Hello, and welcome to my very first blog!
For my first entry, I have written a report on the popular television broadcaster - UKTV.
Please feel free to leave comments on anything regarding UKTV and the actual blog itself (good or bad!)।
UKTV is amongst the United Kingdoms largest television companies. It is a joint venture between the BBC and Virgin Media Television. The vast majority of programs shown on UKTV are in fact BBC productions that have already been shown on the companies Terrestrial television network।
Unlike the BBC, UKTV is funded through the use of commercials. This allows the BBC to make extra revenue through programs that have already been funded for by the TV lisense payer.
It was the success of ‘UK Gold’ that led to the creation of UKTV.
UKTV itself is broken down into many sub - channels, with each one specializing in a particular theme। At current, these are as follows;
UKTV Documentary - As the name suggests, this channel broadcasts mainly documentaries, but of a wide spectrum of topics. This channel was intended as a replacement for UKTV Horizons - which was pulled off-air 24 hours before UKTV’s launch.
UKTV FOOD - UKTV Food broadcasts a mix of BBC archives of food & cooking related shows, and both live and pre-recorded original material of the same genre. UKTV Food has a very active website, that allows viewers to catch up on recipes that were featured on the shows. And to discuss any topics, again related to UKTV Foods broadcasts, through it’s forums।
UKTV Drama - UKTV Drama was originally launched in 1997 under the title of ‘UK Arena’. At this time, the channel was intended show a more broader range of shows, all based on the arts. However viewing figures for UK Arena were very disappointing, so the channel was relaunched as ‘UKTV Drama’ in 2000 with a stronger focus on drama, rather than the arts/culture - based shows.
As the name suggests the output of UKTV Drama is mostly drama films and serials - taken from the BBC archives. The rest of the output tends to be older comedy, a lot of which is also shown on other UKTV channels.
UKTV Gold - UKTV Gold, and it’s eventual success is what led to the creation of UKTV. ‘UK Gold’ (as it was known then) was launched in 1992 in collaboration with Thames Television .
Interestingly, it was not originally intended to be broadcast to UK viewers, but it broadcast frequency was easily and often picked up by the UK public. As a result of it’s broadcast frequency not being intended for this audience,the reception was often ‘grainy’ or ‘sparkly’.
The purpose of UK Gold, was to give BBC ‘Classic’ shows, such as ‘some mother’s do ‘ave ‘em’ and ‘Only fools and horses’ to a wider audience.
A Common criticism of the channel at this time was the way in which the show was edited to make way for commercial breaks. As the program’s were intended for the commercial-free BBC terrestrial television network, they were never produced with advert breaks in mind. When shown on UK Gold however, often breaks were introduced halfway through a sentence, or even a punchline of a comedy show..Which would often (understandably) irritate the Viewer. These days, adverts are handled in a much more professional manner on UKTV Gold, and the advert breaks are not held to such a rigid timetable when needed.
As mentioned earlier in this blog, it was the success of UK Gold that led to the creation of UKTV. The then financially troubled Thames Television’s place in the venture was bought-out by Virgin Media.
In 2004, a UKTV Gold derivative ‘UKTV Gold Classics’ was launched, it’s focus was on the more older program’s. However, it’s name was soon changed to “UKTV Gold 2”. It’s existence was a result of the channel bringing in newer and newer program’s - sometimes only months after they had been originally broadcast on the BBC networks. This is seen by some, as the channels move away from it’s original intention of providing repeats of ‘Classic’ BBC shows to just providing repeats.
UKTV History - This channel deals in a history shows, covering a broad array of subjects.
There is sometimes a bit of a crossover with UKTV documentaries - both channels have in the past shown the same program। UKTV History is currently available on the digital terrestrial television (freeview), Sky Digital and Virgin media networks.
UKTV People - UKTV People is a channel that tends to show lighter, mostly factual programs that will appeal to a wide variety audience. None of it’s shows are actually produced by the channel, instead they are bought from other companies where they have already been proven to be popular. A lot of UKTV People‘s content is of the “Docusoap” or ‘fly-on-the-wall’ nature. Alongside UKTV Documentaries, it was intended as part-replacement for UK Horizons, which went off-air 24 hours before it’s launch.
UKTV Style - UKTV Style specializes in ‘Lifestyle’ type program genre’s, such as DIY and Home/Self improvement। Before the introduction of UKTV Food and UKTV Gardens, UKTV Style also broadcast program’s related to these genre’s. The content of UKTV Style is both made internally, and bought from other companies (mostly, the BBC).
UKTV Gardens - This channel, as is implied by it’s title, is dedicated entirely to gardening and horticulture। UKTV Gardens was launched in 2007, previous to this it’s contents were broadcast on the UKTV Style channel.
UKTV Bright Ideas - UKTV Bright Ideas shows a variety of program’s that are taken from UKTV Style, UKTV Gardens and UKTV Food. It was launched early 2003 and intended primarily for the ‘freeview’ market, but has since been pushed onto other networks.
The viewing figures for UKTV Bright Ideas only averages 0.1% of the market share, as a result of it’s poor performance UKTV Bright Ideas is closing down as of the 14th October 2007.
Currently, UKTV is available through satelite and cable in the UK and Ireland. Some of the channels are available through Digital teresstrial television (freeview) 's "Top-up-TV" scheme.
As the output of UKTV's channels varies so much, it has no one definite Audience demograph.
However, all of UKTV's channels carry the same 'look' and tend to follow very similiar formats.
FUNDING
As UKTV largely consists of programs that have already been paid for by the TV Licence fee payers, UKTV does not have to rely on commercials to pay for the majority of it's content. As I mentioned earlier in this blog, UKTV does make money through commercials, which are shown at the same rate as ITV - approx. every 15 minutes.
However, this does leave UKTV very reliant on the BBC's ability to produce quality programs for it's native channel in order for UKTV to retain it's appeal.
Unlike a lot of it's competitors, UKTV does not tend to include 'pay to enter' competitions in any of it's native shows to generate extra income.
FUTURE CONCERNS FOR UKTV
As a result of the many different channels that UKTV currently hosts, each with it's own audience demograph, I think it would be very hard or unlikely that UKTV would make many decisions on it's content or schedule that would adversely effect many channels at once.
A concern I do have, is the amount of UKTV channels that are currently only available to freeview owners that have signed up to the 'Top-Up-Tv" contract. At current, it is estimated that less than 5% of Digital/Freeview users use Top-Up-Tv.
3 of UKTV's most popular channels (most notably) UKTV Gold, UKTV Style and UKTV Food are only available through Top-Up-Tv. Further more, they are broadcast on a 'Time-Share' basis, which means that the channels are only shown for part of the day, the rest of the day the channel is occupied by another broadcaster
Thanks,
chris..
For my first entry, I have written a report on the popular television broadcaster - UKTV.
Please feel free to leave comments on anything regarding UKTV and the actual blog itself (good or bad!)।
UKTV is amongst the United Kingdoms largest television companies. It is a joint venture between the BBC and Virgin Media Television. The vast majority of programs shown on UKTV are in fact BBC productions that have already been shown on the companies Terrestrial television network।
Unlike the BBC, UKTV is funded through the use of commercials. This allows the BBC to make extra revenue through programs that have already been funded for by the TV lisense payer.
It was the success of ‘UK Gold’ that led to the creation of UKTV.
UKTV itself is broken down into many sub - channels, with each one specializing in a particular theme। At current, these are as follows;
UKTV Documentary - As the name suggests, this channel broadcasts mainly documentaries, but of a wide spectrum of topics. This channel was intended as a replacement for UKTV Horizons - which was pulled off-air 24 hours before UKTV’s launch.
UKTV FOOD - UKTV Food broadcasts a mix of BBC archives of food & cooking related shows, and both live and pre-recorded original material of the same genre. UKTV Food has a very active website, that allows viewers to catch up on recipes that were featured on the shows. And to discuss any topics, again related to UKTV Foods broadcasts, through it’s forums।
UKTV Drama - UKTV Drama was originally launched in 1997 under the title of ‘UK Arena’. At this time, the channel was intended show a more broader range of shows, all based on the arts. However viewing figures for UK Arena were very disappointing, so the channel was relaunched as ‘UKTV Drama’ in 2000 with a stronger focus on drama, rather than the arts/culture - based shows.
As the name suggests the output of UKTV Drama is mostly drama films and serials - taken from the BBC archives. The rest of the output tends to be older comedy, a lot of which is also shown on other UKTV channels.
UKTV Gold - UKTV Gold, and it’s eventual success is what led to the creation of UKTV. ‘UK Gold’ (as it was known then) was launched in 1992 in collaboration with Thames Television .
Interestingly, it was not originally intended to be broadcast to UK viewers, but it broadcast frequency was easily and often picked up by the UK public. As a result of it’s broadcast frequency not being intended for this audience,the reception was often ‘grainy’ or ‘sparkly’.
The purpose of UK Gold, was to give BBC ‘Classic’ shows, such as ‘some mother’s do ‘ave ‘em’ and ‘Only fools and horses’ to a wider audience.
A Common criticism of the channel at this time was the way in which the show was edited to make way for commercial breaks. As the program’s were intended for the commercial-free BBC terrestrial television network, they were never produced with advert breaks in mind. When shown on UK Gold however, often breaks were introduced halfway through a sentence, or even a punchline of a comedy show..Which would often (understandably) irritate the Viewer. These days, adverts are handled in a much more professional manner on UKTV Gold, and the advert breaks are not held to such a rigid timetable when needed.
As mentioned earlier in this blog, it was the success of UK Gold that led to the creation of UKTV. The then financially troubled Thames Television’s place in the venture was bought-out by Virgin Media.
In 2004, a UKTV Gold derivative ‘UKTV Gold Classics’ was launched, it’s focus was on the more older program’s. However, it’s name was soon changed to “UKTV Gold 2”. It’s existence was a result of the channel bringing in newer and newer program’s - sometimes only months after they had been originally broadcast on the BBC networks. This is seen by some, as the channels move away from it’s original intention of providing repeats of ‘Classic’ BBC shows to just providing repeats.
UKTV History - This channel deals in a history shows, covering a broad array of subjects.
There is sometimes a bit of a crossover with UKTV documentaries - both channels have in the past shown the same program। UKTV History is currently available on the digital terrestrial television (freeview), Sky Digital and Virgin media networks.
UKTV People - UKTV People is a channel that tends to show lighter, mostly factual programs that will appeal to a wide variety audience. None of it’s shows are actually produced by the channel, instead they are bought from other companies where they have already been proven to be popular. A lot of UKTV People‘s content is of the “Docusoap” or ‘fly-on-the-wall’ nature. Alongside UKTV Documentaries, it was intended as part-replacement for UK Horizons, which went off-air 24 hours before it’s launch.
UKTV Style - UKTV Style specializes in ‘Lifestyle’ type program genre’s, such as DIY and Home/Self improvement। Before the introduction of UKTV Food and UKTV Gardens, UKTV Style also broadcast program’s related to these genre’s. The content of UKTV Style is both made internally, and bought from other companies (mostly, the BBC).
UKTV Gardens - This channel, as is implied by it’s title, is dedicated entirely to gardening and horticulture। UKTV Gardens was launched in 2007, previous to this it’s contents were broadcast on the UKTV Style channel.
UKTV Bright Ideas - UKTV Bright Ideas shows a variety of program’s that are taken from UKTV Style, UKTV Gardens and UKTV Food. It was launched early 2003 and intended primarily for the ‘freeview’ market, but has since been pushed onto other networks.
The viewing figures for UKTV Bright Ideas only averages 0.1% of the market share, as a result of it’s poor performance UKTV Bright Ideas is closing down as of the 14th October 2007.
Currently, UKTV is available through satelite and cable in the UK and Ireland. Some of the channels are available through Digital teresstrial television (freeview) 's "Top-up-TV" scheme.
As the output of UKTV's channels varies so much, it has no one definite Audience demograph.
However, all of UKTV's channels carry the same 'look' and tend to follow very similiar formats.
FUNDING
As UKTV largely consists of programs that have already been paid for by the TV Licence fee payers, UKTV does not have to rely on commercials to pay for the majority of it's content. As I mentioned earlier in this blog, UKTV does make money through commercials, which are shown at the same rate as ITV - approx. every 15 minutes.
However, this does leave UKTV very reliant on the BBC's ability to produce quality programs for it's native channel in order for UKTV to retain it's appeal.
Unlike a lot of it's competitors, UKTV does not tend to include 'pay to enter' competitions in any of it's native shows to generate extra income.
FUTURE CONCERNS FOR UKTV
As a result of the many different channels that UKTV currently hosts, each with it's own audience demograph, I think it would be very hard or unlikely that UKTV would make many decisions on it's content or schedule that would adversely effect many channels at once.
A concern I do have, is the amount of UKTV channels that are currently only available to freeview owners that have signed up to the 'Top-Up-Tv" contract. At current, it is estimated that less than 5% of Digital/Freeview users use Top-Up-Tv.
3 of UKTV's most popular channels (most notably) UKTV Gold, UKTV Style and UKTV Food are only available through Top-Up-Tv. Further more, they are broadcast on a 'Time-Share' basis, which means that the channels are only shown for part of the day, the rest of the day the channel is occupied by another broadcaster
Thanks,
chris..
1 comment:
Great start Chris. Well done for using links to provide mre info and details of the source material. Where is this week's posting? There was a copy deadline.
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