The BBC has been compared to a dinosaur. It reminds me more of an aging boxer, once upon a time ‘The Champ’, taking on all comers and defeating them easily. Hancock, Panorama, Morecambe and Wise, Match of the Day, Pot Black or the Nine o’clock News, all lethal weapons in its ... Read review
Advantages: What the BBC does best. Disadvantages: Not enough of them.
The BBC has been compared to a dinosaur. It reminds me more of an aging boxer, once upon a time ‘The Champ’, taking on all comers and defeating them easily. Hancock, Panorama, Morecambe and Wise, Match of the Day, Pot Black or the Nine o’clock News, all lethal weapons in its impressive armoury. But as the years went by the talent dried up and the beeb shuffled ponderously around the ring showing just touches of the old class with ... ...Sports or Ondigital jabbed mercilessly at its leaden footed carcase.
Tonight there was a spark. A memory of the golden days was dredged from the depths of the old warrior; the timing was back, the footwork impeccable and the punch delivered sweetly. The BBC did what it always did best, the objective documentary.
‘The Oklahoma Bomber was a brilliantly made programme. With a minimum of interference, the victims ... more
The BBC has been compared to a dinosaur. It reminds me more of an aging boxer, once upon a time ‘The Champ’, taking on all comers and defeating them easily. Hancock, Panorama, Morecambe and Wise, Match of the Day, Pot Black or the Nine o’clock News, all lethal weapons in its impressive armoury. But as the years went by the talent dried up and the beeb shuffled ponderously around the ring showing just touches of the old class with Fawlty Towers or Blackadder, while the young guns of Sky Sports or Ondigital jabbed mercilessly at its leaden footed carcase.
Tonight there was a spark. A memory of the golden days was dredged from the depths of the old warrior; the timing was back, the footwork impeccable and the punch delivered sweetly. The BBC did what it always did best, the objective documentary.
‘The Oklahoma Bomber was a brilliantly made programme. With a minimum of interference, the victims and the families of the victims of Timothy McVeigh were allowed to express their grief and their anger. Intercut with this were searing pictures of the aftermath of the bombing and heartrending home videos of happy children unconscious of the horror that awaited them.
Timothy McVeigh killed one hundred and sixty-eight men, women and children for the sake of some mad agenda of his own, the reasons for which we will probably never know. Hundreds more were mutilated and countless families lives destroyed. The emotion and the shock even after six years, in the voices and on the faces of the mothers of some of the children, who died, was almost unbearable. This was strong television. The champ just regained the title.
Comment:
Earlier today McVeigh was executed by lethal injection. It did not bring the dead children back. It did not appear to bring much comfort to the victim’s families and it did not bring us one step closer to understanding why he did it.
Some crimes are so horrific, such as this or, closer to home, the James Bulger killing, that the gut reaction is to demand retribution. But the result of state execution, if it becomes accepted, if it becomes casual, if it becomes, as in the U.S., entertainment, is to brutalize us all. This execution will not stop the next Timothy McVeigh, who in his own eyes was a patriot and martyr; it will not stop the next psycho with the AK47 or the next sex killer, who must gratify his lust regardless.
If you cheered as McVeigh died, then you just knocked a nail into the coffin of your own humanity.
Advantages: Some great programmes, no adverts, high quality news reporting Disadvantages: some weak slots filled with mediocre programmes
I have always considered BBC1 to be the best television channel, providing high quality programmes on a wide range of subject areas. Being advert-free, this just seems to convince me further than the BBC is the best. But am I right? I decided to compare BBC1 and ITV to see which is really the superior channel. First of all, I rate the BBC highly because it introduced the wonderful Dr. Who in 1963, my all-time favourite programme. I have already written ... ...viewing figures (w/e April 8th), BBC1 has nine programmes, ITV has eleven. EastEnders is the number one programme, Casualty was 8th this particular week, Match of the Day 10th, Holby City 13th, Parkinson 14th, National Lottery 16th, Neighbours 17th and Animal Hospital at 20th. The BBC’s coverage of the Grand National was 5th, but of course, this is only an annual event and would not usually affect the weekly ratings. BBC1 has a very impressive ...
KarenUK 10.05.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of BBC1
Advantages: Classic comedy, sport, drama, natural history, news, no ads... Disadvantages: Eastenders, comedies with Caroline Quentin
A little anecdote I like telling friends about digital TV is that my favourite channel since expanding my channel list is BBC One. It may not be perfect, it may not beat ITV for ratings but for me it is still probably the finest TV station around. This review is set to be the first in a series that should run to about 20 reviews or so. So here is the first in a mammoth collection.
I know many are annoyed at paying for a channel that they don’t ... ...of satellite channels people never watch. When you consider that the BBC costs £8.75 it seems like excellent value considering the programming it offers.
The controversy over the Ten O’clock News may have been a bit of a PR disaster, especially considering the fact that News At Ten is beating the BBC on ratings, but I think the change to the schedule has invigorated BBC One primetime viewing.
While I don’t personally watch many of their ...
kfingleton 21.02.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of BBC1
Advantages: A very useful service, and well executed Disadvantages: no page numbers - bring them back!
If you've got Digital telly, flick a BBC channel on and press your text button. You'll see something that has not happened for years. You'll see the BBC finally getting something right.
BBC Text is here...at last. And having to wait that little bit longer for it has made it so much more efficient than the equivalent Sky Text on digital that it is actually usuable.
Sky Text's major problem was that whenever you accessed it, it took you away from ... ...If you wanted to see the sports headlines you could have turned to Sky Sports News. If you wanted to see the news you could have turned to Sky News. But what you wanted to do was to find them out whilst you were watching your programme.
Of course Sky's major problem is in teh very nature of the digital text system - it is effectively broadcast on a separate channel and therefore had problems knowing which channels users were subbed to and which ...
johnnapig 26.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of BBC1
Advantages: Farscape Disadvantages: Cost, repeats, the weakest link etc...
The BBC is now an antiquated institution that no longer requires our support. The original idea behind the licence was good, in that it provided the nation with a supported structure of national and regionalised TV and radio, when nothing much else was available. The problem now is that people do have a choice of TV and radio from all over the world through the use of services like BskyB and the cable networks. Through these services you can now ... ...tastes. What do you pay for these services, between £6 & £40 a month which roughly works out to around £3.50 a channel per year or much less, depending on the package you choose. So why do the BBC feel that £100+/year is good value for their services. They say that they offer specialist services that cannot be replaced by commercial offerings. So what is so unique, Radio 3, no! just listen to classic FM, Radio 1, no! just listen to Kiss FM or Galaxy, ...
jason_webb 12.12.2000
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of BBC1
Advantages: Excellent programmes, good comedy, they had England v germany, good news Disadvantages: NONE
...have always been made by BBC1 and shown on BBC1. Only Fools and Horses, Fawlty Towers, Birds of a Feather, 2 point 4 children, Vicar of Dibley, Men behaving badly, I could go on for ages are all excellent comedies shown on BBC1. Who cares if they repeat them maybe a little too often? They are still excellent and in my opinion funny every time. BBC have been showing repeats of Only Fools and Horses primetime for years and they still continue to do ... ...popular.
Now onto soaps. Well BBC1 has EastEnders and Neighbours. The only 2 soaps that I watch. EastEnders always comes first or second in the ratings wars and Neighbours usually earns a respectable place. Drama, BBC has had some good drama programmes over the years though here is an area where I personally would say ITV is better. Bad Girls, At home with the Braithwaites have been two of my favourite recent drama programmes and they have both ...
Disillusioned 19.09.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of BBC1
Advantages: Great Djs, Good music, Funny Disadvantages: Run by BBC
Hi today i will be reviewing BBC Radio 1.
I usually listen to Radio 1 at night as its something to do while trying to get to sleep (not a bad thing!). I personally enjoy the Chris Moyles Show and Scott Mills mainly because I find Chris funny and Scott has some great features from the old angry pizza man wind up to the new Whats Becky's Forté
which features Becky the Assistant Producer trying to find that talent she excels at.
The Chris Moyles show is different than most other shows on Radio 1 in that its not just the presenter that gets involved the whole team have a great time and in turn help you to get ready for whatever your going to.
During the day there is Jo Whiley, Sarah Cox and Edith Bowman. I personally don't listen to these just because I'm usually busy. For the few times I have listened to them they do film ...
coolguymcd 12.08.2009
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of BBC Radio 1
Advantages: Excellent news readers, reports and coverage, same time every night Disadvantages: Not on at 9pm any more
I was angered when BBC1 moved their main news programme from 9.00 p.m. to 10 p.m. I was used to the news at 9 and was happy with it there. Luckily for the BBC, the 10 o'clock news has proved to be very informative and the format well thought out. The link to the local news at 10.25 p.m. is also good - allowing the regional news a whole 10 minutes for their late broadcast.
Conversely, what have ITN been up to? Do they even know? First it's the 11 o'clock news and now it's back to the 10 o'clock news - but when is it actually on at 10 o'clock? Mostly it seems to be on around 10.20 ish - sorry but then shouldn't it be renamed the 10.20 o'clock news? The format of the programme is poor, concentrating more on advertising the Tonight Programme with Trevor MacDonald and worrying about what will be read (briefly) after the ad break. I ...
MichelleC 02.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of BBC1 - BBC News
Advantages: comprehensive and easily accessable Disadvantages: A lot of it
A white male tonight read the news. Its presentation was almost identical to earlier sessions today. National Headlines for national TV. Live footage from the Middle East. An interesting piece on Christian America and the workplace. The controller of the BBC has moved to independent TV. They announce a break in the programme which did not seem to happen (an independent channel might have commercial breaks). Towards the end SPORTS news. Followed by local news broadcasters - they have started to use channel 5 presenters and weather both national and local with predictions as far ahead as Friday.
I found watching all 3 sessions in 1 day a bit much, but it is nice to know that you can switch on at selected hours and catch up with today?s news events world wide (very little changed through out the day). It?s good to see a wide variety ...
JeffreyB 14.02.2005 (15.02.2005)
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of BBC1 - BBC News
