TVSquad

The BBC rolled out a new version of its iPlayer software today. The iPlayer online video service allows UK residents to watch full-length episodes of any program that's aired in the last 7 days. Version 2.0 adds higher resolution videos, the ability to keep track of TV shows you've watched, and the ability to schedule upcoming recordings. The redesigned portal that lets you access TV and radio from a single page.

The update also paves the way for the BBC to roll out a set top box with iPlayer features. Earlier this year the BBC announced plans to roll out the iPlayer software for existing set top boxes including the Nintendo Wii video game console. Now it looks like the BBC might also be planning to build its own box.

The device would work like a Windows Media Extender or an Apple TV, in that you'd plug the box into your television and connect it to your home network so it could access the internet. It's possible that the BBC isn't really planning to put out a box with its own name on it, so much as work with hardware makers to add iPlayer software to future devices that may also be able to access content from other networks, play DVDs, or perform other services. You can think of the box as sort of the BBC version of the Netflix player by Roku.

[via Electronista]

UK residents can already watch any show that's aired on the BBC over the last 7 days using the broadcast service's iPlayer software. Now the BBC plans to go one step further by offering a live stream of BBC One content on the internet.

The new service will be available sometime in the next few months and will be available only to viewers in the UK. You'll also need a broadband connection and you'll have to pay the same £139.50 annual license fee that you pay to watch television in the UK.

Critics have complained that it will be difficult for the BBC to make sure that viewers are actually paying their license fee, which means that television owners could wind up subsidizing free content for people who watch programs on their computers but do not own a TV. Right now there's not a huge number of people trading in their televisions for computers, but then there are aren't very many TV stations providing all of their content for free over the internet.

The BBC may be porting its iPlayer internet television service to the Nintendo Wii and other video game consoles and set top boxes, but for some reason the BBC has ignored the mos obvious way to get web content onto a TV: Windows Media Center.

Most computers sold today come with Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate, which means that they already have Windows Media Center software designed for displaying video and web content on a TV screen. Taking an application like the iPlayer, which is designed for keyboard and mouse navigation, and integrating it with Windows Media Center for remote control navigation should be a breeze. And it turns out, it kind of is. Since the BBC hasn't designed a MCE plugin, developer Martin Millmore made his own.

The plugin isn't perfect yet. While you can navigate iPlayer content with a remote control, Millmore hasn't been able to get programs to play or switch to full screen mode without using a mouse. And of course, the iPlayer service won't work if you don't live in the UK. But that's a feature, not a bug.

[via Ian Dixon]

Engadget is reporting that Sony plans to launch the PlayTV television tuner add-on for its Playstation3 gaming console on July 31st. But if you follow the link to the Amazon product page for the PlayTV, you'll find that the release date is listed as October 31st.

Either way, it seems pretty clear that UK PS3 users are going to be able to get their hands on the PlayTV before US customers. The devices is designed to work with the UK's digital television system and will not work with US cable, satellite, or over the air television yet. I'm pretty sure we'll see a US launch eventually, but not until afte the UK version is released.

Engadget says the PlayTV will set you back £59.99 or about $120 US whenever it becomes available in the UK.

There's more reality being served up by NBC: a food-based competition show in which couples vie to open a restaurant. British chef Marco Pierre White will be the judge. NBC has greenlit The Chopping Block for next season, calling it a sort of Top Chef meets Hell's Kitchen. Actually, it sounds like a twin for BBC America's Last Restaurant Standing. That one has nine couples competing for one restaurant with Chef Raymond Blanc as the judge. The NBC incarnation will have eight couples, and unlike Chef Blanc who has earned two Michelin stars for his restaurants, Chef White has three.

Victoria Beckham, a.k.a. Posh Spice, would have to go a long way to be compared to the foul-mouthed, in-your-face TV chef Gordon Ramsay, but that's what Fox TV is hoping for if they want her proposed new show, Fashion Nightmares, to ape Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares. The net is talking with the former Spice Girl and fashion "scion" with her dvb Style denim brand to do a show in the style of Kitchen Nightmares. In that US version of the BBC hit, the chef goes to troubled restaurants and diagnoses what's wrong and how they must fix it. Ramsay's way includes many expletives deleted and mucho histronics. Like the UK version, Fox's US variation has been a hit.

Showbiz has gone green, and that's not just ecologically! Green is flashing all over Hollywood. CBS has given the greenlight to three more pilots, including a doctor drama, a psychic romance, and a British-based tale of international love.

NY-LON (no, not nylon the fabric!), refers to the New York-London connection via air. The story, which writers Patti Carr and Lara Runnels (who both worked on 'Til Death) are translating from the U.K. version, is about a British businessman who meets a New York City record store clerk while she's in London, and then their subsequent attempts to maintain a transatlantic romance. The series ran seven episodes in England, which is not atypical. Of course, for American TV, many more episodes than that will be necessary to constitute a hit.

The BBC may be preparing to distribute some of its more popular programs via Apple's iTunes store. The Register is reporting that details on the partnership could be announced as soon as Tuesday.

UK residents can already watch a number of BBC shows online using the iPlayer service, which lets users watch any show that's been broadcast within the last 7 days for free. But the iPlayer is only available to British residents who pay for the BBC's programming with their taxes. Outside of the UK, you have to pay if you want your Doctor Who.

It's not clear right now whether any shows the BBC distributes via iTunes will be available outside of Britan or not. Apple charges UK customers £1.89 to download a television episode, which is almost $2 more than the $1.99 US customers pay. So while it's possible the BBC won't want to sell its content at the lower prices, some money is better than no money, right?

Update: It looks like BBC content is now available at the UK iTunes store, but not the US store.

According to this article in the U.K.'s Telegraph, kids on the reality TV show Supernanny have been intentionally made to cry to boost ratings. The show is successful in Britain and in the United States (on ABC) and has made host Jo Frost a household name.

My question is: why is this surprising? It's somewhat common knowledge that reality TV intentionally gets its participants into awkward situations in order to get good TV out of it. Hell, right before I started with TV Squad I appeared on a cable TV game show and I was amazed at how much the producers wanted me to behave a certain way in order to make for better TV.

Later this month, TVComedyClassics.com will officially launch as a download service in which folks can purchase, or rent, various comedies from the UK.

Don't expect well-known shows like Black Adder or Monty Python, however. In fact, there isn't a single show listed on the site I've ever heard of. Perhaps they'll be familiar to some of our readers from across the pond: Labours of Erica, Up the Elephant and Round the Castle, Mann's Best Friend, Robert's Robots and Two in Clover, just to name a few. Other series from the '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s will be added when the site officially launches, with over one thousand titles in all eventually added to the service.

Here's the story:

Carved in a hillside in the U.K., Cerne Abbas in Dorset to be exact, is a 180 ft image known as the "Cerne Abbas giant." The club (and boner) weilding pagan god has been in place since the 17th century and is seen as a symbol of fertility (and how).

Now, the god has a friend, or at least a temporary visitor. A drawing of Homer Simpson, placed there to promote the upcoming movie, now stands next to the ancient symbol. The biodegradable Homer pic will wash away after the first rain, but local pagans are still upset, calling the advertisement disrespectfut. I'm sure it doesn't help that Homer and the giant look like they're playing some perverted form of ring toss, too.

I'm not easily offended (hell, I often offend people by how unoffended I am by offensive things), but this concept does seem more than a little egregious.

Splitting Images is a celebrity lookalike company in the U.K. They have a ton of people that can be hired for your next party, corporate event, or other entertainment-related function, though some of the lookalikes look more like the celebs than others.

For example, these guys look like Rowan Atkinson so much that they could probably commit some crime and he'd be blamed for it, and this guy could probably do the same for Bing Crosby, if he wasn't, you know, dead and all. But a lot of these people seem to be stretching things a bit. Do these woman really look enough like Pamela Anderson? And does this guy really look like Mr. Spock? I guess wearing a costume and/or having a pic taken in a particular setting helps.

Of course, you could get a Leo Sayer lookalike, though hiring the real Leo Sayer now would probably be cheaper now.

[via Marty Beckerman]

Former TiVo CEO (and current board member) Mike Ramsey tells the Sunday Herald that TiVo could be returning tot he UK, but not with its own set-top-boxes.

Ramsey says manufacturing and distribution problems have kept the company from launching a new box in Britain, but the same technology that will allow TiVo software to run on cable boxes distributed by Comcast and Cox Cable in the US could be used to add TiVo software to Freeview boxes in the UK.

TiVo would work with a Freeview device maker to distribute the boxes, while TiVo would be responsible for providing service. The company has been talking with companies, but Ramsey says TiVo's not ready to announce any partnerships yet.

[via HDTiVo Blog]

If you've been enjoying the antics of Benny Hill on BBC America, I have sad news for you: the series is being removed from the channel.

The decision to remove The Benny Hill Show from the channel's lineup is just part of a new makeover that's discarding many older shows for newer ones. The channel hopes to give American audiences more modern shows instead of older fare such as Hill and Are You Being Served? and replace them with newer shows like Torchwood and Hollyoaks.

I must say, I never really understood the appeal of Benny Hill, though that certainly doesn't mean it was a bad show. Obviously, a lot of people liked the series, and how many of us can watch a scene shot in high speed and not start humming that goofy Benny Hill chase music?

I have to ask: will any of you miss Benny once he's gone? Or is he an artifact of an earlier age and no longer relevant?

[via CC Insider]

The UK's Channel 4 had decided not to broadcast a drama featuring British soldiers abusing Iraqi detainees so as not to exacerbate the current situation surrounding fifteen Royal Navy personnel currently held captive in Iran. The debut for the movie was moved to May 17, which will most likely remain now that the soldiers have been released to the British Embassy (and assuming their return to British soil).

The drama, Mark of Cain, is somewhat based on the true-life story of three British soldiers who were convicted of abusing Iraqi civilians at Camp Bread Basket, Basra, in May 2003. The drama itself, however, is entirely fictional according to Gerard Kearns, who plays a soldier in the made-for-TV movie. Due to the tumultuous nature of the diplomatic standoff, the channel decided it was better to avoid anything that might endanger the lives of the fifteen soldiers, who were held captive in a secret location for twelve days.