4seven

Not really the same thing.

Well, say for example I see a programme on 2seven and want to record the rest of them..... next week it might not be on that channel so how will the EPGs cope with that?

Record it's initial airing on C4/E4/More 4?

I can't think of any reason why they wouldn't show the next episode of a series but if they didn't then series link just wouldn't be available or wouldn't work. No different from BBC Four showing a single episode of Blue Peter or The Russell Harty Show.

TiVo would probably cope if any channel did show a one off episode from a current series though.

Exactly my point, you won't be able to series link it on 4-7, you have to trawl the schedules for the original time slot

If these are the most popular programmes from the previous day, it doesn't take a genius to work out when they were originally shown, or indeed when the first broadcast of the next episode will be.

And due to the nature of the channel I'm sure they'll flag up when such shows are scheduled.

I think the biggest irony of this is it's being launched at a time when C4 has very little of note worth watching - a few years ago I found myself watching something most nights on C4 (in addition to Big Brother) but this so called "creative renewal" in the wake of Big Brother has just killed it off. There's virtually no original drama or comedy in the schedules, the big imports seem to have disappeared (other than Homeland) and their factual slate has become quite derivative, with C4 just seemingly signing up names on exclusive contracts without the programming to justify their appointments.

E4 is still quite strong - indeed the strongest it has ever been in terms of US comedy, although they do need a few more US drama series to replace the likes of Smallville, Glee, Desperate Housewives and One Tree Hill - I think they only have 90210 and Revenge as returning series at the moment, and the latter is probably doing well enough to not attract the attention of Sky.

More4 has really lost it's spark though and the one thing it did really well - True Stories - was taken off it by C4, who have turned it from a weekly strand to something which I think has just aired twice so far this year - and indeed 4seven could actually hurt More4 even further as it relies mainly on repeats from C4. Indeed 4seven might have worked best as a night of programming once a week on More4, similar to how E4 packaged their repeats together as "Second chance Sunday" in it's early years.

The summer is always a fallow period for TV. At the beginning of the year Channel 4 had loads of good stuff on, in particular there were some great 9pm documentaries. I think that's when it will be useful

They could just be taking advantage of the date, then.

Quite possibly, in the same way as ITV1+1 opted for 11/1/11 as a launch date without anything specific to promote on the new service.

Perhaps a similar person in marketing/scheduling had an orgasm about the clever date for 4/7.

Either that or they want it up and running and established before the Autumn season, and of course there's the Paralympics

Unless they use it for additional paralympic coverage (which doesn't seem to be the plan) surely the schedules will be blank that week as C4 will pretty much be exclusive paralympic coverage, so they'll have little else from the last 7 days to show.