BBC Three: Launch

[Josh]

Yes, got an episode of The Catch Up at the TOTH presented by Callum Tulley. Much better tonight I feel. It didn't feel like it was talking down to us like last night. Great fit for the target audience.

[buster]

Another thing to remember is those 7pm slots are absolute killers to get a good figure at because their is no inheritance at all, you are literally going from 0. Liquid News got absolutely crucified in the 7pm slot, probably unfairly. And it wasn’t for nothing that BBC4 put it’s World news at 7pm for years and years - warm the channel up with something that is more or less zero cost.

[Josh]

Have also posted in the Eurovision thread but:
https://twitter.com/superTV247/status/14...2642618370

[bkman1990]

I've just heard about the figures for RPDR v The World. They're very good figures to fall back on considering that it's only the 1st episode of it's new series premiereing on the channel. It's also good news that it beat ITV2 & E4 for that opening night. That's a really good achievement for the return of a TV channel that went online only about 6 years ago.

[Inspector Sands]

Would it have been possible to switch the feeds over earlier (i.e. 1855 instead of 1858) to allow for a proper junction, or are the channel swaps locked in and unable to be moved?

Nothing's unchangeable, and the system that does the switching does do other services switches at different times when needed.

Whether they'd want to do that in day 2, and then there's the knock on effects of the schedules of CBBC etc

[JAS84]

Probably more relevant to The Sport Thread, but I guess they are censoring a sponsor

Yes, they were a couple of seconds to late the first time round:

Not like we have Orange anymore (at least not in its current form), so shouldn't matter too much

Why don't they have graphics that change sponsor mentions per market - in the UK's case, it should be EE. It's pointless advertising obsolete brands.

[Spencer]

Yes, they were a couple of seconds to late the first time round:

Not like we have Orange anymore (at least not in its current form), so shouldn't matter too much

Why don't they have graphics that change sponsor mentions per market - in the UK's case, it should be EE. It's pointless advertising obsolete brands.

EE is owned by BT these days and doesn't have any connection to Orange anymore. I guess as far as they're concerned, it does no harm to Orange for their brand to be seen outside the markets where it operates.

[Brekkie]

I guess the sponsorship agreement doesn't permit the production of a safe version. Most European based events seem to produce one, probably due to the strong PSB element on the continent. Other events, most noteably the IPL, don't though and generally blur them out.

[JAS84]

Looks like BBC Three's schedule for tonight is in the bin. The football is in extra time, so Free Spirits isn't on.

[Josh]

And the fact that the continuity is pre-recorded means that there won't be any updates on the changed schedule immediately.

[Josh]

Yes, just a generic "We're sorry the next programme is starting later than billed" announcement

[Brekkie]

You'd think they'd have prepared continuity given the likelihood that would happen.

Watched Free Spirits earlier on the iPlayer - despite being about the young cool kids of the Winter Olympic team it didn't feel at all like a BBC3 style documentary.

[dbl]

Different announcer tonight, Matt - so sadly seems some of his links have been dropped

[Brekkie]

I get why they wanted to have the semi-finals as part of the launch schedule but they really failed to put the viewer first in that decision, firstly with the matches kicking off the minute BBC3 goes to air - so BBC2 would have been a better fit for them, and secondly because the possibility of extra time and penalties meant the 9pm slot in their first week was compromised. Yesterday it was more filler type programming with Hot Property. Free Spirits tonight on the eve of the Winter Olympics arguably slightly more flagship, but still something they could drop and reschedule or push back.


Although they've got Starstruck next week feels like they could do with another big on target brand to back up the channel launch alongside Drag Race. It's mainly one off documentaries and a couple of brand new series with no established audience over the next week or two.

[Neil Jones]

BBC Three continuity in the previous incarnation wouldn't mention any times, programmes later that night or whatever. It would be something like "Don't forget the new series of is on Wednesday, it'll be great! Now its your back to back Family Guy". It was specific but about as generic as it could get. You wouldn't get "coming up at 2am" or whatever.

And of course you could always see the join when they were due to repeat EastEnders at 10pm and the BBC One airing hadn't happened for whatever reason, so you had an entirely different/unique announcer for that one link for the replacement programme.