OTT’s chart of the decade
Thursday, January 14, 2010 by Ian Jones · 4 Comments
Time for the final update to our list of the most-watched telly of the 2000s. Read more
That was the decade we watched
Thursday, December 31, 2009 by Ian Jones · 2 Comments
Scenes from a decade
OTT doesn’t have much truck with the idea of a “golden age of television”. Every era has programmes that are exceptionally good and desperately poor. If there has to be a “golden age”, then it began when TV was invented. It hasn’t stopped. Not even in the face of some of the telly from the last decade.
The ratio of small screen triumphs to travesties is the same as it ever was; there are just more of them. The past 10 years weren’t characterised by new lows or highs; just different ones. What we watched didn’t really change; how and when we watched did.
Here’s a commemoration of sorts in the shape of an A-Z of the decade’s television»
Who goes there
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 by Ian Jones · 2 Comments
The BBC has done a deal with MSN to make various archive Dr Who stories available to watch online.
The Beatles: on Record
Saturday, September 5, 2009 by Ian Jones · 2 Comments
Prefab Sprout have just released an album written and recorded 17 years ago.
Read more
Richard and Judy
Wednesday, July 1, 2009 by Ian Jones · 4 Comments
Richard Madeley is a student of history. He knows this because he says he is. Read more
Your Torchwood ratings-ometer
Tuesday, June 30, 2009 by Ian Jones · 26 Comments
Just how will daily doses of adult telefantasy fare on BBC1 next week? Read more
Patrick Dowling, 1919-2009
Thursday, June 18, 2009 by Ian Jones · Comments Off
The Adventure Game
Patrick Dowling, co-creator of The Adventure Game and producer of Vision On and Take Hart, has died. He was 89.
Dowling was a pioneer. He conceived new ways of using television to delight and inspire generations of children, and had the imagination and tenacity to see his ideas come to full fruition.
In doing so he exploited the power of the small screen to both entrance and intrigue.
Dowling’s work was never didactic, in the way of so many of the BBC’s early children’s series. Instead he demonstrated how it was possible to make the educational seem entertaining, and vice versa.
Doctor Who
Saturday, April 11, 2009 by Ian Jones · 10 Comments
The following is a transcript from a media studies conference in April 2019. Read more
Comic Relief Night
Friday, March 13, 2009 by Ian Jones · 3 Comments
Fry and Laurie contended every good play needed “a Paul Eddington in it”.
Margaret
Thursday, February 26, 2009 by Ian Jones · Comments Off
“Prime Minister, how are you?” “Fighting on, John. And your mouth?” Read more
Way down in the hole
Sunday, February 22, 2009 by Ian Jones · 10 Comments
One of the greatest shows in the history of television is about to be repeated.
“I know I’m right”
Friday, February 13, 2009 by Ian Jones · 14 Comments
Someone needs to do some serious cosmic reordering on Noel Edmonds.
Most-watched shows of the 80s
Monday, January 26, 2009 by Ian Jones · 14 Comments
A slight return to OTT’s chart of the decade.
Read more
President Obama: The Inauguration
Tuesday, January 20, 2009 by Ian Jones · 6 Comments
This was not the star-spangled clamour it ought to have been.
OTT’s chart of the decade
Sunday, January 18, 2009 by Ian Jones · 11 Comments
It’s time to update our list of the most-watched telly since 2000.
Read more
Countdown
Monday, January 12, 2009 by Ian Jones · 7 Comments
Letters, prey?
US Election Night
“It belongs to you,” proclaimed President-Elect Obama, live in Chicago.
Read more
Countdown
Monday, November 3, 2008 by Ian Jones · 3 Comments
Do not go gentle into that good night…
Read more
Getting the Sachs
Wednesday, October 29, 2008 by Ian Jones · 25 Comments
The Ross/Brand affair has led the BBC, yet again, into hysterical over-reaction. Read more
Blue Peter at 50
Saturday, October 11, 2008 by Ian Jones · 12 Comments
The forward march of Blue Peter feels like it has, for the time being, halted. Read more
