Big Brother Re-Interactive

Charles Slane

Good news for fans of Big Brother (and interactive services).

On this month's Backchat in a reply to a viewer in Mayo (Steve Barrett), a statement from E4 claims that the Irish regional content (ie ads) was to blame for the lack of interactivity.

E4 also states that the interactive option will be available for next year's show.

Rabies

i don't really care for big brother, don't even like watching it.
thats a different rant.

why was the interactive option not given to irish users, we pay a subscription the same as our neighbours over the water.

last years big brother was interactive, why not this year.

whats this you are saying about ads, these are the reason for no interactive. was there no ads in the english broadcast?

byte

Well, I'm glad to see they've noticed! Maybe we will be able to vote via the red button as interactive services via Phoneline shoiudl be up and running by then.

chernobyl

Originally posted by Charles Slane
E4 also states that the interactive option will be available for next year's show.

Super!

Charles Slane

Originally posted by Rabies
whats this you are saying about ads, these are the reason for no interactive. was there no ads in the english broadcast?

As far as I know, the Irish version of E4 (with Irish ads) is broadcast from a different transponder. To access the interactive function the channel has to be on the same transponder as the one broadcasting the interactive stream.

So I'd assume that by next year they'll have moved the Irish E4 onto the same transponder, or stream a duplicate of the interactive stuff on the Irish E4 transponder.

byte

Yeah, they'll probably have both versions of E4 on same mux though can't understand why they didn't do this in the first place.

ShaneOC

Do the BBC stream their interactive content on the different transponders? The various BBC1 variations are split over two transponers and they all carry the same interactive services.

DMC

Yes Shane,

The BBC main channels is organised in such a way that they are on only 2 transponders, and both transponders has BBCi content, which would include all interactive gubbins. The interactive stuff then links onto other transponders for the sport/regional news stuff. The BBC has 2 more transponders for holding all the feeds for the interactive stuff.

The exeception being BBC Parliament, and the link to BBC News Interactive. BBC Parliament is on a different transponder with S4C 2 and BBCi News (the split screen views of news and sport round-ups) is on one of the BBC transponders used soley for interactivity.

Which makes it look really seamless.

ShaneOC

The BBC make it look so easy, don't they?

Channel 4 now have two transponders. One for all the regional channels 4's plus E4 UK (this is where the interactive stuff was) and the other for the E4 Ireland and the Film Four movie channels.

TVDX

Yes, this is also in the Sky Guide, and its great to get such good news this far away from Big Brother 4, i thought i wouldnt know the answer to this problem until May 24th 2003 when the series starts.

But i have to admit its a huge joke to think that the only reason they couldnt provide the service was because they were stupid enough to put the irish version of E4 on a different transponder.

How stupid was that?, and it was just in time for Big Brother as well. Its funny to think how many solutions were bandied around at the time such as the fact that we dont have a phone line connection to our box and the fact that they didnt want us having it becasue we werent paying for it through voting on stupid polls and eviction votes.