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 New Year's Day 1927. The oldest and largest local and global broadcaster by stature and by number of employees, the BBC employs over 21,000 staff in total, of whom approximately 17,200 are in public-sector broadcasting.
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 28 languages and provides comprehensive TV, radio, and online services in Arabic and Persian.
Some of the BBC's revenue comes from its commercial subsidiary BBC Studios (formerly BBC Worldwide), which sells BBC programmes 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. In 2009, the company was awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise in recognition of its international achievements in business. (Full article...)
Selected article
Madhouse on Castle Street is a 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...)
Selected image
Bernard Cribbins and Freema Agyeman feature as Old Jack and Shelly Periwinkle in the CBeebies series Old Jack's Boat.
Selected list article
Blue Peter is a British children's television programme created by John Hunter Blair. The first programme was broadcast on 16 October 1958. It is the longest-running children's television programme in the world, and also one of the longest-running television programmes in the world.
Blue Peter currently airs weekly on Fridays in the United Kingdom on CBBC, a digital television channel. The show is produced in a magazine format, often transmitting live, and features a combination of studio presentation, interviews and outside broadcasting items. There have been forty-three official presenters of Blue Peter. (Full article...)
Related portals
Selected biography
Konnie Huq (born Kanak Asha Huq /ˈhʌk/; on 17 July 1975) is a British television and radio presenter, screenwriter and children's author. She became the longest-serving female presenter of the British children's television programme Blue Peter, presenting it from 1997 to 2008. She has been a presenter and guest of shows including the 2010 series of The Xtra Factor on ITV2.
She co-wrote the Black Mirror episode "Fifteen Million Merits" with her husband, Charlie Brooker. Her children's book Cookie and the Most Annoying Boy in the World was published in 2019. She published the follow-up, Cookie and the Most Annoying Girl in the World, in 2020 along with her third children's book, Fearless Fairy Tales. (Full article...)
Selected building
The Egton Wing of Broadcasting House was completed in 2005 on the site of Egton House. A memorial sculpture, Breathing, for those killed whilst reporting on wars is situated on the roof.
Did you know
Highlights from Wikipedia's Did you know
- ... that author Jacqueline Wilson described Dustbin Baby, the BBC dramatisation of her novel of the same name, as the best ever film adaptation of her work?
- ... that Andrew Lloyd Webber was concerned about casting a dog in the BBC television series Over the Rainbow?
- ... that BBC traffic reporter Sally Traffic has also narrated poetry albums for the blind?
- ... that the composer Zbigniew Preisner wrote the title music for the monumental BBC documentary People's Century, which spans 26 parts?
- ... 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 François Glorieux was a Belgian pianist and improvisor, conductor of the BBC Radio Orchestra and Stan Kenton's band, and arranger for Michael Jackson?
- ... 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?
- ... that the BBC commissioned a painting of a 1987 Bullingdon Club photograph featuring David Cameron and Boris Johnson to circumvent copyright protection?
- ... that the first song played on That's 60s was the same song Tony Blackburn had played on BBC Radio 1 more than 55 years earlier?
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