Digital TV Blog

The news corporation ITN has announced the launch of six channels related to news, sport and music on the French video-sharing website Dailymotion. This is the first such deal to be struck by a British news partner with the rival to YouTube.

The channels due to be launched will have the names ITN Entertainment, ITN News, ITN Music, ITN Sport, Games and Gadgets and OMG.

The ITN News channel will air breaking news stories, as well as news round-ups and an environmental news bulletin.

Programmes on other channels include quiz shows, video games review shows, celebrity gossip from both the UK and around the world, as well as music broadcasts. Advertising revenue from the programmes will be split between ITN and Dailymotion.

Website users will be encouraged to upload their own video clips, blog comments and photos.

Creative director of Dailymotion UK, Digby Lewis said “This perfectly complements our roots in citizen journalism and curated content from our Motionmaker community.”

It has long been a gripe of those who enjoy the arts that there are simply not enough cultural programmes on TV. Indeed, this week’s terrestrial schedule has a paltry offering – cultural “highlights” include Maestro, in which celebs attempt to conduct the BBC concert orchestra, badly, and the Edinburgh Festival Show, both on BBC2.

So a new arts channel from Sky should put a smile back on the faces of dissatisfied arts enthusiasts. Replacing the current Sky Arts Channel, Sky will be launching Sky Arts 1, which will showcase contemporary art, rock concerts and documentaries, and Sky Arts 2, which is to focus on classical music, opera and dance. Sky Arts HD will show programmes from both channels in High Definition.

Programmes include The Book Show hosted by Mariella Fostrup; a series of operas from the New York Metropolitan, including Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth; The Classical Top Ten, hosted by Vanessa Mae; and a four-part documentary of the late British painter Edward Seago.

The managing director of Sky entertainment, Sophie Turner Laing, said it was more difficult for terrestrial channels to maintain their arts content because they were driven by ratings. “To us they are not the be-all and end-all because the viewers have already decided to be with us. We have airtime available to make it easy for people to watch arts programming.”

She went on to say: “At a time when other broadcasters’ commitment to the arts is open to question, we firmly believe in giving our customers the best choice, all delivered in the highest possible quality, HD.

“This is further evidence of our commitment to invest in the content that people love and demonstrates how pay-TV can meet viewers’ individual needs.”

The Channels are due to be launched on 20^th October, and together will broadcast 36 hours of arts output a day.

Laurence Fishburne has been confirmed to replace actor William Petersen as the lead in the American CBS crime drama CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

The celebrated actor best known for his role as Morpheus in the Matrix movies will first appear on screen in series 9, which is due to air in October in the US. Channel 5, which holds the British terrestrial rights, and Living, which holds the multi-channel rights, will air the new series next year in the UK. Fishburne’s character is currently being developed and doesn’t even have a name, known only as “The Professor”. However, we know that he’s a pathologist turned college lecturer whose job is to find out why people turn violent. Disturbingly, he finds he shares many of the biological traits of the aggressive criminals and murderers he investigates. The Professor has some other skeletons in the closet. For example he was sacked from his previous job as a pathologist. He will join the Las Vegas Crime lab as a level 1 crime scene investigator after assisting with a murder case.

Fishburne was quite a catch for CSI executive producers Carol Mendelsohn and Naren Shankar, who said he topped their “dream list”.

“The quality that we were looking for was deep intelligence, and Mr. Fishburne, you look at his work, he’s always brought that sensibility to the work that he’s done,” said Shankar.

Whilst Fishburne’s acting was by no means new to the producers, her had never seen an episode of the veteran crime drama before the audition.

“I felt a little stupid and embarrassed that I hadn’t watched the show prior to having a meeting with them,” admitted the actor during a news conference on Monday.

“But I’m happy to say that the episodes that they sent me to look at were really engaging and really wonderful, and kind of dark and moody like a lot of the work that I’ve actually been involved in.”

Petersen, who will no longer appear on screen in series 9 will remain executive producer of the show.

Jade Goody has cervical cancer, it was announced last night.

The star, who had been due to appear on the Indian version of Big Brother, known as Big Boss, was forced to leave the show after the news came to the house from her consultant in the UK.

A tearful Goody told the other contestants simply “I have cancer” after she was informed of her condition in the diary room. She had undergone hospital tests in early August after her third cancer scare and several collapses. These were the tests that confirmed that she was suffering from cancer. She was immediately withdrawn from the show and flown back to the UK last night for treatment.

Goody’s spokesperson said last night “She went for tests and results have come back and she has cancer. She was phoned up and informed. This is a massive blow for her.”

Goody had decided to enter the Indian Big Brother house in order to make amends for the torrent of racial abuse she directed at Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty in the British celebrity version of the show, and to clear her name. She was reportedly being paid £100,000 for appearing on the show.

Football fans hoping to catch a glimpse of Premier League action at their local this season may be in for a disappointment as thousands of pubs and bars up and down the land ditch their Sky subscriptions.

According to the Association of Licensed Multiple Retailers, which represents the interest of pubs nationally, the soaring cost of Sky television combined with increased overheads and fewer customers has resulted in 20% of pubs abandoning their subscriptions to the service over the last five years. Pubs currently pay £13,000 a year for a subscription.

“Watching a big game in the local with a group of friends is as close to being there as you can get,” said Nick Bish, ALMR’s Chief Executive. “It’s also the only place fans can watch live Premiership action for free. This pleasure is being threatened by Sky’s relentless price rises.”

The trade group says that the number of pubs ditching their Sky subscriptions almost exactly mirrors the price rises that Sky has so far imposed, and predicts that many more bars will opt out of the service in the next two weeks, since Sky’s commercial customers can only cancel their subscription in the month of August.

Other pubs have hiked up the price of beer in order to cover the rising price of a subscription. “You have to sell a lot of beer to cover this extra cost so in these difficult economic times businesses are having to pass this on,” explained Bish.

However, Sky saysthat its subscription charge has remained the same since September 2007 on account of the credit crunch because many pubs cannot afford to pay more for Sky TV.

The BBC is struggling to retain support for the licence fee as an Ipsos-MORI poll shows that almost half the British population do not find it value for money.

The survey, conducted on behalf of the Guardian newspaper, indicates that a large section of the population believe that the licence fee is poor value for money and an inappropriate method of funding BBC programmes.

According to the poll, 41% of viewers are of the opinion that the licence fee is an “appropriate” way of raising funds while 37% object to the fee. However, 47% of those surveyed do not agree that the licence fee offers “good value for money”. What is more, only 30% of the population agree that the licence fee enables “distinctive programming” not available elsewhere, one of the principle arguments in support of the fee.

The survey also found that the further north you live, the less likely you are to support the licence fee. This also applies to people in lower socioeconomic groups. In Scotland just 35% of people agree that the licence fee is an appropriate method of funding the corporation, whilst 47% disagree. 37% of people living in the north of England disagree whilst 44% agree. In London however, 41% agree and 28% disagree.

56% of those classified under the high-earning socioeconomic group AB support the fee, whilst only 32% of those in the DE group see the fee as appropriate. Similarly, readers of broadsheet newspapers are far more likely to be in favour of the fee than their tabloid-reading counterparts.

The validity of the licence fee, at £139.50 a year, has frequently been questioned and is particularly coming under fire in the current digital age when viewing is increasingly fragmented and people are likely to spend less time watching BBC programmes.

However, Mark Thompson, Director General of the BBC, says that for this very reason it is important to provide high-quality content to a wide audience. He has pointed to the positive effect that the BBC has on the British economy, its reputation worldwide and its contribution to British culture as arguments for maintaining the fee.

Blex to give ‘lessons in lust’‘

A report in today’s Daily Star suggests that BB bosses are planning to inject loved-up couple Luke Marsden and Bex Shiner back into the house, in a bid to give ‘grumpy’ Rex Newmark and his on-screen squeeze Nicole Cammack ‘lessons in lust.’

Luke and Bex have spent their ‘honeymoon’ in Las Vegas following their eviction, and will return to the Big Brother house for one day. A Channel 4 insider is quoted in the Star saying: “Bosses have been jealously watching how much fun Luke and Bex have been having outside the house while Rex and Nicole’s relationship appears boring.

“The look on the faces of other housemates will be priceless as they walk in with tales of Vegas. And, now that Luke has become more experienced sexually, he will be able to teach Rex some of the tricks he has learned.”

Whether this is true or not remains to be seen; Luke and Bex, both 21, have signed a contract with the Star, so this could all be some kind of daft publicity stunt.

More plausibly, the piece suggested that Rex, 24 could be faced with the possibility of having to make some tough choices if he wants to keep 19 year old Nicole in the house. The report says that he may have to record some fake diary room entries with Big Brother, saying that he is no longer interested in Nicole, or pretend that he is homosexual.

The Star’s unnamed source said: “[Rex] has been annoying viewers with his arrogance and boasting, so it’s going to be great to see him squirm big time.”

The report also says that Rex could be forced to decide whether to nominate himself for eviction in order to keep Nicole in the house, or sacrifice her in order for him to retain a chance of scooping the £100,000 prize.

In other BB news, Chanelle Hayes from BB8 is waging war with evictee Jennifer Clark, whom Dale Howard, also evicted fell for in the house. Chanelle has promised to “show him a good time!” Jen retorted by claiming that Dale had said that Chanelle had a “large forehead.”

Yawn.

But don’t hold your breath

Some good news for Virgin Media customers: Sky and Virgin are talking to each other again, about returning the ‘missing channels’ Sky One and Two to Virgin’s digital TV platform. However, those hoping for a swift return of the likes of The Simpsons, Jack Bauer and the 24 gang to cable screens shouldn’t immediately get their hopes up; the two parties haven’t agreed on anything yet, but the fact they are talking can only be a good sign.

Sky still remain adamant in their position that Virgin should pony up the dough, and Virgin are still claiming that Sky are asking for too much.

“Our view hasn’t changed,” said Sky CEO Jeremy Darroch, who admitted that the spat had cost Sky in the long run. He said that: “We’d like to get our channels back on Virgin. It’s cost us money in terms of advertising and wholesale, and I’m afraid that is the power of a closed network, so we can’t do that unless they agree. If we can get to sensible terms we’ll try to but it’s still up in the air.”

Last month, Virgin Media added new content from News Corp-owned channel FX, including catch-up episodes of the second season of serial killer thriller Dexter, which stars Michael C Hall (pictured) of Six Feet Under fame.

Oh dear.

Instead of letting sleeping dogs lie (no pun intended) Jade Goody will rake over the coals one last time as she attempts to make amends for her ‘Shilpa Poppadom’ outburst on last year’s Big Brother… by jetting off to Mumbai to star in the Indian version of, yup, Big Brother.

We don’t know if this move is an idea of Jade’s or of her PR team, but it certainly smacks of something that would spill from the brain of someone who once uttered the word ‘Portuganese’. It gets better. The host of this years’ Indian Big Brother is none other than Shilpa Shetty.

Jade, who is heading to Mumbai this weekend, where angry crowds burned effigies of her in the street after she insulted the Bollywood star in 2007 is reportedly nervous about filming.

“Jade was worried about how the Indian housemates and public might react,” said a source to the Sun. “She was really upset about everything that happened after the scandal last year. But she really wants to clear her name and prove to everyone that she’s not a racist.”

Turns out that Jade stands to mint £100,000 for this noble act of philanthropy. Maybe she’s not as dumb as she looks.

…but fail to decapitate Big Brother

Much has been made of the return of The Tudors – the hit US-funded historical drama based upon the reign of Henry VIII of England – to BBC2 after a moderately successful first series which, whilst wildly inaccurate historically speaking, put bums of living room seats to the tune of 2.2 million.

The mutli-part period piece, featuring Gormenghast and Velvet Goldmine star Jonathan Rhys Meyers (right) as King Enry Imself, has been heavily promoted by the Beeb, who used Marilyn Manson’s 1996 hit The Beautiful People to advertise the show, perhaps conscious of Rhys Meyer’s screen pairing with former Manson squeeze Rose McGowan, who played Ann-Margret in the 2005 Elvis mini series.

Last Friday saw around 2.3 million of the British viewing peasantry to flock to their screens; the new series deals with tumultuous events surrounding Henry VIII’s attempts to have his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled so that he can slip the ring on the finger of Anne Boleyn.

Despite all the regal fanfare, the impact of The Tudors failed to dent Big Brother over on Channel 4, which pulled in an altogether more majestic 3.6 million punters, who witnessed the booting out of Luke Marsden, AKA the chap who allegedly got the nasty on with fellow evictee Rebecca ‘Bex’ Shiner.

Henry and the gang even failed to fend off a repeat of Agatha Christie’s Poirot over on ITV1 which, scooped a respectable 3.2 million.