Happy 10th birthday to the BBC's Red Button. Do you press it?

chris

It is 10 years since the BBC first piloted its Red Button interactive TV service. And 10 is the approximate number of times I have used it. It would appear I'm in the minority.

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday Red Button, happy birthday to you!

It is 10 years since the BBC launched its first pilot of the Red Button in the UK. And two years since Channel 4 dumped the interactive service, its chief executive Andy Duncan branding it "clunky and inefficient".

So who was right – Channel 4's Duncan or BBC director general Mark Thompson? There's only one way to find out. Fight!

I worry that I don't use the red button enough. But on the odd occasion when my mind has flickered towards the irritating little icon in the corner of the screen, I have found it an oddly unsatisfying experience.

The interactive news pages are slow to load and irritating to use. It is hardly surprising that it suffers in comparison with the web, but I sometimes find myself yearning for the good old analogue days of Teletext.

Anyone else remember Debbie's Diary on 4-Tel? Thought not.

I also hit red for Strictly Come Dancing's "expert commentary" on the celebrity contestants – while they were dancing! Exciting in theory, entirely unenlightening in practice, I switched off.

Then there is the opportunity, during big live football matches – there are not quite as many of these as there used to be on the BBC – to switch to an alternative commentary, such as BBC Radio 5 Live. This I quite like - if only to avoid Motty.

In the main the red button is of most use during big events, such as Wimbledon, the Olympics and Glastonbury, where you can break away from the main channel and watch something of particular interest to you.

But in this respect it is not so much "interactive" as a whole load of extra TV channels that come and go on demand.

Still, if it's interactive you want, you can have it. To mark its 10th birthday, red button fans are being treated to an EastEnders quiz, Bob the Builder karaoke and a whole load of other stuff I won't be touching with a 10 foot remote.

But it must have something going for it, with 11 million people hitting the red button every week. Eat that, Andy Duncan!

The BBC has also come up with their 10 top Red Button highlights from the last 10 years. Woo-hoo!

There is no word yet on whether the Red Button will be hosting a 10th birthday party, attended by all his best buddies – Set Top Box, Wireless Willy, Dave DAB radio, Barry BlackBerry, Ian iPlayer, Ione Sky+…

Anyway, here are those top 10 moments, according to the BBC. How were they for you?

1. Test The Nation, the UK's "first truly interactive quiz", says the BBC, which has been back 16 times since it launched in 2002. I did the first one. Not bothered since.

2. In 2002 the Chelsea Flower Show "brought interactivity to a new audience". Green fingers, red button.

3. The BBC's live music coverage has been interactive since 2003 - Glastonbury, T in the Park, Reading and Leeds, the BBC Proms…

4. In 2004, BBC Red Button broadcast a live interview from an astronaut orbiting in the international space station – a first for interactive television. Missed it.

5. BBC Northern Ireland staged its first ever interactive quiz in 2004 – Would You Pass the Eleven Plus?

6. Strictly Come Dancing's Len Goodman got behind the Red Button in 2005 to teach viewers a different dance each week.

7. More than half-a-million viewers pressed red to watch extended coverage and access up-to-the-minute results from the UK General Election in 2005.

8. "Fans of Doctor Who have been accessing weekly episode commentaries from the likes of Russell T Davies and David Tennant since 2006". I have only seen one Who episode since Eccleston left. How wrong am I?

9. CBeebies favourites Charlie and Lola went interactive in 2007 with an exclusive premiere of a new song and some corking karaoke. I love a singalong! Maybe they could do a David Bowie one.

10. The 2008 Beijing Olympics saw the launch of the new Sport Multiscreen, featuring up to six different streams, plus news, results and statistics.




Source:Guardian

Channel Hopper

I must admit I did hope it would improve once the channels had started growing on DVB, but at the moment I just press the multi screen on BBC News for the weather just before I leave the house, to find out if I will get wet or not.

The childrens channels have some games on them, but it definitely needs improvement to provide entertainment, and learning skills

There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness"

ynotdu

ha ha Channel hopper,Even knowing If we need a raincoat can be useful ! ;-)

Analoguesat

I use the red button services maybe a couple of times a year. They are far too slow to use on a sky box.

If I want to watch the BBC interactive stream I just tune them in on my Dreambox instead!

Analoguesat's message to the world Analogue forever!

rolfw

Likewise, have used it on several occasions for the weather and also when Wimbledon has been on, but have opted for using the Dreambox on a couple of occasions for the interactive screens..

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PaulR

Similarly, I don't use the red button on the Digibox but, if I want to watch an interactive stream (not often!) I'll tune directly into the channel (30x) on my Freeview PVR as generally the red button is just too slow.

PaulR As I get older I find myself thinking about the hereafter - I go into a room and then wonder what I'm here after.

simonskyman

I use it for sports and concerts,quite useful. I use text a lot but am disappointed with the speed. Why is the BBC and Sky text so slow?
Bring back fastext

Channel Hopper

Text in general doesn't work on digital transmissions, hence the idea of content on a different channel, or information via a guide within the transport stream.

It will improve, that I have no doubt, but only as long as there is no pandering to the 'quantity is better than quality' that pervades other broadcasters/broadcasting standards (DAB).

There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness"

wod

i dont use it as it doesn't work on my vantage satellite receiver with built in freeview tuner

it works very quick on my pace 2600 sky digibox though

bobdisk

I use the RedButton Very occasionally when I think of it, it can be useful some times for news weather and schedules, but it is very slow. I find it annoying that it keeps on popping up in the top corner every few minutes in news programmes, and it does not timeout on Freeview (am I allowed to use that Fr.. word on this site??!!).
Bobdisk, newbie

PaulR

Freeview, Freesat, $ly (my personal distaste won't let me spell it correctly!) are all OK.

Just don't mention the American satellite systems or the the Non-Satellite, Non-Terrestrial alternative way of getting TV for people in British cities.

And I quite agree with you about the annoying way the red button keeps returning on satellite and can't be got rid of at all on Freeview.

PaulR As I get older I find myself thinking about the hereafter - I go into a room and then wonder what I'm here after.

bobdisk

Actually, I have found that you can get rid of the dreddid "press red" on freeview by pressing the green button. It will go, until the next time!!
bobdisk

PaulR

You're right.

Would you believe that I discovered this myself only two days ago when I was idly pressing the buttons on the remote?

I know, get a life...

PaulR As I get older I find myself thinking about the hereafter - I go into a room and then wonder what I'm here after.

the_happy_traveller

same as a lot of you.....we just use the streams for bbc. lot less hassle.

irart

I use it to watch the Moto Grand Prix when it's on. Better than Eurosport - no interuptions for adverts!

Turok

since,i have a sky box,i press the red button too,before i dont know it

good idea,but the aplications,are a little bit slow!
does the have the patent on the red button?

doverrog

Anybody know why with Sat. when you press the red button,the BBC changes the channel to BBC news channel, which is annoying and takes ages, but with Freeview it stays on the channel you're on which is much better? It didn't always change channel on Sat. so there is presumbably a reason?

2cvbloke

In all honesty, it's very rarely used in this house, because it crashes the TV (Sony IDTV) and on cable sometimes it crashes and sometimes it works, so it's easier not to take that gamble...

On my old Nokia 9850T though, before I stripped the PSU of vital parts for something else, it worked well, but it had so little content available, I just didn't bother, cos I could get more info off the t'interwebby...

jimbo

If I'm around at 17.00 on Saturdays I use it for the Premiership stuff. Other than that not a lot.

Jimbo