Do flat-screen TVs eat more energy? Bad news this month for those of us considering a flat-screen Hi-Def TV who are also energy conscious: they can take more energy than a conventional CRT (Cathode Ray Tube)-based set. This came as...

Going on from my comments about radio-advertised charities the other day, last night I went to a presentation at the Royal Geographical Society by the Population and Sustainability Network (PSN). The theme of the evening was "Population Increase ? the...

I notice that Classic FM is running a joint promotion in the run-up to Christmas with the theme "The Alternative 12 Days of Christmas". Every day participants can win one of a number of "alternative" gifts ? such as "four...

Whatever the impact of Michael Grade's departure on the BBC - and there are all sorts of opinions on that from disaster to nothing at all - there can be no doubt that his move to ITV can be anything...

That's the question that I am sure many people at the BBC are asking at the moment. On the face of it, Grade's departure is an enormous slap in the face for the Corporation. But is that really the case?...

Unless I'm away, items seldom stay long on my Sky+ system: I've usually watched them and either wiped them or archived them to DVD before the week is out. So why is last week's Torchwood still on my hard drive,...

Is it me, or has the BBC's Click technology programme gone completely off the rails while I wasn't looking? I haven't seen the programme for some time and happened to switch on News 24 this morning just before it...

Just as the war between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray Disc is ensuring that comparatively few people buy either HD disc format (leaving the way open to downloads superseding packaged media on video as well as audio), along comes something to...

Al Jazeera's English service gets into its stride Despite US protestations, nobody can surely now be in any doubt that "Al Jazeera is the new frontier" as Sir David Frost claims in their trailers. Looking at the English language service...

There was a time, not so long ago, when ITV was the country's leading advertising medium, with vast amounts of money changing hands for expensive spots. Now, as ITV1 continues to lose its way, the precipitous fall in popularity -...

Samsung launches BluRay player in the UK (BBC Radio 4, Today, Business Report) The first player from one of the two high-definition optical disc formats has been launched in the UK: it's Samsung's BluRay Disc (BRD) player and it'll cost...

I don't know about anyone else, but I discovered a cool little sci-fi series a few weeks ago, A Town Called Eureka, running on Sky. Unfortunately I missed the first few episodes and as a result I looked the show...

The recent sad passing of naturalist and TV presenter Steve Irwin inevitably raises questions about how we produce television programmes about the natural world. The BBC spends vast amounts of our money on natural history programming, and the resulting multi-award-winning...

So, the World Cup has long since passed, and as a result you're probably watching the crop of available HD channels on your Sky box and wondering what to do next. Needless to say, the BBC content is wonderful -...

A slightly unfortunate side-effect of Charles Allen's recent MacTaggart lecture in Edinburgh is that it has reignited a rather annoying debate around the metaphorical water-cooler and elsewhere, on the future of Channel 4. This is a debate one would rather...

So Allen steps down, and it would appear that ITV has favoured its shareholders at the expense of its viewers. As one commentator put it: "ITV has tried to be blatantly populist but has failed to be popular...". And the...

"What ITV is up to" is a subject that occupies our minds from time to time here at Transdiffusion, especially in the wake of the 50th anniversary last year, which encouraged us fairly inevitably to look back over that half-century...

It's surely a truism, but in my view the big problem with commercial broadcasting is... the commercials. Or, more accurately, the crass, ill-conceived and inappropriate ones. Typical is the supermarket chain that will break the mood of a peaceful programme...

Many thanks to Malcolm Smith for bringing this to our attention. Alexandra Palace Television Group Chairman: Richard E Norman CBE; Treasurer: Tony Wilding; Secretary: Frank Phillip ****URGENT PRESS RELEASE**** Alexandra Palace TV Heritage Faces Destruction John Thompson, curator of the...

I wonder if you invested in an HDMI/HDCP-equipped flat panel display and an HD box to watch the World Cup in Hi-Def? Well, let’s not talk about that then. But have you seen Wimbledon in HD? The World Cup looks...

The Independent: Sony does battle with Toshiba over new DVD formats Many of us involved in the home entertainment business are keeping our eyes on the progress of HDTV, and also on the success (or, more likely, otherwise) of the...

by Joseph Gallant Living in the United States, I only got to see one season of BBC's long-running Top Of The Pops: in 1987-88. That season, CBS transmitted the programme in a late-night Friday slot, adding segments presented by Nia...

Tango Clear - Bravo Sony Bravia - Balls You know that commercial... the one that starts with aerial views of a city; gently-edited shots of streets and street corners... beautifully scene-setting music (Heartbeats, performed by José González from his album,...

At 3pm on Friday, 7 June 1946, a BBC Television Service announcer drove up to the doors of Alexandra Palace in a chauffeur-driven car. She stepped out and walked up to a TV camera. Then, captured on newsreel film and...

It seems that hardly a week goes by when there isn't some new scheme from the commercial sector to emasculate the BBC, either by stopping it from getting the money it plainly needs to continue its world-leading services, or by...

There's something that has been widely talked about recently in the several forums and email lists that discuss goings-on in television and the media. If you're someone who frequents such places, you'll already know about it: but to the vast...

I'm very pleased to see that our friend 'Sir' Gavin Sutherland's excellent new recording of Fritz Spiegl's Radio 4 UK Theme is now on the shelves, metaphorical or actual - backed with a very pleasant rendering of Sailing By, I...

There's a long television tradition for getting an 'expert' to pronounce on-screen in a documentary series about their specialist subject: it goes back to Kenneth Clark's marathon 13-part Civilisation in 1969 and beyond. The latest example is Michio Kaku, one...

While reading a piece on how the BBC intends to set aside £100m for UK films over the next ten years (excellent news!) ? assuming a positive outcome regarding the licence fee, of course ? I was prompted to wonder...

With all this kerfuffle about Radio 4's UK Theme, has anyone noticed that 'light music' is disappearing from radio and television? No sooner has BBC Four televised a (rather good) documentary on "Music for Everyone" than it's suddenly Music for...

I cannot imagine that there are many Transdiffusion writers - or readers, for that matter - who are not fans of startup themes of one sort or another. Virtually all the stations we write about have had themes, just as...

I would like to start by wishing all our readers, contributors, editors and 'back-room' staff a very happy New Year, and here's hoping that 2006 will be a little more peaceful than last. To start they new year , we...