BBC Three have just relaunched their DOG – that is to say, the graphical logo in the corner of the screen that tells stupid people what channell they’re watching (it comes up on whatever digital box they have anyway) and generally distracts the viewer.
Anyway, BBC Three’s previous logo was seemingly too small, because they’ve now put a massive one in its place.
Then they posted a sarcastic article attacking those who dislike the things on their website. They’ve taken in down now, and replaced it with a less sarcastic version. I can’t find the original cached on Google, but here’s a cut’n’paste of it.
Frankly this just increases the general disdain I have for BBC Three – quite possible the only BBC channel (radio or television) that I don’t think fulfills its remit. It spends far more than the significantly better BBC Four (£92.9m v £41.1m), and the majority of its most popular programmes are either repeats of BBC 1 programmes (Eastenders, Dr Who), or are destined for BBC 2 from the outset (Little Britain, Bodies).
They even needlessly interrupt films with news – something they can leave either broadcast at the start or leave until the end.
I firmly believe that the channel needs a new broom or face closure and replacement with something else.
[Update: Mediaguardian follows up this story – free registration required. And the BBC have put their response to the furore here. Note that the response does not refer to the following sentence that orginally appeared
In a world where international terrorism, indiscriminate murder and global poverty are facts of life, you might think people would have more important things to worry about than little logos in the top corner of their television screen
For all the rights and wrongs of the DOG appearing on the screen, that article appearing as BBC news is indefensible. An apology is required.] [Update 2: The BBC have apologised and removed the article altogether. I also note that they’ve reduced the size of the logo. So now it’s significantly smaller. They’d already adjusted the opacity of it. I still argue that these logos are pretty pointless anyway.]