British Broadcasting Corporation – Company Profile & SWOT Analysis, is a source of comprehensive company data and information. The report covers the company’s structure, operation, SWOT analysis, product and service offerings and corporate actions, providing a 360? view of the company. British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC or “the company”) is a public service broadcasting company that offers television (TV) channels, radio stations, and online content services.
The channel was due to launch on 20 April, 1964, but was put off the air by a massive power failure that affected much of London, caused by a fire at Battersea Power Station. A videotape made on the opening night was recently rediscovered by a BBC technician. In the end the launch went ahead the following night, hosted by an announcer holding a candle. BBC2 (as it was originally spelled) was the first British channel to use UHF and 625-line pictures, giving higher definition than the existing VHF 405-line system. In December of 1967 it became the first regular television channel in Europe to broadcast in colour, using the German PAL system that is still in use today although being gradually superseded by digital systems.
The name BBCi (meaning BBC interactive) is given to all of the BBC’s interactive services: on television and on the Internet. Since the introduction of digital television and the explosion in World Wide Web use, the BBC has developed new channels, interactive services and types of online content under this name. The BBCi web service, formerly known as BBC Online, includes a comprehensive news website and archive. The website allows the BBC to produce sections which complement the various programmes on television and radio, and it is common for viewers and listeners to be told website addresses for the BBCi sections relating to that programme. BBCi on the Internet also allows users to see and hear many of the BBC’s television and radio services using streaming media.
According to Alexa’s TrafficRank system, in January 2004 the BBC’s main website was 26th on their “Global Top 500” list of most visited Web sites, and the 12th most popular English Language site. The BBC was formed on 18 October 1922 and began broadcasting later that year on 14 November. In 1927 the British Broadcasting Company becomes the British Broadcasting Corporation, when it is granted a Royal Charter. In 1932 the BBC begins what will one day become the World Service when it introduces the BBC Empire Service. In 1938, the first foreign-language service (in Arabic) begins. By the beginning of the Second World War it is also broadcasting in French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish.
John Logie Baird begins experimental broadcasts in conjunction with the BBC in 1932 and on 2 November 1936 the BBC opened the world’s first regular high-definition television service from Alexandra Palace. BBC Radio 2 (music for a more mature audience; and comedy), originally known as the Light Programme. This was a peacetime offshoot of the Allied Expeditionary Forces Programme set up to entertain the Allied troops (and civilians) in World War II. BBC Radio 3 (Jazz, classical and non-western music and study in musical topics), originally the Third Programme. BBC Radio 4 (Non-musical entertainment such as drama, comedy, news programmes and factual programmes), previously the Home Service, formed in 1939 from the fusion of the prewar National and Regional Programmes. Radio 4 has both FM and longwave frequencies and sometimes broadcasts different programmes on the two bands. Displaying this page does not burden Wikipedia hardware resources. This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.
LONDON, July 11 (Reuters) – At noon London time on July 12, 2012, Britain will slip silently into a new era of radio history. At the top of the hour, the BBC World Service – once the voice of the British empire – will transmit its last radio news bulletin from its imposing home, Bush House in central London. For more than 70 years the art-deco building was the beating heart of the British Broadcasting Corporation’s overseas service and a bastion of press freedom around the world. From here King George V addressed the Empire in 1932, Charles de Gaulle defied the Nazis, and legions of emigres sent news in dozens of languages to the unmistakeable introductory strains of Lilliburlero, its signature tune.
Setting off a wave of nostalgia, the BBC has decided to move the operation to a gleaming new office in London as part of its efforts to bring all of its broadcasting teams under one roof. With a warren of meandering corridors, soaring halls and marble stairs, the majestic Bush House has already been mostly abandoned, with the last team of journalists due to leave officially on Thursday after the final bulletin. Andrew Whitehead, a former South Asia correspondent who has worked for the BBC since 1981, his footsteps echoing in the building’s hollow silence.
Marking the birth of Britain’s broadcasting tradition, the BBC’s Empire Service, as it was known at the time, was launched in 1932, helped by new radio technology that allowed it to send signals over vast distances. Its boss at the time was not very optimistic, quipping once that its programmes would “neither be very interesting nor very good”. Yet it expanded fast, soon beaming news in dozens of languages into some of the world’s most far flung corners. From its grand location off the Strand in central London, Bush House witnessed every turn of history throughout the drama of the 20th century, its culture shaped by the gripping years that followed World War Two.
It has been described as an organism in itself with a United Nations like atmosphere where journalists from all over the world rubbed shoulders in its polyglot canteen. Peter Horrocks, the BBC‘s Director of Global News. It is also the place whose labyrinthine corridors and newsrooms are said to have inspired British author George Orwell to form his vision of the Ministry of Truth in his novel “1984” describing a totalitarian future society. At the height of the Cold War, trouble sometimes struck too close to home. In 1978, BBC Bulgarian Service journalist Georgi Markov died in mysterious circumstances after being jabbed in the leg by an umbrella tip containing highly toxic ricin near London’s Waterloo Bridge.
Banned by the secret police from having a telephone, the Czech dissident Vaclav Havel once used to sneak into a local post office to record secret interviews with Bush House studios. Maya Samolov from the former BBC Yugoslav Service told a BBC programme. Samolov added with a laugh. Millions of listeners around the world, from Nigeria to Pakistan, feel they know the place personally after countless programmes introduced with the words “From Bush House in London”. For both friends and foes, Bush House was a powerful symbol. At the height of the Cold War, Russian spies were specifically instructed to listen to its bulletins – with anti-Soviet bits meticulously cut out – as part of their training, according to Oleg Gordievsky, a double agent in the KGB.
Robert Seatter, Head of BBC History. In some repressive regimes, listening to Western news reports could land people in jail. Dissidents from the Eastern bloc still like to recall how they used to huddle in secrecy around their radios in tobacco smoke-filled flats in Prague or Moscow, thirsty for snippets of news from the outside world. For many of them, the BBC’s “This is London” – a phrase preceding news bulletins at the top of the hour – rang out like the echo of a world they thought they would never see. Suu Kyi said during her visit.
Described by the BBC as a quintessentially British building, Bush House was originally commissioned as a symbol of Anglo-American trade – hence the inscription on its facade reading “Dedicated to the friendship of English speaking peoples”. When it opened in 1925, Bush House was considered the most expensive building the world, its cost estimated at two million pounds. When the BBC’s lease expires at the end of this year, it will return to its Japanese owner. The BBC says the move to a new office building is necessary because it wants to encourage efficiency and creativity through new and better broadcasting technology.
At the end of the day, listeners may not notice any difference. But for many it is still an emotional moment. Its former inhabitants have been seen streaming back to the building recently for a last stroll through its empty corridors, to say goodbye to their memories and an epoch fast slipping way. Whitehead smiled sadly as he recalled his years as a young reporter in the 1980s when he used to sift through wads of colour-coded news agency copy as part of his job. Whitehead paused. Lost in his memories for a moment, he did not finish the phrase.
Nikki and the Lyell unit are called in to investigate an attack against a transgender man. EZ Reyes rides with his brother?s biker gang, but for a covert reason. Megan wants an apology from her ex Alexi for his flirtatious ways. The show goes live and the final nine acts take to the stage for the challenge shows.
List of popular BBC shows, ranked from best to worst. This list of the top current and cancelled British Broadcasting Corporation TV series includes the date when each show first aired, as well as which actors starred in the show. The best BBC TV programs of all time include the most viewed shows on British Broadcasting Corporation, as this list covers the entire history of the network. This list is sorted by popularity, so the shows with the most votes are at the top of the list. Shows include everything from Doctor Who to Pride and Prejudice.
British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), publicly financed broadcasting system in Great Britain, operating under royal charter. It held a monopoly on television in Great Britain from its introduction until 1954 and on radio until 1972. Headquarters are in the Greater London borough of Westminster. The first initiatives in British radio after World War I were taken by commercial firms that regarded broadcasting primarily as point-to-point communications. The British Broadcasting Company, Ltd., was established in 1922 as a private corporation, in which only British manufacturers were permitted to hold shares. In 1925, upon recommendation of a parliamentary committee, the company was liquidated and replaced in 1927 by a public corporation, the British Broadcasting Corporation. Although ultimately answerable to Parliament, the BBC has virtually complete independence in the conduct of its activities.
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