1st time since 2007 the German equalize for the going to before being Integra part of PM or at about price in the 2nd half they win season I am resized me up to 4th in the Premier League table Christie are out says his lawyers a confident on the truth is always coming as he answered questions and I eventis Champions League news conference about ripe allegations against him Katherine my organs and that's right out a right turn at a Las Vegas hotel in 2009 he denies the accusations Jay Marino says he's happy at Manchester United or wants to say that his contract at the club that's after being linked with a return to reanimate Dritte contract runs until 2020 Pep Guardiola has again claim Manchester City do not have the feel of Champions League winners and supporters to propel the club forward 70 Harringay Boro happened on a dime to League One A.F.C. Wimbledon in the 1st round of the F.A. Cup because of the full draw on the B.B.C. Sport website and more than champion Angele Kerber was beaten in 3 sets by Kiki Burton's up in a finals in Singapore earlier Sloane Stephens beat the U.S. Open champion Miami a soccer decently sized lined Stone this week onside slide but looking at the grey areas around relationships in a modern workplace is it OK to go for a drink with your box how far can you go and be in someone a consulate a senior people that lack look at your social media is your own fault for not locking it down because the we feel here workplace dynamics fellow you need to help children choosing the right and he's in the wrong way is for all this week on B.B.C. Radio 5 lives are at. The told that. 1 AM and F.M. Are in the U.K. On digital online I'm Raj Shah We're up all 8 my heart's in the Highlands as I may have mentioned before and so too are increasingly a large number of. Other peoples including a panel of experts of the travel guide Lonely Planet This is undoubtedly good news if you're a tourism director and your reports are expected to reflect an ever upward trend in the number of visitors on the other half the whole point about the Highlands is a known a whole lot of people live imagine if everywhere were like the road up the side of luck Loman enough with a count of audience I was the Highlands and Islands I know and Lonely Planet's best and travel top 10 for 29 to wheel. It started as a promise every day of his presidency Barack Obama would read 10 of the letters received at the White House the some of them he even pen a passionate reply to and he did here's one Dear President elect Obama my name is Benjamin Jarrett I am a teen years old this was my 1st time voting and let me tell you it was not a fun experience I thought with my father of this election so much that I didn't get my doubt filled out to the morning of the election it was not until that night when the Democrats had a chance to get 60 chairs that I saw some of the things my father was talking about he showed me how the Democratic Party now has majority of all the branches of government he even went so far as to say that we may not have an election in 2012 after he had finished his rant he looked at me and said I pray that you are right and I am around. Voting for you in this election was truly the 1st time I had done something that went against my father at Tilt this has been a big step in becoming the person I meant to become I truly believe that you are the man who can make this place we all call home a great want to get if we are doomed to collapse then so be it I will look like a fool along with all my friends and my father will tell me it's OK and then I never could have predicted this I don't know what you have to do to fix this place we live in I don't even know if you can all I ask is that you give it everything you have if you do that I will know that I made the right choice sincerely Benjamin Derrick Jeanne Marie Laskas reading from a to Obama the book she's compiled of letters to the 44th president of the which he calls my single favorite story about my presidency that's not a bad thing to get on your blower as it so hard to Jeanne Marie Laskas Did you ever get access to such a true love well it was really quite a surprising experience all around and this was right at the end of Obama's 2nd term of office in 2016 and you know the place was packing up everyone was heading out the door and I learned that the president had been reading 10 letters a day for all 8 years of his presidency and I simply asked for a visit to the mail room and they let me in and I saw all that mail. And I said my goodness I want to read that man and I started reading it and it was a great experience why didn't they make this more of a sort of a political party I mean surely there are some political capital to be raised from the fact that your president is so responsive. You know you kind of would think they would have they could have like made a deal out of it and turned it into a you know can now especially in America here we are you know make a show out of it. But they didn't cause I think I mean it wasn't a secret but they didn't sort of blast it and I think because it genuinely was Obama's thing I mean it was a private thing he did at the end of each day read the mantel and it wasn't something that President Bush did was before him well you know every president had some relationship with constituent now but nothing like this not this kind of like promise that I would make a part of each and every one of my days that was a uniquely Obama thing. And then the question obviously occurs why did he do it and you did have a chance to ask about didn't you pretty clear that he had good reason for doing this you know I talked to him I talked to him a few times about it actually I had a chance to once while he was still in office so before he left and then about a year after and just asked that very question you know what why did you do this what was this about and he talked a lot about you know 1st maybe maybe it seems obvious but you know that once you're in the White House you're in a bubble and you lose contact with you know the voters and the constituents and the people that you were have pledged to serve you really you don't really know what's going on you only read polls and and read to filtered version that it that your senior staff is bringing to you and he wanted the he wanted the truth you know he wanted the unfiltered version and the mail was just a mechanism from from his perspective of and that was a way that he had some access and it was it was unfiltered and these were just hand selected by a team of staffers not you know not policy people you know trying to make a point so I mean how many letters had they were coming in to the mail room during the the Obama presidency it averaged 10000 a day or so was a big squad the they had actually read in the mall and then they read the mail they read everything it was a huge squad it was a. Team of about 50 staffers and then I don't know how many in turns that was a rotating crew then turns and then about 300 volunteers rotating in and out it was quite an operation reading the mail one of the things I think I got from the book was people would actually ask to go to the mailroom sometimes that would be something that they would really enjoy doing. Yeah well that's the thing it started to be in oh this was President Obama 110 hours a day but ended up happening is the senior staff and the folks over in the West Wing became to want to know what was going on in the mail to you know they didn't that letter because like a source and so it became. The divorces were actually elevated because the president won and then others people want to start started to want them as well and all of those are sky so they ended up virtually on a distribution list and lots of people were saying the speechwriters were seeing them yes and fact often. Obama would give them to the speechwriters and say here please work this letter into something this is exactly what it is we've been talking about here's someone with this same story but you know this is a the textured version filled with emotion and plot and everything so he would sometimes filter through but all so yes this these letters would go out on this distribution list of people would could pull from them and use them for all kinds of you know. Just just use them as research. So let's go by the one of these island throws again the this one is from somebody called 1000000000 groom in Oxford Missouri and I'll just give you a page number which is 23 what was so special about bubby and grooms leftover from Oxford Missouri Why did they all talk about how it really is a favorite and it's one of my favorites as well you know hearing you have this guy in Oxford Mississippi who was just a guy out of work out of work for 2 years as it happened when he finally sat down to write this letter and he writes in to tell of this experience and the way that he renders the experiences by looking at his hands that no longer have calluses on them you know he was a working man he was a lancer mayor and he was missing in his old hands and so he was reticent to can you could you read it for us I would love to yeah this is a beautiful letter it starts Mr Obama my president in 2007 I was proud of my hands they had veneer callouses where my palms touch my fingers cuts and scrapes were never severe splinters and blisters merely annoyed me with a vice like grip and a dextrous touch my hands were he tolerant and cold ignorant I was nimble When willing or when sharpening an axe I could expose the 8 with an open palm when my weights back. Or my arched for a RUB MY Now as for usually stained after a chore they were tough or not cracked so the manicured my hands to find my work passions my life. After 23 years as a lancer there and here it 2 years unemployed I miss my career and my old hands and unite and clutch new hands together and we may all recover what seems lost May God guide your hands to mold our future thank you for listening to the citizen I am Bobby Ingram. I put citizen Lim in capitals doesn't he or capital C. Anyway rather like every man it's as if he is he is the American talking to the American president and honestly I I spoke with him and every single letter he. Printed on this was a handwritten one had a meaning like that there was a reason he had the capital C. That was to me every one just that the whole letter he wrote he worked on for months just like a poem or like a prayer really. Did he expect to get a reply from the president he certainly did not nor did anyone in fact almost everyone I talk to have the same it's the same thought like well I know he's never going to read this but this is just something I need to do and so they would be then all of a sudden some of them would get a response from the Obama in the mail and they would be just shocked. And what happened to Bob you that did the letter make a difference to his life or was just a way of venting in getting over the fact that the you know the recession had taken its toll on him too I think for him you know it wasn't getting a letter back from Obama that changed his life I mean that was sort of like just miraculous and like sort of 6 to range dream but for him getting that letter written and getting it out and send it in it. For him it's sort of mark to the end of his grieving it was just like he was going to now stop he was going to do whatever he could with his life that wasn't going to be about just mourning his old life he was going to start a new one and for him the writing the letter was kind of like a passage of time anybody I think who's ever seen the the Oval Office knows that there's a gate keeper. Who like it keeper is terribly important who is a promise gate keeper well for him there were many gatekeepers but the gate keeper between him and the man was a woman named Fiona Reeves and she was the one who was in charge of picking which 10 letters he would read each day and that is you know going through the you know not that she had to read all $10000.00 but that she was in charge of all 10000 every day and whittling them down to 10 and they would get passed up to her and in some kind of a short list. They would get past her and a short list list of about 2 to 300 that the rest of the that had called through and decided were you know sort of like should be in the running and she would take those and get those down to 10 and then she would put them in a very specific order the order she thought the president should read them in you know should he have a funny one 1st or a funny one at the end and winding ones in the middle or what should he have. What about the topics because they're all organized by topics run things. Well she didn't organize them by bike topics unless America was writing by topic so for example just she's trying to render Americas nude at any given day so if most of the male one day is all health care reform she might do a whole 10 just about health care although that would be an unusual day. But more than that it would be like OK this is a repeated voice we keep getting people are complaining about. You know maybe you did don't ask don't tell policy in the in the military a lot of complaints about that we need to you know we need to get rid of that we need to get rid of that and so she would put a bunch of those in you know but it really was just like what she was hearing how can she get best deliver it to him and somebody even wrote about the plight of the B.S. There was that there was even a B. Section in the in the mailroom apparently there was a they had a they had a big wall and they would sort of Lake file them by category and there was one about there's all kinds of like categories you just couldn't even imagine needed to be one. A few of us background was one that took a close to the president before he was president right she was on the campaign Yeah and you know I heard that a lot a lot of the folks who dealt with the mail had started either on the campaign or shortly after it and came in as internes who wanted to be on the campaign followed him very closely and Fiona was one who had been to knocking on doors door to door. Lot of the letters in fact I think all I thought you know have of one thing in common which is that it's important it's important for the writer to write to the president and they all have a kind of confidence don't there's very little actual cynicism whichever view they take whether they approve of something he's done or disapprove you know this is such an interesting point that I hear only when I'm talking to people outside of the U.S. . Remark let's And it must be something that is unique to this country where people have the kind of the confidence or exactly confidence but. They they deserve they're a citizen and they deserve to be part of this conversation no matter how small they are in the scheme of things they feel they have a voice and that's what I mean that's what Obama was encouraging you know like participation in your government pretty in your democracy so in a way in a way that's that's like a lovely thing to notice that we do want to participate and in our democracy here no matter what we think of it quite a lot of them actually and you are my last chance or you're my last hope you know I've tried everything else and they believe that. Oh yeah that was a common. Such a common cry you know I have nowhere else to turn and so I'm writing to you Mr President and you know these are the moments of desperation people in real heartache a moments of you know a child a son or daughter just died or it's a side or you know. Just these just these terrible moments and people having no place then maybe they had plenty of places to turn in their actual lives but also felt they wanted to tell the president I found that remarkable. And a lot of them have really how rowing stories to tell about their experiences with American health care don't they and nearly all of them have to talk about how much has cost them so many especially in the earliest days. When Obama was 1st sort of getting in people who are sending they were sending in their health care bills they were just like look at this what were we supposed to do you know my my son would have died without this operation and now what do I do in here is living proof you know that the bill. There was a lot and this staff would say to me you know you could look at all the charts and graphs about how this was like politically not. Maybe maybe not a good idea for him to get. For him to be pursuing this health this American. The A C. a Health care act of all Care Act Thank you for a look at you know maybe maybe he shouldn't have been. Politically in the in pursuing this but when you get enough of these letters day after day after day after day you start getting the sense of OK how much of that do you need to hear the you say I'm just I got to do something there's a couple who you visit and you visited quite a lot of people who who who write these letters and at the back of the book there are notes about where they are no it's a bit like watching the the end of the movie and everything scrolls up you know and somebody is a teacher and somebodies you know doing something else anyway here's a couple and there's a so heartbreaking story indeed because they lost somebody in the Trade Center on the day of the attacks Thomas and Joanne medium. What was the point of of that letter I mean wind Why did Thomas and Joe on me and feel that they should be writing to the president. As a beautiful letter they were telling the story basically of their daughter. Working that day and and how it was that they came to discover that she was at work when the planes hit and how it was for them and the other families to have to deal with. Not just the grief of losing but not even knowing where the body parts of or of your last one just was there and she worked for a big transatlantic reinsurance agency called counterfeiters General lot of British people were over there working in that office and way way up high on top of the trade. Yes And and it the point of the letter was not just to give sort of like the gruesome horrible details this poor family had to go through but in the end really it was and I'm writing you know don't forget you know we can't forget are the ones who we've lost and if we stop talking about them we're going to forget them and and shows and the writing on the About This Place the teens almost mythical significance in the story of 911 and that's the Fresh Kills landfill in New Jersey where the the sort of sort of dreamy and went I mean when everybody had finished looking for remains that were still a load of stuff that was taken off and they're just saying how awful this is you know that there are still human relics in there. Yeah and the way that they go to visit their their daughter is is to get in to be driven in a garbage truck to the to the dump and into that you know with the flag on top you know and now this is not disses not how we. Want to be remembering the fallen. Really sad and you know and that's a story that kind of has flown off the radar you know we forget and they're saying we mustn't ever forget their daughter certainly. And then there are sort of the road throws and I came across a lovely left her about the value of money from a young a grad student couple who have sent the president $15.00 in 202012 for his reelection campaign and they actually list don't they the things that they could be doing with yeah $15.00 yeah everything like from buying a pizza to just just all the things they could do with that 15 dollars but instead they sent it. To the president and by the way I think I don't know if we ever got to say this in the book but this of nother follow up to that family was that they ended up getting pizza delivery from Air Force One. Really. Just as one of the many thanks. To slow series the became characters you know like all these folks became the characters that were talked about in the White House. What about well talk about something became account for woman teacher called Money Hazelton she loses her job as a teacher and then she finds herself in a game show. It's crazy she was lovely so Marty able to loses her job you know and she's she's just really angry because it's her whole life she has devoted herself to to teaching and to to educating you know and to building she's a nation builder by being a teacher and she loses her job she writes to the president to say you know what if I'm losing my Like how can I done everything right and how is it that now I have to walk around unemployed and able to do the thing that I'm so good at. And she ends up getting a note back from the president who says in handwriting among other things he says I'm rooting for you so Marni to her this letter and these words I'm reading through for you from Barack Obama become you know the biggest thing that she's ever got she takes that letter everywhere she takes it on job interviews she takes it everywhere and finally even takes it to a game show Who Wants To Be A Millionaire the she gets to be a contestant on and she reads it on the air and then she ends up not getting the $1000000.00 she doesn't win. For the stove she's got to go something and she gets a wonderful consolation prize is not goes on better than she then she went to. And yes she gets and she finally you know she realizes Wow I just got $25000.00 or something how might it complaining but what ends up happening with her is she carries this letter from job interview to job interview is she ends up getting hired back at the school district that fired her and getting promoted and promoted and promoted to become super and tendon of the entire district so that is like a beautiful success story but. Let me let me finish because we have to with the story of you visiting the mail room in the White House and the the day after the 2016 election and that's a pretty. Pretty unvarnished the kind of disappointment isn't it. Was a really tough day you have to imagine here in the U.S. You know we were in Expect we were everybody was expecting the same outcome you know we were all kind of gearing up for OK Hillary Clinton is going to be our president. And all of that and you know that was a little bit easy for the White House are mad because you know it's the same party that are in the same transition team probably and maybe maybe a lot of them would get to keep their jobs yes sort of a handover you know instead you know and they had invited me to come to the mailroom because it's going to be so wonderful we're going to hear from America celebrating the 1st woman president and then the middle of the night I'm thinking oh no you know I don't even know if they're going to want me to come anymore this is a shock so I went and. They described it is basically America in melt down the road with the kind of mail that we're getting in and they were sweeping I mean it was it was shock it was a funeral it could have been a funeral how many were at 1st as Barack Obama still get he says he's getting about 250000 a year so that's about you know in a week. So I think people are still. Reaching out to him it's a it's a unique relationship that people have with him it's. It's I don't know it's sort of fatherly or something I didn't write back oh yeah oh yeah he's a team still in place that helps him with that small everything's much smaller but . You still he still wants to hear. And do you have any knowledge about how the the present White Hose deals with mail. Where you know I tried I have tried and I keep trying to find out but unfortunately they don't answer and the few folks they have been able to reach have told me that they have signed agreements that they're not allowed to talk so I don't know why they would be at a lot sort of the mail room but they're not allowed to so we don't actually know what's going on we just have to use our imagination. Jeanne Marie Laskas restruck about her book of letters to Obama and it's just after half past 3 from digital on smartphones and tablets this is B.B.C. 5. Minutes the news now is clear Graham a group of Nobel Prize winners has written to leaders in the brakes in negotiations urging them to reach a deal in order to be tax science the latter says science needs the flow of people and ideas across borders to resume a has said person might have to accept an extension to the transition period but insisted that it would be over well before the summer of 2020 Take she told M.P.'s that a withdrawal deal with the E.U. Was 95 percent agrees although the issue of the Irish border was still outstanding . A man's been charged with murder after the discovery of a 25 year old woman's body at her home in east London Muhammad Ali who's $33.00 is accused of killing. And researchers of human Curry has find that microscopic plastic particles are increasingly making their way into the human gut academics from a small study discovered tiny particles of up to 9 different types of plastic in a cotton has a sport it's 10 wins in a row for Arsenal thanks to the magic of Mesut Ozil and duty on to buy a replay was English was was yes a German instrumental in Arsenal sensational 1st goal in that 31 win at home to Leicester City as 0 Hour equalized in the 1st half a force that he appear Emerick about Man 2nd half price by women's is $10.00 successive victories for Arsenal for the 1st time since 2007 and moves in I am resigned up to 4th in the Premier League side. Without that little girl maybe. Not on the like oh we want about what they think of the liberation of the on the March of the 90 minute I think. That with a very very big. Baby Big 11 also in our quality Christiane around our legs says his lawyers a confident as he answered questions and eventis Champions League news conference about ripe allegations against him Katherine my organs and to rape her in a Las Vegas hotel in 2009 he denies the accusations I'm up your man we did this statement 2 weeks ago of course I'm not gonna lie on this situation I'm very happy my lawyers they are confidence and of course I am too also the most important I enjoy the football I enjoy my life the rest I have people who take care of my life and of course I do true always coming in 1st positions or I'm good Ventus face Manchester United in the Champions League later United manager Josie Marino say he's happy at Old Trafford and wants to see out his contract at the club after being linked with a return to reanimate dread Rainier's deal runs until 2020 Pep Guardiola has again claim Manchester City did not have the feel of Champions League winners and urged supporters to propel the club forward they face shutout and us this evening I was born in Barcelona star to play there and there when you were. Late in your blood to your body the only way to survive is when they saw my cheering last season and this isn't a man is it concise or the club we are so honestly you're still we're not ready to win it that doesn't mean it won't we are not going to try to West Ham have confirmed that when you're under a young Malenko will be sidelined for around 6 months after undergoing a Killie surgery he was forced after the defeat to top him on Saturday 7th Harringay Bradley chance to cause the biggest upset of this season's 1st round of the F.A. Cup is after they were drawn home to League One A.F.C. Wimbledon you can see the. Full draw on the B.B.C. 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Now a serious discussion of games and politics and how much have you paid for all those ups you have on your phone here's game on how this is going on and I imagine most are her of the is a small city half white nearly between Gothenburg and Stockholm I was there last year for the Sweden game conference which is held by the university there in that small city there this time is Hayden Taylor from Games Industry don't because the news website and Hayden you've heard from the C.E.O. Of the soft massive Now that's the studio that's putting together the division to the division Monaco set in New York around about Christmas time this one so in Washington the citizens militia is there and he's told everybody in the whole that politics isn't really going to play a part in this particular iteration the story which is striking somebody was a law doesn't it would be entry so I pacifically was Ubisoft doesn't take a stance if you make. It it's like the back away from any sort of political action games which I think when you're get is you know in this dystopian future where you are militias running around. Gunning down is maybe a little bit difficult. But ultimately I think part of the point he's trying to make yourself massive can't stand up on a platform and say X. Y. Is good that creating mass multimedia consumer goods really and so yeah he is trying to tread a line somewhere in the middle. I don't really think ultimately surfaces but one of the quote you have in the author who says it's also bad for business is to about why they don't take a stand in current politics unfortunately if you want the ONLY So it's also bad for business unfortunately I I read ever. Badly if you want the honest truth but it is interesting and it is a discussion that we have and it's an ongoing discussion we have with our users so they understand that the game is going to be seen with a political tinge they simply don't want to discuss what their take is I mean they are a studio there in Sweden this setting a game in Washington you know at the moment there seems to be a lot of bipartisanship going on inside the inside Washington insider but all across America so there's the idea that they can then want to position to talk to the Americans about their own problems but they're making a game which is almost commenting on it is interesting isn't it a cover it's a it's a very the link there's a linkage isn't there but it but it's not an easy one to explore thing we can except that can't we Yeah absolutely and I think with the division to I mean everything. Political right everything like ham sandwiches the cartoons and everything but it's really hard to separate politics. At any creative endeavor I think just so intrinsically linked and I saw think. Like you say I understand where they're going by trying to not make a statement and a statement but dystopian fiction particularly becomes more popular during times of social or people's social turmoil so it's fiction like the Division 2 is you would think would be kind of reflective of a lot of the armies that people are feeling in these modern difficult hardens I think the trial and completely remove yourself from is it's an impossible ask really. Evans the wall over there a term you're a gamer wrote back in June an article called If You be soft wants to cling on to Clancy it's time to talk politics he makes a lot of very good points about the fact that the soft have kept the kind see Brand there you know the Rainbow 6 seats and so on and so on and so forth and that stuff is always been a no vote lead political in a very civil right wing view of geopolitics the effectiveness of intervention you know the guy's going to difficult parts of the world and doing the right thing he explores it very fully in this new got a lovely quote from the creative director on I'm Division 2 saying I love the coldness of the 1st game and to be able to go to D.C. Energy get through the humidity and hot some of the East Coast weather I mean wow and then say oh it just struck struck 2 slightly odd I mean I mustn't go the article is there for people to read the other thing is I spoke to Dan He was the executive producer on Far Cry 5 and when I asked him about you know the relationship between what we're seeing in America and their representation of us of the rise of a right wing religiously motivated cult he was he was at pains to say this grew out of the environment that we wanted to explore this wasn't an exploit it was just a kind of a happy accident yes I remember seeing you here night and yeah there is a real reluctance among especially you know higher ups in the game studios do you really. Have a kind of make a point. About anything really and I think it goes back to this idea that it's bad business and I don't necessarily think it is I mean I could be wrong. But I don't necessarily think it is to actually explore. To really get into the meat of what's your game. And I suppose you could argue against that you know Far Cry 5 was one of the most successful games of 2018 it sold millions of units and that was it was massively criticized for pulling its punches when it came to the aspect of really kind of exploring religious extremism in America so maybe they do have this case and making it a bit more cookiecutter a bit sort of safe and pulling back from the you know the political overtones really is the only way these multi-million dollar budget games can actually get made and thrive. To him out to politics I think is what the main theme there is a the event is a run to what are people from the smaller studio saying are they being more open about their wanting to talk about the current situation around the world or in their country is going to say I mean so there was one person Emily Grace Buck who's a former narrative designer Telltale Games and she was giving bit of a post-mortem on telltale and she was quite open in support of unions for example which specially when you consider you know the situation of workers' rights in America and in the games industry in particular unions are becoming an increased area for discussion so I think it is perhaps easier for ready staff of smaller studios because she's now working at a different studio so I think maybe it is because if the school the studios to be a bit more open you know they're not accountable to shareholders or to the stock price or anything like that which you know you have to be very careful if you say something you know shareholders react negatively you could see it. Shop in stock and there is an arc with these things with ultimate cover I think it's kind of the nature of like free market capitalism that people are always going to be walking on eggshells around contentious issues it seems people who are going to be walking on eggshells around the people at Rockstar as well the rock star just announced just today is just before we recorded this their staff can now talk about their working conditions on social media and people are saying anonymously Well it's not bad you don't have to do the crunch you don't have to do the 100 Hour working but you also get the feeling the. They might not have to do it negatively assessed if they're not doing it with crunch culture even if there's not a you know somebody stood up on high cracking the whip there is and this was a point that was made again health help post-mortem if there is a culture of trying to prove your own passion and try to prove that you know you're the one who cares the most that can then create almost like a culture of guilt I think everyone else feels that they have to prove that passion and it's something which is possibly fostered in the school environment as well are you sure that you are the most passionate person in the room and I don't even know if it's necessarily you know management I think sometimes it is management really pushing it but I think sometimes it's almost self-inflicted and that's not to say that these people you know well willfully like really really sort of damaging themselves by this I think it's like it's very hard when there is a culture of everyone trying to sort of be the best that you kind of have to keep up or maybe sort of be ostracized or something I think it's a very good school position for a lot develop as we've turned I think a telltale as well they were to read about people who take leave whenever they like you know as long as your work's been done you can take leave and there was a member of the articles I saw who took advantage of the collapse but those same just simply didn't do it because it was the idea that if you're doing that somebody else is picking up your work you know you really being a collegiate player and all that kind of stuff a lot of these points are coming out of the article from the vulture the gobo put together we actually talked to some of the whose's who are brothers there in New York and they made the point that they were always saying oh well you know we've been really committed this project we've been doing 100 hour crunch and people are becoming and saying well yeah but for a game this big and this taken this long why on earth are you still using crunch and then we get the spelling of no you can talk about it on social media and so on and so forth it's a very complicated issue I'm not sure you and I can address it directly but we can talk about maybe hopefully we'll get to some of these people. Up in the industry and at some point soon and put these kinds of questions to them I think unionization is in exceptionally dirty word in the industry for whatever reasons I mean I'll put my hand up and say I've been unionized every job or I could join a union I joined a union that's just the way that I like to play the game but then I'm working in journalism over here in the U.K. I'm not in the US I don't know how it plays there you might ask those questions what are you seeing next Hayden how many more how much more time of you going to have the. Well tomorrow is my sort of final day actually on the show floor where I'm doing a few things I'm possibly on a panel about political game narratives it's money to get back and there's a really interesting panel about using board games for therapy which although doesn't necessarily fit within my remit as a video games business journalist does does massively interest me. But yeah there's a lot of to sort of just general discussion about politics and games and then more parties. And you know exposed to that particular cat out of the bag Hayden us that's not good for Letterman is going good. It's a great article thank you for bringing to our attention and thanks for coming on the show now that's right thank you very charming out of well it's move on from talking about what's been happening in Hove there at the Sweden games week to talk about Google price which is going to be 10 years old the App Store is responsible for over 2 thirds of the downloads across the world 70 percent in fact of the world's apps a damn I did from the Google Play apps store and they have been some 330000000000 with a B. Apps downloaded from the service which is almost twice as much as what we've seen from Apple's app store however only $85000000000.00 has been spent in Google Play which is 65 percent of the $130000000000.00 spent on the App Store for bonds from at any is with me Paul you guys have been looking at this why is it the people who are using Android are actually putting their hands in their pockets with the regularity of the people who are buying their stuff on I.I.S. Are putting their hands in the pockets once the difference do you think it's really about the different devices that the systems runs if you look at Android there's a whole plethora of relatively cheap devices that run on Android and that's always been the case for Android and it's got more so time if you look at Android go which is the sort of little Android lite version it's really easy to get a cheap device which is right. Android for a smartphone and therefore it's really the market that associates more with Android if you look at Apple on the other on the other and that i Phones and the whole i OS ecosystem that goes around that actually very much targeted people who are by their nature a big spender and yes you see that we we've always seen that but I think it's become particularly prevalent in recent years the biggest driver of downloads growth at the moment is emerging markets it's India Indonesia places like this you have a very heavily weighted towards Android apps a huge propensity to consume apps and spent time in apps but you know realistically there's just not the same level of willingness to spend right now is it also the fact that if I am making an app for I.O.'s I have to actually submitted to Apple and get it approved to go into the perfume garden but if I'm producing something which runs on Android I can just produce and release it so I could theoretically with a couple of friends build an app that lets me at the Odio For instance me and this is the job I do is these things I think about but if I wanted to do that on it with an I.R.S. Device I would have to be submitting it for approval and get me cleared and there are hurdles in front of me there on the quite some hurdles to a crater on Android that there are an I.S.O. On that I think they are different for sure you're right and you see that in the kinds of numbers that come through from the number of apps that have gone on Google Play we were looking at this as part of this 10 year anniversary and there's almost this crazy I was almost 10000000 apps that have been put on the Google Play Store since its inception now of that 10000000 there is around 2.8 something like that that are currently live now so for sure that the rules are starting a different Google Play does offer a bit more flexibility in terms of launching apps and managing and controlling apps but I don't think that's a big driver of revenues if you look at the you know the. The big gaps that generate money that the games at candy crush these kinds of things but also the more subscription apps you know Netflix attend these sorts of things they're present on both platforms it's not a case that they're on one not on the other it's just that in the main people on Android and not going to part with the money quite as freely as owners of i Phones and i Pads were a Candy Crush Saga I think we're going to be completely unsuited to learn is the most downloaded guide in areas and indeed is the biggest of broadcaster consumer spend in the U.K. Now and it has right now and the top going all time by downloads there are some games which have just landed with the audience and have just stuck haven't there we were going to be playing Candy Crush Saga well into the next century on these on these metrics are we. It's entirely possible the King are going to be there forever this is it's interesting isn't it there is a no there's an open market inside the price thaw there is this open playing field as it were but when it hits big there's something the hopes are going to cross over I mean did you look at them and is there a way of saying you can put a game into the store where you can't necessarily get an audience unless you are of a certain size or are prepared to spend a certain amount of money on advertising is there a relationship there is well I guess you see that to a certain extent you see those big names always appearing at the top you say you know Activision Blizzard King supercell C Do you tend to see the names at the top there you know Rocio Angry Birds these kinds of things but there are ones that have stayed around and got there that maybe were you know less expected so 8 ball pool has been consistently up there in features even if you look at U.K. Downloads as the force most downloaded game ever on Google Play and in U.K. Over time. You know even the sort of hyper casual games like street ninja which you may have may have played come along and do pretty well so I don't think it right at the top certainly you see those big gaps and big companies playing a part but but there at this plenty of room plenty of room smaller down and in fact one way to look at it is you say how many apps have generated more than a 1000000 dollars in consumer spend and if you look just at the U.K. It's $310.00 apps which have generated more than a $1000000.00 of spend in the U.K. Since it the place that has been around so you see it's not it's not just contained to a handful is plenty of scope if you hit the right thank you Agent with people to really generate downloads and certainly generate money through the Google Play store you know one of the things on my phone actually a Subway Surfers which was my daughter's picture yes so she's yeah that on my phone is still there and this is the other thing of course I've probably got as many apps as most people which is something around $93.00 according to your research but people are only using $36.00 of the monthly I've got one that's for taxis in Europe and when I've got it on the fan cause I end up in Europe and farmers have neither taxi frankly which is not you know on the Browns a possibility so that's an interview mostly people get these things they don't delete them do you think they really are doing more aggressive housekeeping on their phones or is this just the kind of way that we use our phone is there just in case I think it's the it's the way we operate and it's interesting if you look at other markets so you look at India say as a market that's really exploding with growth in their in app usage more than half of the access that people have on their phone they're using really regularly whereas once you get to markets like the U.K. That starts to tail off and if you get to markets like the U.S. Japan it's even less way to getting more to that one industry and the apps that are actually on the phone are installed and I think there's a real there's a certainly a need to do somehow ski. For us all as individuals but if you look at our behavior what's happening is we're spending more and more time in apps but we're starting to consolidate that time a little bit being a bit more choosy spending more time on a selected number of actually I think that's going to be one of the trends we see we see Kantrowitz and as we talked about last week on the program when people who are into Warhammer 40 K. More AM have the pile of shame all of these unused unmade up models people have got to kind of the part of shame in their own phones has of me as a hoarding instinct which I find very straight as a book buyer I'm why these people who buy books never read them just got this huge stack of them need to go through now I know that they're not simply don't address them it is a peculiar thing that we have these behaviors which we take with us to new devices you know this is an established pattern and you seas of people repeating it with a new thing which makes me wonder Palm just announced this new sort of a friendly little companion parasite found to go with your mind Phone does a device like that what does that do to the mix is that somewhere where your you have only the most highly used highly trafficked apps that you you want on your little phone and you've got of a mind from full of yet more stuff. Yeah I think we could potentially see that I think these things or around your Warhammer points interesting is what Hammer is actually coming into mobile gaming now there's a trading card game that's coming along which blend app gaming and is in app experience with the real world as well so I think all these things are kind of getting a bit more blended together but certainly in terms of the concentration would you have a companion device running your top 5 or 6 apps then yeah I think I think there's a we're starting to see that now we're actually starting to see companies publishers trying to be more relevant to are just individuals by partnering up and saying hey you know we know you love this kind of coffee or you know you go to the cinema or you even gauge of these kinds of activities so let's try and bring those links and those loyalty aspects into into our app so you're going to choose our app as one of those decreasing number that you really invest your time in check out a partnership site I think is quite interesting as well in the app space now so cut the cost of coffee at the tracks the loyalty points that you've got all the the app from new app from want to sign so you don't have your little cup Hypercard stamped anymore when you spend 10 pounds or more in the shop you actually have your or your app or card and they're linked together might stand suggesting to me Have you considered you need to be using this kind of message or or you mind Joy this kind of game has got to be that kind of synergy yet yes the I definitely am starting to starting to see that already and I think they'll be going to be wanting one of the trends going thought of you next year gosh that's fascinating So all of these cousins of conversations with Lynn lead me to thinking there's so much more that we're going to have to explore and keep across as time goes on in there is never going to get less it's only ever going to get more but the question is are people going to be targeted more closely are they going to be offered to more selectively so they're going to be there's going to be more but less you're going to see more you want to see less but there will be more that's just something is going to happen is it yeah I think so and if you look at you know. I look at how our lifestyles have changed and how much more of our life is within that app space now than it was I mean if you go back to that early days of the App Store 2012 we were you know we were faffing around downloading tools that could turn our smartphones into torches and you know flash an Adobe Acrobat so we could read documents that kind of thing whereas now if you look at it it's a very much lifestyle and the most the biggest monetizing app in the U.K. Up outside of games over the history of Google Plus been tender so you look at tend Netflix Pandora music these are the big apps that we're actually spending significant time and money and of course that's on top of Facebook who are the you know the Giants in this in terms of downloads with you know with their 4 apps or watch that messenger Facebook and Instagram which are consistently up at the top so you know we live so much more of our lives in apps than we have done you know it's inevitable that they're targeting aspect will increase and should get better I mean it should make more sense for us to make things more relevant so it's like time now we could have a conversation about the way the tender is going to fight over the relationship might Yeah but we're not going to go there and I always hope I think you're absolutely right and we will keep watching this price for my family thanks so much for coming on OK No problem thank you. 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