10 years of bbc four

A very nice effort - though strange they seem to be making much more fuss about 10 years of BBC4 than they did about 75 years of BBC TV. I guess though it's the perfect platform for BBC4 to put it's case forward in the face of forthcoming cuts - though not sure I'd have gone with a night of disco myself!

Personally I think the resolve looks more like a BBC1 circular ident

From a news presentation perspective, IIRC the daily simulcast was known as BBC4 News or The World, when it aired on BBC World News. Early days were presented by George Alagiah, occassionally Kirsty Lang, the late Brian Hanrahan and Lyse Doucet, before Zeinab Badawi took over.

I vaguely recall a presenter with an American accent? Can anyone recall who that was?

Which is kind of what it did when it was BBC Knowledge?

Drop the bug.

I must say I never received BBC Knowledge; was it predominantly archive, and what were the topics?

If the channel will feature more archive that has actually recently come to light as a result of the ongoing project, and / or that hasn't been shown since 1st TX, I've no complaints there.

BBC Knowledge still remains as an overseas channel of course.

BBC Knowledge wasn't an archive channel per se, it's just that since it had virtually no budget that (from April 2000) the vast majority of its output was made up of documentary repeats from the previous few years.

However it was very different when it launched in June 1999, when it was cheap-and-cheerful educational channel, and even included some children's programmes. Then ten months later it changed overnight into a more serious documentary channel, and each weekday was stranded - Monday was history, Tuesday was science, Wednesday was business, Thursday was languages and culture and Friday was arts, with programming running throughout the day in a three hour loop. Around a year later the daily themes were dropped, and by this time it was starting to become more BBC Four-like.

However, BBC Four had much more of an arts bias to begin with, and watching back the continuity announcements I recorded from the opening night reminded me how impenetrable the channel felt at the very beginning; it took a year or so for it to lighten up a bit. There's no way they'd have shown anything as frivolous as Top of the Pops back then!


Which really has nothing whatsoever with the UK channel, only sharing its name.

Indeed, I remember when they bought Curb Your Enthusiasm, Roly Keating specifically said he wanted to get more comedy on the channel because he'd felt it was a bit forbidding. Certainly for the first year BBC4 was far more niche and serious than the quirky, entertaining channel we have now, there were loads more arts programmes on it, but I like how it's been made more appealing without losing any of its authority or intelligence. I think Sky Arts is quite similar to the early BBC4 line-up.

I remember the Radio Times (who, amusingly, forgot to change the channel heading so billed the first week's BBC4 output as BBC Knowledge) pointing out that George Alagian presented BBC4 News without a tie, making his the first BBC newsreader to do so. I assume that the change from BBC4 News to World News Today was to cut costs, simply simulcasting BBC World, though I think it was always simulcast on BBC World.

The original BBC Knowledge was a hopeless idea, like the original BBC Choice they were simply stumbling around for ideas of what might work on difital telly, but this was just like watching the Open University all day.

Aye, I see - although:


You make that sound like a bad thing.

I disagree; although of course we have broadband video content nowadays I think the original format could have been expanded upon over time. I can only presume they thought digital TV was going to blast off and their small budget would be fine.

I think if Knowledge had continued we would have seen the format shift slightly to more BBC Four nowadays of the evenings, with the original Knowledge content in the daytime. Just think of the shows they could have put on at a time where elsewhere the BBC is showing news on 1, some gameshow on 2, and another repeat of MythBusters on the Discovery Channel or Quest. Shows like The Big Bang and How 2 on CITV were brilliant at being fun and interesting at the same time whilst catering to a family audience.

Similar thing with BBC Choice too - the original format wasn't a bad idea they just didn't realise digital TV wouldn't be an instant success, not until Freeview came around anyway. IIRC they also didn't advertise it very well, just vague adverts for 'BBC Digital' not many promos on 1 or 2 for shows on Choice or Knowledge in the early days for content that you would make you want to get digital, like "Doctor Who night" or "Set Top Boxing Day".

It's interesting to see BBC Knowledge in other countries.

For example http://www.bbcknowledge.com/australia/schedule/ - the schedules aren't that far removed from, say, BBC HD or BBC2.