Right to Reply
Section Contents
Created Tu 2-Dec-98
Updated Su 1-Dec-24
Ahead of the launch of Channel 5 at Easter 1997, I asked whether viewers were being kept in the picture about what they needed to do to receive the new service.
After Channel 5 began broadcasting I covered the aerial issue again and took part in a studio discussion about who would and would not be able to tune in. Also taking part was Channel 5's then-CEO, David Elstein, who announced he was negotiating making the channel available on satellite.
Programme Delivery Control allowed you to set your video to record a programme, knowing that, even if the programme didn't run on time, you'd still get the whole thing on tape. In October 1997, I asked Channel 4's manager of technical operations how reliable one of broadcasting's best kept secrets was. And the Director of BREMA spoke about the features consumers should look for when buying a new video recorder.
Even before digital TV had begun and back when most sets were not widescreen, broadcasters were increasingly showing films in a letterbox format. But was widescreen a benefit to viewers or just some arty thing we could well do without?
Permanent on-screen logos are used by broadcasters to tell you what channel you are watching. But I say these "DOGs" are annoying viewers, so let's get rid of them!
TV companies are very image conscious, sometimes spending huge sums on their on-screen look. But do the logos have higher production values than some of the programmes? And as the broadcasters increasingly turn to outside agencies for their marketing, how long would it be before the marketeers' influence spreads to the programmes themselves?
The first Right to Reply of 2000 was a special edition looking at the future of television. Would there be less regulation? How would the Internet be involved? Would there be a single ITV company and would the BBC still exist? These were just some of the questions discussed.
Editorial: Goodbye, Right to Reply
In April 2001, Channel 4 announced it was pulling the plug on Right to Reply, a programme that had been on air since the birth of the channel in 1982.
