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With so many of us now working from home in lockdown, plenty of people understand the embarrassment of being about to make a really good point in a Zoom meeting, only to get chucked out when you reach that dreaded 40-minute mark.
But not all of us have that cringe moment on national television.
Unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened during a BBC News interview on Tuesday afternoon, when Westfield’s managing director Scott Parsons found himself unceremoniously cut off live on air.
He was being interviewed from his home about what could happen to his business in the next stages of lockdown being lifted, but disappeared mid-sentence, having apparently run out of free meeting time on Zoom.
To make matters worse, before he disappeared viewers were treated to a glimpse of one BBC producer’s desktop and the message: “This free Zoom meeting has ended.”
Oh dear.
The awkward moment did not go unnoticed by viewers watching along on social media, either…
Plenty of news anchors have been discovering the trials of live-streaming from home during lockdown in the last few weeks.
That includes ABC reporter Will Reeve – the son of Christopher Reeve, fact fans – who suffered an unfortunate moment when he inadvertently revealed he’d sat down for an interview without any trousers on.
But that’s nothing compared to the absolute saga that transpired in Spain last month, when Alfonso Merlos was forced to apologise when a semi-nude woman was spotted in the background of one of his home broadcasts… and viewers quickly realised that she was not his girlfriend.