David Baker, contributing editor of Wired, explores the challenges Facebook must meet and overcome in order to survive after a disastrous period which has seen the reputation and the business model of the social media giant questioned like never before. Producer: Jonathan Brunert

Can Facebook Survive?

Seriously is home to the world’s best audio documentaries and podcast recommendations, and host Vanessa Kisuule brings you two fascinating new episodes every week.

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For the last decade, True Crime has become ubiquitous on television and podcasts. Yet despite its current popularity, it’s not a new phenomenon. In this programme, author Charles Nicholl take us back to a time before podcasts, TV, pulp magazines, even Penny Dreadfuls – all the way to the English stage 400 years ago when, for the first time, playhouses were putting contemporary news onstage. Presenter: Charles Nicholl Actors: Rhiannon Neads, John Lightbody, Michael Bertenshaw, Josh Bryant-Jones, Ian Dunnett Junior
Sound design: Peter Ringrose
Producer: Sasha Yevtushenko

True Crime 1599

In this series, teenage boys from all over the UK talk frankly to Catherine Carr about sex, consent, life online, fun and friendship. They discuss porn, their struggles at school and becoming men. In the first episode, they talk candidly about what it is like to be a boy in 2024. They reflect on where they get their ideas about masculinity from, and whether those might be different if they lived elsewhere in the country. They also discuss the importance of role models - if they have them. Catherine also hears from adults making a difference in boys’ lives and finds out how examples of masculinity online can put real pressure on boys thinking about what it means to be a ‘successful man’. To listen to the rest of the series, just search for About the Boys on BBC Sounds. Thanks to  South Dartmoor Community College 
Dr Martin Robb, Open University
DRMZ Carmarthen Youth Project 
Thomas Lynch from Dad's Rock
Elliott Rae Founder of MusicFootballFatherhood
Cambridge St Giles Cricket Club
Dance United Yorkshire
Movember
Rebecca Asher Author ‘Man Up How Do Boys Become Better Men?’ Producer: Catherine Carr 
Researcher: Jill Achineku
Executive Producer: Marie Helly  A Whistledown production for BBC Radio 4

About the Boys - Episode 1

With criminal gangs now controlling most of Haiti's capital and no function government, Mike Thomson explores what caused this spiralling descent to Anarchy in this predominately Christian, Caribbean country, where more than half its eleven million French and Creole speaking people live below the poverty line. Mike looks for answers with help from Haitians, experts and political leaders who’ve lived through many of their nation’s recent social upheavals and natural disasters. Producer: Ed Prendeville
BBC Audio in Cardiff

Haiti - Descent Into Anarchy

In February 2024, the NHS dental crisis hit the headlines as hundreds of people queued outside a dental practice in Bristol to register as NHS patients. It was the latest sign of the severity of the national shortage of NHS dentists. The Nuffield Trust have declared that NHS dentistry faces its 'most perilous point' in 75-year history and the government have responded pledging to improve access and funding for dentistry. At the centre of this crisis are the dentists who serve our communities.   A Dentist's Life follows one Cornwall based dentist, Dr Jenna Murgatroyd, as she treats patients needing vital care, manages a practice facing financial risk and trains the next generation of dentists.  As a second generation dentist, Dr Murgatroyd also reflects on the past and the future of the profession and asks what it means to be a NHS community dentist today. Produced by Mugabi Turya

A Dentist's Life

What do Artificial Intelligence and digital technology mean for actors and their relationship with audiences? Leading acting coach Geoffrey Colman, who has spent his working life on the sets of Hollywood movies, in theatrical rehearsal spaces, and teaching in the UK's most prestigious classrooms, wants to find out.  AI, he says, may represent the most profound change to the acting business since the move from silent films to talkies. But does it, and if so how are actors dealing with it? What does that mean for the connection between actors and audiences? Geoffrey's concern is rooted in acting process: the idea that the construction of a complex inner thinking architecture resonates with audiences in an authentic almost magical way. But if performance capture and AI just creates the outer facial or physical expression, what happens to the inner joy or pain of a character’s thinking? The implications for the actor’s technique are profound. To get to the bottom of these questions Geoffrey visits some of those at the cutting edge of developing this new technology. On the storied Pinewood lot he visits Imaginarium Studios, and is shown around their 'volume', where actors' every movement is captured. In East London he talks to the head of another studio about his new AI actor - made up from different actors' body parts. And at a leading acting school he speaks to students and teachers about what this new digital era means for them. He discusses concerns about ethical questions, hears from an actor fresh from the set of a major new movie, quizzes a tech expert already using AI to create avatars of herself, and speaks to Star Wars fans about how this technology has allowed beloved characters to be rejuvenated, and even resuscitated. Producer: Giles Edwards

Can Facebook Survive?

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