“The BBC has admitted it was taken for a ride by a cabbie. The network has apologized to its viewers for a studio mix-up that resulted in a cab driver appearing on live television as an expert on Internet music downloads. ‘We interviewed the wrong person,’ a British Broadcasting Corp. spokeswoman said Monday while speaking on condition of anonymity in line with company policy. ‘We apologize to viewers for any confusion.’ The case of mistaken identity occurred May 8 – the day Britain’s High Court awarded Apple Computer a victory in a lawsuit against Apple Corps, the Beatles’ commercial arm,” Danica Kirka reports for The Associated Press. “In a reaction story to the verdict that is now circulating widely on the Internet, consumer affairs correspondent Karen Bowerman welcomed who the BBC thought was computer expert Guy Kewney. As Bowerman introduced him, there’s a moment when the still unidentified driver realized the mistake. He scrunched his face into a grimace, and in panic tried to open his mouth as if to explain. ‘Were you surprised by this verdict today?’ Bowerman asked.”
Full article here.
Video via YouTube (if it doesn’t appear promptly below) is here.
Guy Kewney blogs about the episode here.
[UPDATE: 1:28pm EDT: “OK, reset everything you’ve heard about my appearance on the BBC: they’ve found the “taxi driver” and (as I have constantly tried to explain to everybody) he isn’t a taxi driver. His name is Guy Goma – which goes some way to explaining why he (and the BBC receptionist) assumed that someone asking for Guy Kewney was asking for him. And he wasn’t there to pick up a fare, because he’s not a cabbie. He’s a Business Studies graduate, from the Congo, and he was there in reception because he was applying for a high level IT job with the BBC,” Guy Kewney explains. Full article here.
You have to watch the video – the cabbie’s reaction during his introduction is — as Kewney himself describes it — priceless.
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Hilarious video. Unfortunately, this is the way most TV news is manufactured. Gullible public thinks “if its on TV, it must be true”.
His favorite song is “Crosstown Traffic”?
Poor guy–what a nightmare to get stuck answering questions like this. I wonder why he thought he was invited to be on TV…!
If you didn’t know he was the wrong guy, you wouldn’t analyse what he says as much and it would probably just wash right past with the rest of the 24-hour rolling ‘news’
Steve Jobs should send this guy an iPod and an iMac and the Screen Actor’s Guild should award him an Oscar. What an on-screen recovery after he realized what was happening!
hahha! thats great.
bless him – he actually handles himself very well!!!
He was waiting in reception to pick up Guy Kewney, when the receptionist shouted his name (to appear on News24) the cabbie thought it was his call to take him wherever he wanted to go. Before you can say cock-up he had a mic on his lapel and was sitting in the hot seat.
Hilarious! I actually thought he did really well considering the circumstances!
He makes a pretty good point that the verdict is ‘much better for people’! because it will ‘make it easier and faster to find things’!
What a dude! Good for him!
Things like this can really damage a man. I remember when I was accidentally mistaken for Rob Enderle and interviewed on an episode of ‘Ass hat talk’. I had only been hired to go into the studio to clean up the expected pools of verbal diarrhoea that Rob leaves in his wake when I found myself in an impossible situation. Even now, I still receive death threats and I’m laughed at in the street because people think I’m him, his dog and his wife.
Amazing! Shows off the style of most technology reporters: just keep spewing out words, it doesn’t much matter if you know what you’re doing or not, just keep it coming and fill the space!
SOMEONE SHOULD FLY THIS GUY OVER TO NYC FOR THE FRIDAY OPENING OF THE BIG NEW STORE, A “GUEST CELEBRITY”!!!!! WHAT A HOOT!
Talking head and a taxi driver. He was as smart as the expert would have been. She was as dense as all the talking heads.
A celebrity is born! I’ve got a thousand questions for ‘im.
That has got to be the funniest YouTube since the DellPorno QVC video.
http://www.newswireless.net/index.cfm/article/2708
He’s not a cab driver
OK, reset everything you’ve heard about my appearance on the BBC: they’ve found the “taxi driver” and (as I have constantly tried to explain to everybody) he isn’t a taxi driver.
His name is Guy Goma – which goes some way to explaining why he (and the BBC receptionist) assumed that someone asking for Guy Kewney was asking for him.
And he wasn’t there to pick up a fare, because he’s not a cabbie. He’s a Business Studies graduate, from the Congo, and he was there in reception because he was applying for a high level IT job with the BBC.
Apparently the unflappable Mr Goma assumed the whole thing was some kind of initiation prank. His own speciality is data cleansing, and (my source inside the Beeb tells me) was “a little upset that nobody asked him about his data cleansing expertise.
regardless of whether he was a taxi driver – IT student – or a flippin bin man – the buy done good!!!!
the real ‘expert’ seems to have taken the whole thing very badly on hiw blog.
is he embarrased that these ‘experts’ have been totally exposed?!?! and lets face it – upstaged!!!
maybe i shouldnt have tried typing that whilst eating a sandwich… ignore bad spelling! you get my drfit!
too funny
Ok, so he’s not a cabbie, but it’s as funny as hell anyway!
http://www.nikfletcher.com
I am not a cabbie, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn® Express™ last night!
Does this mean he doesn’t get the IT job?
How about a transcript, I couldn’t understand a thing he said.
Let me tell you guys something, you don’t know the history of faking through interviews. I do.
After embarassing his potential employer, there is no way this guy will work for the BBC.