest computer game on their Wii without leaving the room, watching the latest series of Lost before it’s even aired on television - it can’t be healthy to have such high demands.

What are your thoughts on this? The topic is mainly aimed at the parents out there but you may have noticed the change in personality with your siblings or cousins. It will be interesting to get feedback from other parents on the issue and whether you think it will have an impact on society in the future.

In an attempt to shake up the way TV programmes are viewed online in the UK, Apple have finally launched the TV Programmes Store in the UK. With the BBC’s iPlayer and Channel 4’s 4OD getting some stick by limiting customers to the Windows Media platform, it seems like a good move to open up IPTV to the growing Mac userbase. However, if you’re looking forward to seeing all your favourite British material on your iPod or Apple TV, you’d be quite disappointed.

At the moment, all you will get your hands on are US shows from the likes of ABC, Disney, Nickelodeon, MTV and Paramount such as Lost, Ugly Betty and Desperate Housewives - basically all the crap that Channel 4 couldn’t put on 4OD due to copyright issues.

Obviously, this is a step in the right direction for Apple considering the iPhone will be launched over here later this year and how dominant the market share of video-capable iPods are in the UK against the competition but I personally feel they’ve fell flat on their face with this launch. I’m sure there will be plenty of new content coming soon to the store once deals are signed with local production companies and it’s great Mac owners can finally get their hands on some legal video material (although all the material is still using DRM, something that also needs attention to avoid yet more backlash).

However, at £1.89 per show compared to 4OD’s 99p, its not that cheap neither.

It’s still early days and there are bound to be developments in the near future so I won’t completely discard this move. Well done Apple for finally opening the doors to downloadable video for Mac users.

I’ve just been watching the final episode of Fortune: Million Pound Giveaway on ITV. To be honest, its the first time I’ve watched the series - coincidentally it will also be the last. I’m not a huge fan of ITV productions - they stink of Sun reader mentality - but the concept of British millionaires (allegedly) giving away their own money to the general public grabs my attention.

At the end of the show, everyone’s favourite Richard Madeley signed the programme off with the panelist’s names, one in particular I didn’t recognise. When he mentioned her name, I was straight on Google to find out how she made her money. It was Jacqueline Gold - the lady who established the huge sex-shop franchise, Ann Summers.

Intrigued by the people behind Jacqueline’s website, I noticed in the footer a link off to Fawthrop McLanders IT Consultancy & Development. Clicking the link, however, presented me with this not so friendly screen…

It shocked me to think that this web design consultancy couldn’t even ensure that their own website was up and running when one of their highest profile clients (if not the highest profile) was on prime time television, playing the nice friendly business lady on the last programme of the series. Fair enough - her website was running. But think of all that potential business FM could have gained if they had made sure their website was running (which it should have been anyway).

It just goes to show that you can’t buy good publicity - you can just throw it away like those millionaires.