Mondo from Dublin wrote: » They haven't marked their birthday in about 20 years and I highly doubt they will next month either but here is their first nights schedule https://scontent.fdub3-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/fr/cp0/e15/q65/44452544_2320622754832668_946582677182480384_n.jpg?_nc_cat=100&efg=eyJpIjoidCJ9&_nc_ht=scontent.fdub3-1.fna&oh=e5d86be2b569acb78c85a13d123a5e7d&oe=5C85A40D
One of the big pre-launch hopes and predictions for RTÉ 2 was that it would provide late-night weekend entertainment. Closedown on the night of the grand opening came at 11.35pm and downcast viewers settled in for the next future of broadcasting to arrive in the shape of the VCR.
Instead, its arrival led to a huge surge in households and entire estates paying to have cable installed so they could have back their BBC and ITV no matter what cultural imperialism came with the bundle.
Arthur Daley wrote: » RTE2 seemed to be a very stuffy place in the first ten years, don't think it's image was the best. Then with Network 2 in 1988, it somehow got a bit of edge. Coinciding with an uptick in the economy in 1988, and a bit more confidence around the country in general. Programmes like Nighthawks, the first showing of Italian soccer in 1990, a handy, concise late news show around 10.30/11 and then the End came along around 1994. It was a successful rebrand.
The second key demographic that the new station was created to serve was that social strata known today as 'young adult'. Ireland had experienced a mini-economic boom in the 1960s. Compared to the wild abandon of the Celtic Tiger it was modest stuff, but it meant that for the first time since the foundation of the State, Irish school-leavers in the 1970s weren't forced to head straight for the cattle boat out of the country.
The showband industry announced they would mount a picket of RTÉ 2's opening ceremony, although on the night the promised placards were thin on the ground.
Elmo wrote: » This is where the 2nd Demographic came in, when it became Network 2, RTÉ weren't concerned with that demographic, save for a few shows like MT USA, I think aired on RTÉ1 first, while I vaguely remember TOTP airing on RTÉ1 also, as did Dempesy Den, Pajo etc etc, RTÉ2 catered little for Yuff TV in its first 10 years.
AwaitYourReply wrote: » I never recall MT USA going out on RTÉ 1 all those years ago - if memory serves me correct I think it was a 3 hour long show on Sunday afternoons on RTÉ2 and later they repeated the same edition late on Friday nights on RTÉ2. This was all pre-"Network 2" days. In fact, after Vincent Hanley passed away, MT USA was cancelled and was eventually replaced by music video show called "Finding Fax Future" which had no presenters.
I remember Dempsey's Den with Ian Dempsey on RTÉ1 (originally had no Zig+Zag etc which came on at 4:00pm straight after "Live at 3" with Derek Davis & Thelma Mansfield. Top of the Pops was on RTÉ2 but following the re-brand to "Network 2" TOTP moved across to RTÉ1 for a few more years but the show was dropped altogether by RTÉ long before the weekly edition was eventually cancelled by BBC TV. Coronation Street was also moved from RTÉ2 to RTÉ1 around same time that Network 2 was launched in Autumn 1988.
"Nighthawks" with Shay Healy was also a unique show for the channel with interviews & music performances in a café and "Network News" would replace the programme Newsnight.
Elmo wrote: » I was reading an article from the RTÉ Guide about MT USA starting up on Twitter KillianM I think? I never saw MT USA or remember it. I always assumed it was replaced by The Beat Box and later 2TV. Only remember TOPT being on ONE, but only a vague memory I think their was a dispute at the BBC and RTÉ never returned it when the BBC returned it? Could be wrong but interest to know if this is the case, as such The Fanta Chart Show on Sratch Saturday slightly replaced it following by Top Thirty Hits. Coro St moved to RTÉ ONE during the Barelona Olympics and remained there until it moved to TV3/VMT one. Nighthawks eventual replaced by about 10 (well at least 3) Jerry Ryan Vehicles, and then the arrival of Later on 2 as part of N2. Think dropping Newsnight which seems like a world news service with reports from BBC and ITN as a huge leap backwards when both NETWORK NEWS and NEWS2 where largely RTÉ NEWS on 2. Never understood the idea of Marketplace on Network 2, eventually subsumed into Prime Time.
Elmo wrote: » Always thought their was an internal BBC dispute that put TOTP off air for a year or so, when it returned to the BBC it was dropped by RTÉ.
Elmo wrote: » RTÉ/Network 2 had a sit-com Monday to Friday at 9pm, up to the mid-1990s? Though I know Friends went out at 8:40 on Tuesday night when it first started, before they started the Comedy Night on Mondays.
Hotblack Desiato wrote: » The only memorable thing about early RTE2 was the amazingly garish magenta and yellow graphics.
Elmo wrote: » Actually a number off issues with that report, I start with the last one, AFAIK late night TV in the UK (BBC1, 2 and ITV) until the mid-1980s.https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/schedules/bbcone/london/1978-11-02https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/schedules/bbctwo/england/1978-11-02https://www.transdiffusion.org/2018/06/26/tonights-anglia-tv-in-1978-2https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_Network The End would be RTÉ2's, then Network2, start on Late Night TV on Friday and Saturday, starting early 1990s.
Hotblack Desiato wrote: » No I mean like the start of this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ju6RFrkSKyw Looked even more garish on the CRT TVs of the time which most people turned the colour knob up more than they should, to get value for money out of their colour TV licence :pac: The big surprise was that it took them more than a minute to get the first words of Irish in! I remember Night Light, it was shockingly bad!
Hotblack Desiato wrote: » I can't find a video on youtube, but the big magenta and yellow RTE2 logo used to flip over into lots of small RTE2 logos. There must have been a mechanical model of this somewhere in Montrose, like the old fashioned BBC globe! It certainly wasn't computer generated. The video I posted here looks like it really did for the first few seconds, until the actual start of transmission. The next bit (which ends with the big 2 zooming in) I first thought was a digital Youtube fake, but it's quite possible that RTE paid for a few seconds of digital (by 1978 standards) animation for their big day. The hue and saturation don't match up to what they usually had.
Hotblack Desiato wrote: » My mother worked in the Dept of Agriculture in the 60s before she got married (and as a result, made redundant), she knew yer man who did Mart and Market and everyone used to call him "Egghead" :pac: Somehow or other our prim and proper Protestant neighbour a couple of doors down in our low-to-medium rent ex-council Dublin suburb got wind of this appelation years later and was not impressed! It turned out he was a second cousin twice removed or some other bolloxology degree of relation of hers. Small world, eh!
Elmo wrote: » It's funny how that logo gets slack when the RTÉ 1 logo is this watching too much making the murder.
