Anna Adams, now officially Best Looking Undercover Reporter, taking over from Donal Macintyre in what is otherwise a very poorly contested category.

I've just finished watching the investigation into UK estate agents put together by Anna and fellow reporter Emma Clarke (possibly not their real names, I can't decide - Anna Adams appears not to exist elsewhere on the internet in any shape or form, other than as a middle-aged author and poet)

It was very well done, and was always a guaranteed winner on a topic most people approach with preconceptions in the first place. As one text contributor to Five Live put it in the programme's aftermath:

So estate agents are crooked. Well done BBC. What's next? 'Bear defecates in woods' exclusive?

But that's missing the point. Sure, we all think we know estate agents are less than level with us. Even so, sitting in front of the television watching employee after employee indulging in a variety of tricks to screw both buyers and sellers is compulsive viewing. It's essentially licence to sit in front of the box screaming 'Bastard!' every four or five minutes. No one passes up that opportunity. This is why soap opera is such a popular medium ('They're under the patio! Under the patio!').

I've just one complaint about the entire programme. No, two complaints, but one is arsey nitpicking because after five months' training to be a broadcast journalist I think I know everything. In other words, I thought the script was a bit unsteady now and again, and fell too often into the trap of overdoing the naivety.

In reality, the phrase 'I was worried that this wasn't right' is a little incongruous as you watch estate agents telling our undercover reporter to lie brazenly to anyone and everyone. Of course it's not right. Were you bollocks worried, that was exactly what you'd expected to find and now you're thrilled because it means you have a programme in the making.

Louis Theroux does this as well. In his Weird Weekends series (he's returning to BBC2 by the way, hurrah) he'd be filmed sitting in on an orgy involving 30 naked, middle-aged Americans, romping around with each other in some suburban idyll. Then he'll narrate over the top: 'I felt a little uncomfortable being here.' Really... no shit, Sherlock. Of course if we're honest, you also felt elated that you had footage of 30 naked, middle-aged Americans romping around with each other, ready to broadcast to an open-mouthed British public.

And speaking of shit, that's my main complaint with tonight's report on estate agents. At one point we were shown some secretly filmed footage inside the estate agent Foxtons (who really, really didn't come out of this well). You could distinctly hear people using the word 'shit' over and over again. Nothing was bleeped out. Yet the subtitles that had been put in place to clarify the voices - not the ones provided by Ceefax, these were put in by the production team to help you understand what was being said - had all asterisked out the word: 's**t'.

Why?

If we can perfectly well hear people saying 'shit', what possible further damage could be done by spelling the word out on the screen? Is it okay if kids who stayed up late enough learn how to say it, but entirely unacceptable for them to spell it correctly? Are deaf people particularly sensitive to the word?

I wonder if this is to do with a little-known piece of technology used when subtitling programmes. Earlier today I discovered the stenographers who transcribe the subtitles for live programmes use special dictionaries which filter out swear-words to ensure they are not broadcast. This is documented in a MediaGuardian article, part of which is reproduced here (the link would want you to register, which I never like to encourage):

Channel 4's Richard and Judy escaped criticism after an ... error was made with a swear word appearing on subtitles. Ofcom was told the stenographer quickly realised the mistake and issued an apology at the end of the programme.

The broadcaster revealed that the wrong electronic dictionary had been used - enabling the stenographer to create subtitles at speed. The dictionary allowed strong language and was designed for Big Brother post-watershed broadcasting.

If the subtitles dropped into the estate agent report also used some form of dictionary, presumably the dictionary asterisked out 'shit' while we all got to hear it.

Of course if you work for Foxtons, you were seeing, hearing and thinking and doing nothing but shit for the entire hour.

In other news, I'm glad Manchester City's abject failure to beat West Ham in the FA Cup last night has been more than matched by Birmingham's 7-0 annihilation at home to Liverpool in the same competition. Misery loves company.