I should add that in 2006, the Commonwealth Games coverage was carried on BBC One and Breakfast moved to BBC Two for a couple of weeks. That was the last time I can think of any English Regional opting on BBC Two. It mattered
slightly
less because neither Oxford nor Cambridge provide their own breakfast opts, so Southampton and Norwich opted pan-regionally. As I understand it however, Plymouth are not capable of opting the BBC Two analogue Channel Islands stream at all, so their opts were lost.
I should add that in 2006, the Commonwealth Games coverage was carried on BBC One and Breakfast moved to BBC Two for a couple of weeks. That was the last time I can think of any English Regional opting on BBC Two. It mattered
slightly
less because neither Oxford nor Cambridge provide their own breakfast opts, so Southampton and Norwich opted pan-regionally. As I understand it however, Plymouth are not capable of opting the BBC Two analogue Channel Islands stream at all, so their opts were lost.
I remember there were plenty of complaints about this at the time, with no regional service at all on any digital platform. I'm sure many will remember Breakfast continuing with an extended paper review for digital viewers - which I rather liked!
It did seem odd to hear viewers being told to switch to analogue in order to get their regional news when normally we're being told to switch to digital.
That was the last time I can think of any English Regional opting on BBC Two.
Superleague Show not withstanding... although I have a feeling that isn't a traditional opt out. Would I be right in thinking that Manchester CTA switch it into the Net 2 distribution for the north of England when it's on BBC2, so that the regional galleries can concentrate on the Politics show opts?
I know that's how the pan regional opts in the South and South West were handled, via Bristol Comms Centre.
That was the last time I can think of any English Regional opting on BBC Two.
Superleague Show not withstanding... although I have a feeling that isn't a traditional opt out. Would I be right in thinking that Manchester CTA switch it into the Net 2 distribution for the north of England when it's on BBC2, so that the regional galleries can concentrate on the Politics show opts?
I'm not entirely sure how Superleague works, the programme itself originates from Leeds and AFAIK is played out from there. With the old network structure, it reckon it have been Manchester who'd have distributed it to the Northern Regions, but I'm not sure that's necessary anymore as the way BBC regional centres are connected to each other has changed...
Steve in Pudsey posted:
I know that's how the pan regional opts in the South and South West were handled, via Bristol Comms Centre.
Yes, the Restoration opts on BBC Two in 2004 were transmitted from Bristol to South, West and South-West regions. Bristol Comms re-engineered the network distribution so that when the Bristol gallery opted, it sent the programme on to Plymouth and back to Southampton!
Bristol also opted out of Grandstand in 2004 and that opt was carried on West and West-Midlands (I think). In that case however, I think Birmingham had to opt to the regional coverage themselves as they were 16:9 at the time where Bristol were still 4:3 cropped to 14:9.
There was also a time when a few (but not all) regions
added
an extra programme to their schedules after the Ten one night (usually an opted programme is simply a blanket of a programme of a similar length on the network, padded if necessary with some trails). On that night, Manchester timeshifted the rest of the night's network viewing all the way to News24 (with some very odd menu slides and live continuity from NorthWest Tonight presenter Peter Jay I seem to remember). After the regional programmes, the opted centres then cut to Manchester for a couple of hours, before finally opting back to Network at something like 2am...! A total palarver for one 40 minute regional programme!
However, this kind of opting seems (perhaps thankfully from an opeartional point of view!) to becoming fairly uncommon now.
On a slightly related note, since the News Channel has moved to N6, the headline opts in the 1/6/10 have changed: BBC London now opt out of network for the headline sequences, while N6 (or TC7)'s output carries the extra sport headlines.
This means that there's a version of BBC One which only really exists in the Broadcast Centre and TV Centre. Unless a region should fail to opt, in which case they'll no longer fall back to London headlines, as they would have done in the past.
Bristol also opted out of Grandstand in 2004 and that opt was carried on West and West-Midlands (I think). In that case however, I think Birmingham had to opt to the regional coverage themselves as they were 16:9 at the time where Bristol were still 4:3 cropped to 14:9.
iirc birmingham opted late (minutes rather than seconds) - so in the midlands there was a rather random switch from whatver rugby match the network were showing, to the rugby match which bbc midlands, southwest and west were showing.
Don't know if anyone's noticed - the graphics on the Six have moved down a few pixels, leaving the logo beneath the straps perilously close to the bottom of the screen. The live/location bug looks much better lower down, though the misalignment of the two boxes is more noticeable.
The ticker on the BBC News channel is in the usual place, however - the text on the straps looks a bit close to the logo and clock.
