The BBC Heritage site will be renamed The BBC Story to be launched in September 2009. Here, as ever, is the press release…

The BBC Heritage website, now called The BBC Story, will relaunch in September and offer users a richer experience in terms of new content and design.

The new site will give audiences a greater insight into the BBC and provide a range of dynamic routes into the unique history of the corporation.

The site was soft launched in June 2009, and has already proved very popular with users; during its first feature on the BBC homepage the site generated more than 3,000 page impressions.

The official site launch will be in September 2009 to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War 2 on 3 September 1939 – a seminal moment in BBC’s history which transformed the corporation’s profile and its public impact.

Other BBC “great moments” to be celebrated on the site will include the appearance of Elizabeth Cowell, the first female TV announcer in 1936 (with behind-the-scenes footage including her wardrobe test – never before broadcast on the BBC), the 40th anniversary of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, the info text innovation that was Ceefax, and the 25th anniversary of the BBC’s most popular soap ever, EastEnders.

Robert Seatter, Head of BBC History, said: “The history of the BBC is the nation’s history, and we wanted to reflect that in the new site, offering topical stories as well as a chance for audiences to tell us how the BBC has touched their lives.

“We hope that everyone will find something to engage with in the new site – whether they are looking for in-depth media history, access to our many historical collections, or simply the opportunity to find out something more about their BBC.”

The site aims to:

• Make BBC History relevant and engaging by connecting the past to the present and future
• Enable audiences to reflect on what the BBC has meant to them
• Offer wider access to the corporation’s unique collection of objects, artefacts, photos and artworks
• Provide a learning resource for users who want to find out more about broadcast history
• Deliver a future platform for enhanced partnership with other broadcast history agencies, such as the National Media Museum and the BFI

New features of the site include:

• Interactive History Of Innovation timeline that takes you on a journey through the BBC’s pioneering work from 1922 right up to the present day and the corporation’s latest creative and technological innovations
• Weekly Great Moments celebration, highlighting key BBC anniversaries with TV/audio clips with short interpretation texts which explain their legacy in terms of contemporary broadcasting
• Direct link to Memory Share, the interactive part of the site where people can read, upload, or comment on the most memorable moments in their lives as well as research events that are linked to relevant material dating back as far as the 1900s
• Access to BBC Collections via a weekly feature on an object from the BBC’s range of props, technological artefacts and artworks
• Changing online photo galleries from the BBC’s unique stills library including many photos that have never been previously released to the general public
• Video tours of the BBC’s most significant historical buildings: Broadcasting House, the iconic home of BBC Radio, and BBC Television Centre, the first ever purpose-built television studio complex in the world
• Range of learning articles, from case studies of the BBC’s editorial independence to the BBC at war
• An improved look and feel, with enhanced graphics and a new page layout that makes it easier to navigate

The site is a valuable resource for licence fee payers and can be used by:

• Anyone who is interested in finding out more about the BBC
• Teachers/students (any age) to support learning programmes
• Historians/heritage enthusiasts
• Other agencies, eg museums

Due to air on 13 March, the Doctor Who star will co-present with Davina McCall. In a pre-recorded video screened at this morning’s press launch at The Empire Cinema, Leicester Square, he said: “It’s a great honour for me. I remember the first Red Nose Day when I was at school, buying the t-shirt and everyone joining in, And then, later, at drama school, me and my mate Alan McCue formed a Proclaimers tribute act and went busking in Sauchiehall Street. We were rubbish, but earned £65 in our lunch hour. The people of Glasgow are very generous.”

Also confirmed for this year’s bash, are Steve Jones and Claudia Winkleman, who’ll be hosting the celebrity-packed Let’s Dance for Comic Relief; Fearne Cotton, Denise Van Outen, Alesha Dixon, Cheryl Cole, Kimberly Walsh, Ben Shephard, Chris Moyles, Ronan Keating and Gary Barlow who’ll be attempting to climb Mount Kilimanjaro; a special episode of Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps and – best of all – Comic Relief Does the Apprentice.

Contestant Carol Vorderman introduced the latter to the press. “In the past it was very much ring up friends and get things donated and get people to buy auction prizes. It was fabulous and raised a lot of money. This time it was decided – and we didn’t know till we arrived – that it would be a proper Apprentice project as they would give to those in the normal programme.” So no calling in favours from famous friends.

By the looks of the trailer, it appears the teams are tasked with making a television advert – but for what remains unclear.

Lining up, alongside Vorderman, to do Sir Alan’s bidding are: Jack Dee, Gerald Ratner, Patsy Palmer, Michelle Mone, Ruby Wax (“With whom I became more intimate than I have with any other woman in my life”, said the former Countdown star), Fiona Phillips, Jonathan Ross, Alan Carr and Gok Wan.

Find out more about Red Nose Day at the official site: www.rednoseday.com

Following in the footsteps of the US networks, the Corporation will be making BBC1 and BBC2 available to view online from 27 November. The channels will join BBC3, BBC4, CBBC, CBeebies and BBC News which are already simulcast on bbc.co.uk.

Director of of BBC Vision, Jana Bennett, said: “Jana Bennett said: “The launch of BBC1 and BBC2 online completes our commitment to make our portfolio of channels available to watch on the internet.

“From 27 November licence fee payers will be able to watch BBC programmes, live, wherever they are in the UK on their computers, mobile phones and other portable devices.

“Through iPlayer and series stacking, they’ll have the option to catch up with them later.”

Read the full story on the BBC press site.

I like being asked for my opinion, even though I didn’t know I had one about this story. But, it turns out I do, so this is what I’ve submitted.

There’s flapping and furore a-plenty about yesterday’s announcement from BBC Director-General Mark Thompson, and his promise of the Birtian-sounding training scheme “Safeguarding Trust”. And that’s probably as it should be. We don’t like to think that the Corporation – our BBC – is playing fast and loose with the truth. It deserves a hammering for that. 

But I think the real reason so many people are making a noise is the plain fact we just don’t like the idea of phone-in competitions on the Beeb. They’ve never been a good fit with the public service broadcaster, and feel like an additional tax-by-stealth on the viewer. This – perhaps – is our time to see them off forever. Or at least, restricted to commercial television – and its notable ITV, C4 and Five’s transgressions haven’t angered correspondents nearly so much.

Let this be a watershed. Mark Thompson’s decision to make a clean breast of things is right and courageous (although you could argue he’s weeding ‘em out before anyone else does). Programme makers have to know when they’re faced with a potential blank screen, or the option of jerry-rigging a last-minute bogus patch-up, the blank screen is what to go for. We’d forgive them that – maybe even respect them a bit more.

I’ve asked to be billed/credited/whatever-you-call-it-in-this-circumstance as “Graham Kibble-White, TV journalist”. There is some truth in that.

Peter Fincham’s been doing a reasonable job “touring”, as they always say, the studios in order to appear suitably contrite. But he’s no Michael Grade, who – had this happened on his watch – would’ve breezed onto Open Air and neutered the controversy with a bit of straight-talking, a few gags and a sense of what’s-all-the-fuss-about.

Moreover, if it had happened when Greg Dyke was running the Beeb, he’d have gone on telly himself, no doubt in shirt sleeves, and nonchalently shrugged off the hysteria via a self-effacing apology – “So, we cocked up, and I apologise, but it’s not the end of the world” – and told everyone to calm down.

Instead Mark Thompson has been cowering behind closed doors, no doubt poring over some spreadsheets to try and determine a cost-plus analysis of the downside of the whole affair, giving the impression of being shifty, not in charge and timid. Not one but two apologies were “issued” to the press. And now a hotline has been set up for BBC staff to shop their colleagues if they think they’re not up to the job.

It’s all become way more of a mess than is necessary, something that Thompson appears happy to encourage by hiding away as much as possible, behaving as if it was still the 1950s and acting as if his organisation might have committed treason.

When he took over in the post-Hutton chaos of early 2004, he was seen as a safe pair of hands. But increasingly Thompson is proving to be one of the most ineffectual and vacant DGs for a very long time. So much so that, when he finally steps down, rather than being carried on people’s shoulders (Dyke) or booed to the rafters (Birt), chances are most people won’t even notice.

“The sofa enters use whenever someone is being interviewed in the studio – to put them at ease I suppose. Sian Williams moved there at just after 7am whilst Dermot read the news in brief – which was an unnerving proposition anyway, because I haven’t seen him behind a desk at that time of the morning since The Channel Four Daily all those years ago.

“TV Ark have a recording of a news report from 1991 during the original Desert Storm, and Dermot was sitting in front of a blue screen then too, in a similar suit – and talking about Iraq and “President Bush”. Hold on, I think that’s the sound of history repeating …

“As I was overcome with waves of nostalgia I turned the tv off at 7.10am as usual so that I could listen to the Todayprogramme on Radio 4.”