Fun and games at YTV

As all regional announcements are recorded (or at least the vast majority -- you can tell when they are recorded as the volume of the ident background music goes down a lot more sharply than normal; YTV's 6.00 announcement is usually recorded and in fact I'm fairly sure the daytime announcer goes home at 3.30, the evening one not starting until 6.30 since all announcements at 5.10 and 5.30 appear to be recorded -- the evening anno also seems to be going home at 12.00am these days), it is more likely that either the minidisc failed to play (technical fault) or the controller made a mistake.

There seems to be a lot of this going on. I'm becoming more and more convinced that something is about to change at the Leeds centre. It's always a sign of testing going on when the incidence of cockups becomes more frequent. Last time it happened Leeds got into a habit of repeating the recorded TTTV announcement for Coronation Street (or whatever else was on at 7.30) before the local news at 10.30. A few weeks later Granada joined the centre and the practice of having a regional, recorded announcement for Tyne Tees before every programme stopped.

(Edited by jason at 6:10 am on Dec. 4, 2001)

HTV never get our channels logo's either. I remember back in the 70's they were always mixing up the West & Wales logos!

It's this sort of thing that makes Network Centre more determined to promote ITV1 above local names... if there was one name there'd be less cockups. But then it also proves why there should be more regional continuity!
'You're watching Carlton... no, I mean Granada, no, Border, no... damn!'

Funny thing is that Granada haven't tried to rename LWT to GWT (Granada Weekend Television) so as their brand is seen down here

Hmmm, I remember in 1993 a few times part of the YTV ident was played back on Tyne Tees, then the TTTV announcer had to come on screen, looking embarrassed and say 'Well of course you're watching Tyne Tees Television, sorry about that...'. Who'd have thought back then that I'd be looking back on that period when the station was still regional, but a lot of cockups were being made, as the good old days? <shudder>

I`ve noticed Border has a small 5 min program on at 6.25 in the evening about web companies in the region. The announcer before this is the early Leeds one, however 5 minutes later at 630 the announcer into the ITV evening news junction has changed, so I suspect the early Leeds announcer does go home early as what would be the point in hanging around until 6.25 to make an announcement on Border

The early announcer b*ggers off at 3.30!!! All announcements between then and 6.30 are recorded...

edit: oh, hold on, you were just adding weight to my opinion about the early announcer leaving early, sorry.

I'm pretty sure the announcers are only working 6-hour shifts now. Which, given that there are 5 announcers on the roster, means that this is now only a part-time job!! (each announcer is only doing an average of 17 hours a week...)

All a far cry from the 2 announcers at TTTV in the mid-90's who were expected to cover 12.00pm to 11.00pm and overtime sometimes (can't really do IVC recorded) 7 days a week. That's a full time role, 38 hours a week each.

(Edited by jason at 11:54 pm on Dec. 5, 2001)

YTV just had a long (15-second) shot of the static hearts ident, with no announcement. It was made worse by the fact that the itv sports channel logo was displayed in the corner for no apparent reason (to YTV viewers anyway).

Tyne Tees was unaffected; their announcement went out as planned.

Surprising that there is apparently no contingency for these things...

Yes I noticed that, two in less than a week!

Obviously, the announcer would have spoken about the ITV Sport Channel if he could have been heard.

Was the Tyne Tees announcement a regional one, with the TT name in?

Back in the summer HTV WALES played out a CARLTON ident in error into Wish You Were Here. I have it recorded on video somewhere.
OK then, whats the 'best' ITV channel to keep watching for continuity and / or logos cockups?

ed
www.rediffusion-cablevision.co.uk

Well YTV must be the worst, if something goes wrong during the afternoon there is no announcer on duty to apologise to viewers. And not only YTV viewers but its Northern neighbours will suffer the same as transmissions all come from one source.

YTV is getting worse and I didn`t believe it actually could. True a few of its announcers do make the effort in the evening to mention regional names, but generic ITV1 is mentioned still too much. I`ve also noticed more 'news from the region' announcements popping up again after this has not been heard for a few months.

Granada seems perfectly happy to let YTV run its presentation for whatever reason, and I think Anglia and Meridian viewers will notice this more and more particually when new idents come in.

BTW did anyone see the advert YTV transmitted on Sunday afternoon promoting advertising in the Yorkshire region. It featured the hearts ident twice I believe, a map of the transmission area and references to advertising on ITV1. It was in a similar theme to the one CARLTON use. I think we`ll see more of this and similar versions will have been made for the other regions

Oh and the late Calendar new feature regional ident with no announcement again