BBC One

BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man and Channel Islands. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution. It was renamed BBC TV in 1960, using this name until the launch of sister channel BBC2 in 1964, whereupon the BBC TV channel became known as BBC1, with the current spelling adopted in 1997.

The channel's annual budget for 2012/13 is £1.14 billion. The channel is funded by the television licence fee together with the BBC's other domestic television stations, and therefore shows uninterrupted programming without commercial advertising. It is currently the most watched television channel in the United Kingdom, ahead of its traditional rival for ratings leadership, ITV.

the channel controller for BBC One is Charlotte Moore, who succeeded Danny Cohen initially as Acting Controller from May 2013.

History
Baird Television Ltd. made Britain's first television broadcast, on 30 September 1929 from its studio in Long Acre, London, via the BBC's London transmitter, using the electromechanical system pioneered by John Logie Baird. This system used a vertically-scanned image of 30 lines – just enough resolution for a close-up of one person, and with a bandwidth low enough to use existing radio transmitters. Simultaneous transmission of sound and picture was achieved on 30 March 1930, by using the BBC's new twin transmitter at Brookmans Park. By late 1930, 30 minutes of morning programmes were broadcast Monday to Friday, and 30 minutes at midnight on Tuesdays and Fridays, after BBC radio went off the air. Baird broadcasts via the BBC continued until June 1932.

The BBC began its own regular television programming from the basement of Broadcasting House, London, on 22 August 1932. The studio moved to larger quarters in 16 Portland Place, London, in February 1934, and continued broadcasting the 30-line images, carried by telephone line to the medium wave transmitter at Brookmans Park, until 11 September 1935, by which time advances in all-electronic television systems made the electromechanical broadcasts obsolete.

After a series of test transmissions and special broadcasts that began in August, regular BBC television broadcasts officially resumed on 1 October 1936, from a converted wing of Alexandra Palace in London, which housed two studios, various scenery stores, make-up areas, dressing rooms, offices, and the transmitter itself, now broadcasting on the VHF band. BBC television initially used two systems, on alternate weeks: the 240-line Baird intermediate film system and the 405-line Marconi-EMI system, each making the BBC the world's first regular high-definition television service, broadcasting Monday to Saturday from 15:00 to 16:00 and 21:00 to 22:00.

The two systems were to run on a trial basis for six months; early television sets supported both resolutions. However, the Baird system, which used a mechanical camera for filmed programming and Farnsworth image dissector cameras for live programming, proved too cumbersome and visually inferior, and was dropped in February 1937.

Initially, the station's range was officially a 25-mile (40 km) radius of the Alexandra Palace transmitter—in practice, however, transmissions could be picked up a good deal further away, and on one occasion in 1938 were picked up by engineers at RCA in New York, who were experimenting with a British television set.

Wartime closure
On 1 September 1939, two days before Britain declared war on Germany, the station was taken off air with little warning; the government were concerned that the VHF transmissions would act as a beacon to enemy aircraft homing in on London. Also, many of the television service's technical staff and engineers would be needed for the war effort, in particular on the radar programme. The last programme transmitted was a Mickey Mouse cartoon, Mickey's Gala Premier (1933), which was followed by test transmissions and an announcement of the afternoon's programmes, which were in the event not broadcast; this account refuted an urban myth according to which broadcasting was suspended before the end of the cartoon.

According to figures from Britain's Radio Manufacturers Association, 18,999 television sets had been manufactured from 1936 to September 1939, when production was halted by the war.

The remaining monopoly years
BBC Television returned on 7 June 1946 at 15:00. Jasmine Bligh, one of the original announcers, made the first announcement, saying, 'Good afternoon everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh?'. The Mickey Mouse cartoon of 1939 was repeated twenty minutes later. Alexandra Palace was the home base of the channel until the early 1950s when the majority of production moved into the newly acquired Lime Grove Studios.

Postwar broadcast coverage was extended to Birmingham in 1949 with the opening of the Sutton Coldfield transmitting station, and by the mid-1950s most of the country was covered, transmitting a 405-line interlaced image on VHF.

Loss of monopoly


The BBC held a statutory monopoly on television broadcasting in the United Kingdom until the first ITV began to broadcast on the 22 September 1955, when ITV started broadcasting. The competition quickly forced the channel to change its identity and priorities following a large reduction in its audience. BBC1 has been based since 1960 at the purpose-built BBC Television Centre at White City, London. Television News continued to use Alexandra Palace as its base—by early 1968 it had even converted one of its studios to colour—before moving to new purpose-built facilities at Television Centre on 20 September 1969.

The 1962 Pilkington Report on the future of broadcasting noticed this, and that ITV lacked any serious programming. It therefore decided that Britain's third television station should be awarded to the BBC.

The station was renamed BBC1 when BBC2 was launched on 20 April 1964 transmitting an incompatible 625-line image on UHF. The only way to receive all channels was to use a very complex "dual-standard" 405- and 625-line, VHF and UHF, receiver, with both a VHF and a UHF aerial. Old 405-line-only sets became completely obsolete in 1985, when transmission in the standard ended.

In the weeks leading up to 15 November 1969, BBC1 unofficially transmitted the occasional programme in its new colour system, to test it. At midnight on 15 November, simultaneously with ITV and two years after BBC2, BBC1 officially began 625-line PAL colour programming on UHF with a broadcast of a concert by Petula Clark. Colour transmissions could be received (in monochrome) on monochrome 625-line sets until the end of analogue broadcasting.

In terms of audience share, the most successful period for BBC1 was under Bryan Cowgill between 1973–1977, when the channel achieved an average audience share of 45%. This period is still regarded by many as a golden age of the BBC's output, with the BBC achieving a very high standard across its entire range of series, serials, plays, light entertainment and documentaries.

On 30 December 1980, the BBC announced there intention to also introduce a new breakfast television service to compete with TV-am. BBC stated it would start broadcasting before TV-am, but made clear the BBC hands were tied until November 1981 when the new licence fee income become available, to help finance extending broadcast hours, with the hope of starting in 1982. . On 17 January 1983, the First Breakfast Time went on air, proving the first UK wide Breakfast television serviceh and continued to lead in the rating until 1984.

Michael Grade era
In 1984, Bill Cotton become Managing Director of Television at the BBC, and set about overhauling BBC1, which had been slated for poor home grown shows, its heavy reliance on US imports, with Dallas and The Thorn Birds'' being BBC1's highest rated programmes and ratings being over 20% behind ITV. Cotton recruited Michael Grade to become Controller of BBC One, the first time the Corporation had recruited someone outwith the BBC, replacing Alan Hart, who has been criticised for his lack of knowledge in general entertainment, as he was head of BBC Sport prior to 1981.

The first major overhaul was to axe Sixty Minutes current affairs programme with the  Six O'clock news, a straight new programme in a bid to shore up its failing early evening slot. It was believed the BBC were planning to cut short the evening news and move more light entertainment programming in from the 18:20 slot, but was dismissed. The Miss Great Britain contest was dropped, being described as verging on the too offensive, After the January 1985 contest, with Worlds Strongest Man and International Superstar being axed as well. Play of the Month was also dropped after 20 years.

On Monday 18 February 1985, BBC1 was relaunch, with a new look, new programming including Wogan, EastEnders and a revised schedule, to help streamline and maintain viewers thought the course of the evening. Grade started to gear most programmes to either on the hour or half past the hour, while Panorama and Omnibus were both moved after the Nine o'clock News. Grade was also determined to end the dated and inept BBC1 scheduling which was hampering the network and which was holding back good programmes. Grade stated "When I took over BBC1, I discovered there were wonderful things, it was just a case of where to put them." Wogan had been scheduled for a 10pm slot, but Grade moved it to a 7pm slot as he believed the show had potential. From February to August 1985, a high amount of American mini series were broadcast while filming took place of a number of new home grown programmes, including 'Allo 'Allo!, In Sickness and in Health, and Open All Hours. Further improvement come about when the corporation strengthened its drama output costing £30 million, with eight new series, including Howards' Way, All Creatures Great and Small, Hold the Back Page, and Bluebill along with the return of Bergerac and Big Deal. The increase in the drama department was archived by switching the money away from the administrative service over a three year period, after BBC1 was criticised, for failing in matching ITV's output in drama. EastEnders was moved to a 19:30 slot, where it managed to soar to 20 million, which helped the BBC1 audience share increase to nearly 50% for the first time since 1982.

On Monday 27 October 1986, BBC1 introduced its daytime television services as Roger Laughton ( head of BBC Daytime programming) stated it was the natural extension of the corporations commitment to public service broadcasting, since half the population had access to Television during the day mainly the retired, unemployed and housewife's. which included a new One O'Clock News, Open Air, Day to Day and Neighbours

1990s
Stereo audio transmissions, using the NICAM digital stereo sound format began on BBC1 at some point in autumn 1987, to coincide with the sale of the first consumer NICAM-enabled equipment, a year after BBC2, and were gradually phased in across BBC TV output, although it took until 31 August 1991 for the service to begin officially on both channels. During this time, both commercial analogue broadcasters, ITV and Channel 4 had officially begun stereo transmissions using the BBC-developed NICAM system. Widescreen programming was introduced on digital platforms in 1998.

For the first fifty years of its existence, with the exception of films and purchased programmes from the United States and elsewhere, almost all the channel's output was produced by the BBC's in-house production departments. This changed following the Broadcasting Act 1990, which required that 25% of the BBC's television output be out-sourced to independent production companies. By 2004 many popular BBC One shows were made for the channel by independents, but the in-house production departments continued to contribute heavily to the schedule.

2000s
Lorraine Heggessey become Controller of BBC One, a post she took up on 1 November 2000. She had previously been sounded out about the job in 1997, after Michael Jackson's departure, but had turned down the opportunity as she felt she was then not yet experienced enough.

During Heggessey's five years in charge, BBC One's audience share fell by 19.9%, to 23%, although this was in the context of declining audience figures across all British television channels due to increased competition from multichannel digital television. However, in 2001 BBC One overtook its main rival ITV1 in terms of annual audience share for the first time since the rival channel had launched in 1955, although much of this was down to the success of the channel's daytime television line-up, which had its own Controller in Jane Lush.

When Heggessey arrived at the channel in November 2000, she inherited two controversial schedule changes which had been implemented the previous month, at the behest of Director-General of the BBC Greg Dyke; the main evening BBC News bulletin had been moved from 9pm to 10pm, and Panorama moved from a Monday night prime time slot to a later slot on Sunday nights. The moving of Panorama attracted criticism that BBC One was sidelining serious programming in favour of more populist output. Heggessey publicly defended the decision despite it not being hers, claiming that Panorama's ratings would have "dwindled" in its previous slot.

Heggessey and the BBC's Controller of Drama Commissioning, Jane Tranter, took advantage of the weekday 9pm slot opened up by the moving of the news to commission new popular drama output, such as the successful Waking the Dead (2000–2011) and Spooks (2002–2011). Celebrity dancing show Strictly Come Dancing (2004–present) was also a popular success on Saturday nights, although another Saturday night entertainment series, Fame Academy, faced accusations of being too derivative of the output of commercial rivals, and during Heggessey's era the channel frequently came under attack for being too populist and not providing enough serious programming.

Heggessey did later concede in a 2005 interview with The Independent newspaper that arts programming had suffered a cutback under her control of BBC One. However, she did respond to this omission following criticism from the Board of Governors of the BBC by commissioning programmes such as the arts documentary series Imagine... (2003–present) and A Picture of Britain (2005).

In 2002, Heggessey took the decision to abandon the traditional "Globe" idents the channel had used in a variety of forms for its between-programme idents since 1963. They were replaced by a new style of on-air identity for the channel, the "Rhythm & Movement" idents. The new idents attracted some criticism for going against the traditions of the channel and pandering to political correctness, as they featured activities performed by people of various ethnicities.

One of Heggessey's most notable decisions and last major success at the channel was the re-commissioning of the science-fiction drama series Doctor Who, which had been a popular hit in previous decades but ceased production in 1989. Heggessey and Jane Tranter commissioned a new version of the series in September 2003, after Heggessey had spent two years persuading the BBC's commercial arm, BBC Worldwide, to abandon their attempts to make a feature film version of the programme and allow it instead to return to BBC One. The new version of Doctor Who (2005–present) debuted on 26 March 2005 and became a critical and popular hit, with Paul Hoggart of The Times newspaper describing the series as "a joyful, exuberant reinvention and a fine legacy from Ms Heggessey."

On 14 February 2005 it was announced that Lorraine Heggessey was to leave the BBC to take up the post of Chief Executive at production company Talkback Thames. She left on 15 April. Five months after her departure, BBC One was named "Channel of the Year" at the Edinburgh Television Festival, primarily on the strength of Heggessey commissions such as Strictly Come Dancing and Doctor Who.

Joining the channel as Controller in 2005, Peter Fincham oversaw the commissioning of several successful BBC One programmes including Robin Hood (2006–2009), Jane Eyre (2006) and How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?, which was followed by similar shows Any Dream Will Do and I'd Do Anything because of its success. His first full year in charge of the channel saw a year-on-year growth in the audience share, with a rise from 22.2% in August 2005 to 23.6% in August 2006.

Fincham also directly initiated the creation of both The One Show (2006–present), an early evening, current-affairs and lifestyle programme, which now runs all but two weeks of the year, and Davina (2006), a prime time chat show, the latter hosted by Davina McCall, who presented Big Brother. However, Davina was a critical and ratings disaster, which Fincham subsequently admitted was personally his fault, although he defended the strategy of experimenting with the BBC One schedule. This he continued in January 2007, when he moved the current affairs series Panorama from its Sunday night slot back to the prime time Monday evening slot from which it had been removed in 2000, most likely in response to a demand from the Board of Governors of the BBC for the channel to show more current affairs programming in prime time.

Fincham's judgement was again called into question, this time by The Telegraph, for his decision to spend £1.2 million replacing the channel's 'Rhythm and Movement' idents, which had been introduced by his predecessor Lorraine Heggessey several years earlier, with the 'Circle' idents, a set of eight ten-second films, some of which were shot abroad in locations such as Mexico and Croatia. Fincham later found himself having to publicly defend the £18 million salary that the BBC paid Jonathan Ross in 2006, although Ross's BBC One work—primarily consisting of Friday Night with Jonathan Ross—formed only part of his overall BBC commitment.

The channel was named Channel of the Year at the 2007 Broadcast Awards.

In May 2007, Fincham took the decision to drop Neighbours, an Australian soap opera, from BBC One after 21 years on the channel, when its producers significantly raised the price they wanted the BBC to pay for it in a bidding war. Fincham commented that it was 'a big loss', but that BBC One would not pay 'the best part of £300 million'. Neighbours left the channel in spring 2008 to move to Channel 5.

There was further controversy in July 2007 when Fincham was accused of misleading BBC One viewer. The incident involved a clip from forthcoming documentary A Year with the Queen which was shown to journalists during a press conference. It apparently showed the Queen storming out of a session with American photographer Annie Leibovitz over a disagreement about what she should wear, but the BBC subsequently admitted that the scenes used in the trailer had been edited out of their correct order, meaning that a false impression was given. Fincham admitted the error, but rejected calls that he should resign from his position as a result. His future was deemed uncertain following critical comments from Sir Michael Lyons, Chairman of the BBC Trust and he resigned on 5 October 2007.

Recent years
In 2012, the BBC out-bid ITV for the rights to The Voice UK, which had already proved to be popular in other countries. The BBC paid £22 million for the rights to broadcast the show in the UK for two years. The Voice UK achieved good ratings for the BBC but ratings dropped towards the end of the first series and the second series. In 2013, The Voice was rescheduled later to avoid a clash.

BBC One HD
BBC One HD, a simulcast of BBC One in high-definition (HD), launched on 3 November 2010 at 19:00. The channel simulcasts a network version of BBC One in High Definition, with HD versions of programmes including Holby City, The One Show, Strictly Come Dancing, The Apprentice and Doctor Who. EastEnders was also made available in HD as from Christmas Day 2010. All programmes still made in standard-definition are upscaled on the channel and it is intended that by 2012 the vast majority of the channel's output will be in high-definition. On 30 May 2012, the satellite and terrestrial horizontal resolution was increased to 1920 pixels.

BBC One HD, at launch did not offer regional variations, and therefore the channel cannot broadcast during regional programming slots, most noticeably the local news programmes. The BBC Trust admitted that this is due to technical and financial constraints, but the BBC announced on 6 June 2011 that the national variations of BBC One Northern Ireland, BBC One Scotland and BBC One Wales, would become available from 2012. On 24 October 2012, Northern Ireland received the first variation. A Scottish variation launched on 14 January 2013, followed by a Welsh variation on 29 January 2013. On 16 July 2013, the BBC indicated that it also wants to launch English regional variants of BBC One HD, however this would require the approval of the BBC Trust, with a proposal due to be presented within six months.

BBC One HD is available on all digital television platforms offering HD channels – Freesat, Freeview, Sky, Smallworld Cable, UPC Ireland and Virgin Media. It is available in addition to BBC Two HD, which simulcasts BBC Two's programming in HD.

Contemporary programming
The top five, most watched programmes, excluding sporting events and news coverage. (At their peak viewing points, according to BARB) were:

With a mission to provide programmes for all licence-fee payers, it has sport, news, current affairs, and documentaries. It has historically broadcast children's programmes (now taken from CBBC and CBeebies). The channel remains one of the principal television channels in the United Kingdom and provides 2,508 annual hours of news and weather, 1,880 hours of factual and learning, 1,036 hours of drama, 672 hours of children's, 670 hours of sport, 654 hours of film, 433 hours of entertainment, 159 hours of current affairs, 92 hours of religion and 82 hours of music and arts.

Since 1990 the BBC has had to commission output from other domestic suppliers. Although the statutory target remains 25% for independent production companies to contribute programming for BBC One, 33% of output was made by them in 2010/11. The quota of original programming in peak times is set at 90%, however 100% of peak programming was original in 2010/11. Over the whole day, the total for the same year was 89%, against a quota of 70%.

2,508 annual hours of news and weather (293 in peak, 1,049 of BBC News simulcasts) are provided by regular news programmes BBC Breakfast, the BBC News at One, BBC News at Six and the BBC News at Ten each including BBC regional news programmes. All three main news bulletins have a lead over their rival programmes on ITV and other terrestrial or cable channels. During the weekend period, three separate bulletins around these three time periods are broadcast and vary in length from 10–25 minutes. BBC One has broadcast overnight simulcasts from the BBC News channel since 1997; the latter in turn simulcasts the majority of all regular BBC One bulletins.

Each year 159 hours of current affairs programmes are broadcast on BBC One, including Panorama and Watchdog. Politics is also covered, with programmes including Question Time and This Week shown. Crimewatch, a programme appealing for help in unsolved crimes, is broadcast monthly.

BBC One shows 1,880 hours of factual and learning programming annually. These includes a wide range of shows such as nature documentaries such as Planet Earth as well as lifestyle-format daytime programmes and a number of reality television formats and the One Life strand.

BBC One broadcasts 1,036 hours of drama each year, more than any other BBC channel. There are four half-hour episodes of EastEnders each week (not shown on Wednesdays), with an omnibus episode at the weekend, plus hospital dramas Casualty and Holby City. Other popular dramas on BBC One include crime dramas such as New Tricks, a programme of which even episode repeats have beaten ITV ratings on numerous occasions.

BBC One has traditionally been the home of children's television, Blue Peter had been broadcast on the channel prior to the Children's BBC strand, and sections such as the pre-school Watch with Mother being transmitted on the channel for several decades. This became more pronounced with the launch of Children's BBC, later renamed "CBBC". This new strand was broadcast primarily on BBC One in the late afternoons, as well as Saturday and Sunday mornings also such as Going Live! and Live & Kicking, each lasting two to three hours. The launch in 2002 of dedicated digital channels for this content —the CBBC Channel and CBeebies—did not affect this provision. Combined with BBC Two, the channel broadcast 2,195 hours of children's programmes in 2010, mostly in the late afternoons on weekdays. Saturday morning children's programming moved to BBC Two in 2006 following a three-month trial.

Sports coverage on BBC One includes Premier League football highlights on Match of the Day, The Championships, Wimbledon, horse racing such as the Grand National, the London Marathon, and other international athletics and swimming events, the Olympic Games, Rugby League, Rugby Union, Snooker tournaments, and more. The BBC shows The Football League Show for Football League highlights and League Cup coverage. Formula 1 motor racing is also shown, Saturday's qualifying and Sunday's main race.

On 18 January 2010, the BBC introduced a local Football League highlight show called Late Kick Off. The BBC also shows the Football League Cup final, and ten Football League matches live from the 2009/10 season. The BBC showed the 2010 FIFA World Cup, splitting the group stage matches with ITV. The BBC had first pick of matches from the second round. Repeats made up 8.4% of peak programming in 2010/11, up from 8.0% for 2008/09. Programming on this channel costs an average of £162,900 per hour.

British and international films are broadcast for 654 hours each year on BBC One. This is mainly late-night fillers with some box office hits at Christmas and holiday periods. Films are sometimes used to fill the Saturday evening slot when no sport or entertainment programmes are due to be aired.

Entertainment programming on BBC One includes game shows such as the National Lottery, Total Wipeout, Strictly Come Dancing and chat shows such as The Graham Norton Show.

The annual 92 hours of religious programming comprise weekly editions of recorded Songs of Praise, Christian services and other shows from independent production companies. Mentorn Oxford produces Heart and Soul, described as “a new multi-faith programme featuring a panel and a studio audience”, followed by Life from the Loft which is made by the Leeds-based company True North. In 2005 BBC One was criticised for reducing the amount of religious programming, previously 101 hours per year.

BBC One broadcasts many comedy programmes, often on Friday nights. These have included the stand-up comedy show Live at the Apollo, sitcom Outnumbered, and satirical quiz show Have I Got News For You. Saturday evening is also a popular slot for a comedy show such as Michael McIntyre's Comedy Roadshow and The Armstrong and Miller Show.

As the weekly popular music chart programme Top of the Pops was dropped in 2006 (except for the Christmas Day edition), BBC One broadcast 49 hours of music and arts programming in 2010. The majority of this was Imagine, presented by Alan Yentob, and classical music concerts, in particular some of the BBC Proms.

BBC One's daytime line-up was a major factor in it overtaking ITV as the most popular channel in 2000, a position it has retained. The morning daytime line-up consists of lifestyle shows, such as Homes Under the Hammer and Bargain Hunt, the afternoons contain drama with daily soap Doctors and classic US drama, such as Diagnosis: Murder. Sometimes a drama such as Land Girls is shown in the afternoons.

Between 15:05 and 17:05 is the CBeebies/CBBC broadcasting strand, with its own visual identity. Historically, BBC One's most popular daytime programme was Neighbours, with audience figures approaching five million. On 11 February 2008, BBC One dropped Neighbours and the programme has since been broadcast on Channel 5. In its place the quiz show The Weakest Link, moved from BBC Two, later replaced in 2011 by Pointless.

On 16 May 2012, the BBC announced the children's block of shows would be moved permanently to CBBC and CBeebies upon the completion of the Digital Switchover.

Presentation
On 15 November 1969, BBC1 began transmitting in colour, and introduced the first version of the “mirror globe” ident (this style was often used within Monty Python’s Flying Circus). The inclusion of the word “colour” in the station ident could be viewed as a subtle reminder to the vast majority of viewers, still watching in black and white, to buy a colour TV set and the much more expensive colour television licence which financed the BBC.

COW, 1985
Michael Grade joined the BBC Television in 1984 as Controller of BBC One, becoming Director of Programmes in 1986 and Managing Director Designate in 1987. During his rein he oversaw a major retouch of the channel on 18 February 1985. The new computer graphics technology was held back from the 1 January to co-inside with a Major relaunch of BBC One.