Portal:BBC
The BBC Portal
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current state with its current name on 1 January 1927. It is the oldest and largest local and global broadcaster by stature and by number of employees, with a total staff of 22,000.
The BBC was established under a royal charter, and operates under an agreement with the secretary of state for culture, media and sport. Its work is funded principally by an annual television licence fee which is charged to all British households, companies, and organisations using any type of equipment to receive or record live television broadcasts or to use the BBC's streaming service, iPlayer. The fee is set by the British government, agreed by Parliament, and is used to fund the BBC's radio, TV, and online services covering the nations and regions of the UK. Since 1 April 2014, it has also funded the BBC World Service (launched in 1932 as the BBC Empire Service), which broadcasts in 43 languages as of 2026.
Some of the BBC's revenue comes from its commercial subsidiary BBC Studios (formerly BBC Worldwide), which sells BBC programs and services internationally and also distributes the BBC's international 24-hour English-language news services BBC News, and from BBC.com, provided by BBC Global News Ltd. (Full article...)
Selected article
Madhouse on Castle Street is a lost British television play, broadcast by BBC Television on the evening of 13 January 1963, as part of the Sunday Night Play strand. It was written by Evan Jones and directed by Philip Saville. The production featured the young American folk music singer Bob Dylan, who soon became a major musical star.
The play was made with electronic video cameras, although recorded onto film rather than tape. The only known copy of the play was junked in 1968, as was the standard practice of the time, despite the fact that Dylan and lead actor David Warner were by then famous. Although extensive searches have been made by the BBC, only partial audio recordings of four songs sung by Dylan survive. (Full article...)
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Bernard Cribbins and Freema Agyeman feature as Old Jack and Shelly Periwinkle in the CBeebies series Old Jack's Boat.
Selected list article
QI (Quite Interesting) is a BBC comedy panel game television show that began in 2003. It was created by John Lloyd, and was hosted by Stephen Fry until the end of Series 13 [M] (13 years) after which Sandi Toksvig took over, and features permanent panellist Alan Davies. Each series covers topics that begin with a different letter of the alphabet; for example, the first series covered topics whose word began with "A". Thus it is referred to as "Series A" instead of "Series One".
QI was given a full series after BBC executives responded well to a nonbroadcast pilot and the first episode, "Adam", premiered on BBC Two on 11 September 2003. From the second to the fifth series, episodes aired each week on BBC Two; the second and subsequent episodes were shown first on BBC Four in the time-slot after the previous episode's BBC Two broadcast. When the sixth series of QI began in 2008, the show moved to BBC One and the broadcasting of episodes on BBC Four was replaced in favour of a 45-minute extended repeat broadcast on BBC Two the following day, titled QI XL. From the ninth series, QI returned to BBC Two on Friday at 10 pm with the XL edition on Saturdays. Lloyd acted as the producer for the first five series. Piers Fletcher became producer starting from Series F. Beginning with Series V of QI, the QI XL version aired before the standard QI on Tuesdays on BBC Two (starting from 22 October 2024). For the first half of the series, the standard edition aired on the following Sunday for the first 3 episodes, changing to the following Monday for the remaining 5. (Full article...)
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Selected biography
Peter Arthur Fincham (born 26 July 1956) is a British television producer and executive. From 2008 until 2016, he was the director of television for the ITV network. He was also formerly the controller of BBC One, the primary television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation, until his resignation on 5 October 2007, following criticism over the handling of the Monarchy: The Royal Family at Work debacle. (Full article...)
Selected building
Specially built for the BBC and opened in 1960, BBC Television Centre in London was home to much of the BBC's television output until 2013. Studio TC1, at 995 square metres, is the second largest television studio in Britain.
Did you know
Highlights from Wikipedia's Did you know
- ... that the first series of British radio stand-up comedy show Mark Steel's in Town was recorded in Skipton, Boston, Lewes, Walsall, Merthyr Tydfil and the Isle of Portland?
- ... that the episodes of the BBC 7 sitcom Knocker have titles such as "Privinvasionacy", "Obselejectivitysence" and "Confidentialitydence"?
- ... that Newman and Baddiel in Pieces was the final show on which the comic partnership of Robert Newman and David Baddiel worked together before going their separate ways?
- ... that Adam and Joe on BBC 6 Music won the Broadcasting Press Guild award for Radio Programme of the Year in its first six months of broadcast?
- ... that most of "Cold Comfort", an episode of British dark comedy Inside No. 9, is made up of footage from a fixed camera in a call centre booth?
- ... that working broadcast journalists were used as extras for the portions of the Doctor Who episode "73 Yards" that were filmed at the BBC Cymru Wales New Broadcasting House?
- ... that Sarah Gibson, who formed a piano duo with Thomas Kotcheff, composed warp & weft inspired by the art of Miriam Schapiro, to be played today by the BBC Philharmonic at The Proms?
- ... that BBC One initially passed on Line of Duty, whose finale would become its highest-rated drama in 19 years?
- ... that technical issues in the minute before their November 2024 BBC Radio 1 performance meant that South Arcade had to set up while the presenter was announcing them?
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