Sky One

Sky1

Country	United Kingdom
Programming
Language(s)	English
Ownership
Owner	BSkyB

Sky1 is a British Sky Broadcasting entertainment channel in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. The channel first launched on 26 April 1982 as "Satellite Television", and is the fourth-oldest TV channel in the UK, behind BBC One (2 November 1936), ITV (22 September 1955) and BBC Two (20 April 1964). (Channel 4 began later on in 1982).

History

Sky Channel

Sky1 started on 26 April 1982 as "Satellite Television Ltd", set up by Brian Hayes, formerly controller of Thames Television. The channel was bought by Rupert Murdoch in 1984 and renamed "Sky Channel". The channel produced a number of home grown programmes, including Sky Trax which covered European music and children's programmes like Fun Factory and The DJ Kat Show. On 5 February 1989, the channel moved to the Astra 1A satellite when Murdoch created the Sky Television Network. At the same time, prime-time broadcasts to European cable operators ended, being replaced by Eurosport.

British Sky Broadcasting Network

Initially the channel's programming remained much the same, except for a few international travel documentaries. On 30 July 1989 the channel was renamed Sky One and began broadcasting to UK and Ireland only. But it was not until 1990-1 that it began to acquire more recent programming, an early success being Moonlighting, which the BBC had previously screened but not repeated. Sky One also picked up some programming (and more importantly, advertisers) from its merger with BSB's Galaxy. On 1 September 1993 Sky One was encrypted as part of the Sky Multichannels subscription package, and could no longer be viewed outside the UK and Ireland without exporting a box, or receiving it over cable.

A companion channel, Sky 2, launched on 1 September 1996 but was not a success and closed after just a day behind one year, on 31 August 1997.

In 2000, a dedicated feed of Sky One for the Republic of Ireland was launched. For most of this Irish feeds existence, the only difference between it and the UK feed has been differing commercials and programme promotions.

2002 - present

In 2002, Sky One launched their new logo along with new idents. Sky One again gained a sister channel, Sky One Mix, which was intended as a "catch-up" channel, screening repeats of key Sky One programmes later in the same week. The channel was subsequently renamed Sky Mix. Before again being renamed to Sky Two on 31 October 2005 with the launch of a second sister channel, Sky Three.

In June 2003, the channel started broadcasting in 16:9 widescreen. However, all trailers and commercials were in 4:3 until November 2005 because they were played off the same servers for all Sky channels, many of which were not broadcast in widescreen.

Sky1 relaunch

'Sky One' was relaunched as 'Sky1' on 31 August 2008 with five new idents: "Bones", "Whack", "Twister", "Lost" and "Boxes". Sky1 plans to add more idents on 30 September 2009 to celebrate the first anniversary of the new idents. The single 'Do It Well' by Jennifer Lopez was used for the relaunch of the channel for promos showing upcoming highlights and new series.

Sky1 HD

File:Sky1 HD logo.png

Sky1 HD logo

To coincide with launch of Sky HD, Sky1 HD began broadcasting in May 2006. The channel is a simulcast of Sky1 and screens high-definition versions of some of the channel's programming, which include Lost, Bones, 24, Fringe, Prison Break, House later episodes of Malcolm in the Middle, and most recently new episodes of The Simpsons. Programmes that are not available in HD are upscaled(Although Sky1 does show the original widescreen film from Malcolm in the Middle, unlike most US broadcasts, since the series was originally filmed on Panavision widesceen film but cropped to full-screen by most broadcasters. This airing of the original film preserves the shows appearence without stretching or upscaling, although some scenes were comprimised for widescreen and had to be upscaled) . Sky have stated that they intend to increase the amount of HD content they show, and hope that by the end of 2008, two thirds of all prime time shows, and 90% of their own original commissions, will be in HD. There was also a new Sky1 HD logo which was introduced along with the rebrand on 31 August 2008 and this logo can be seen on the right.

Virgin Media dispute

On 1 March 2007, at 00:00 GMT, Sky's basic channels, which included Sky1, Sky2, Sky News, Sky Sports News, Sky Travel and Sky Travel Extra were removed from the Virgin Media cable television services after a dispute between Virgin Media and BSkyB. This was due to the expiry of their previous carriage agreement and the companies' inability to reach a new deal. Virgin issued legal proceedings against Sky over the dispute in April 2007.

The Virgin Media predecessor Telewest was involved in a similar situation in late 2004 when negotiations for renewed carriage of the Nickelodeon channels broke down. Telewest was unwilling to pay extra to keep the channels and preferred to simply drop them. Other Viacom owned channels remained such as MTV and Paramount Comedy 1. The reaction to this by customers was fairly large and many left the provider to rival Sky, others were retained as Telewest offered them a free upgrade to the Disney Channel for periods of between one and three months, others were reportedly offered upgrades to Sky Movies packages in a desperate attempt to keep them from leaving. The Nickelodeon channels returned to the Telewest platform on 12 February 2005 following successful renegotiations in Nickelodeon's favour.

At the beginning of March 2008 the two companies were reported to have resumed discussions over the dispute. Virgin chief executive Neil Berkett was reported as saying they had "continued interest in securing Sky basics back on our platform". The resumed talks had followed shortly after both Virgin and BSkyB had launched appeals against a recent Competition Appeal Tribunal ruling on BSkyB's 17.9% stake in ITV plc.

On 4 November 2008, a carriage deal between BSkyB and Virgin Media channels was reached and BSkyB's channels were available on Virgin's cable service from 13 November 2008. The Sky basic channels are spread across each tier of Virgin's cable TV service: Sky3, Sky News and Sky Sports News are available in the lowest M tier; Sky1 and Sky2 are available in the L tier; and Sky Arts 1, Sky Arts 2, Sky Real Lives and Sky Real Lives 2 joined the XL tier.

Programming

See also: List of programmes broadcast by Sky1

US programmes

The channel relies heavily on screenings of US television programmes, with many coming from Murdoch's Fox Network. The Simpsons has been a regular Sky1 fixture since the early days. As many as five episodes of The Simpsons are broadcast each evening, with any new episodes generally being shown on Sunday. Sky1 has exclusive rights in the UK to show the most recent series of The Simpsons. Another early and long running fixture was Married... with Children, which ran all through the 1990s, but in the early 2000s the show suddenly disappeared from its regular schedule and has not been screened on any Sky channel since.

Sky1 was also the original home to the UK's first run showings of episodes of ER and Friends, giving Sky1 some of the highest ratings for any satellite channel. In 2000, 2.8 million viewers watched an episode of Friends, the highest rated show on any satellite channel. However when Channel 4 launched their own digital sister channel E4 they outbid Sky1 for exclusive first run rights to both shows. However, Sky1 still held the repeat rights for the early seasons of both shows for several years.

Sky1 previously broadcast WWE (Previously WWF) programming, before moving it all to Sky Sports 3. Sky1 currently broadcasts WWE Experience, a one-hour round-up of Raw, SmackDown and ECW programming. In August 15 2009, WWE Smackdown is programmed at 3.00 pm every saturdays.

Programmes that have had their UK premiere screenings on Sky1 have included

Sky One share of viewing 1992-2008. Peak was 9.5%, July 1993, current 0.9%

• The X-Files
• Stargate SG-1
• Futurama
• Family Guy
• Dilbert
• Malcolm in the Middle
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer
• 24 (from Season 3)
• Stargate Atlantis
• Nip/Tuck (Seasons 1-3)
• Las Vegas
• Battlestar Galactica
• Rescue Me
• Deadwood
• Father of the Pride
• Bones
• A Town Called Eureka
• Lost (seasons 3-6)
• Prison Break (from season 3)
• Fringe
• Cold Case
• House (from season 5)
• Ross Kemp (In Search of Pirates) (Returns to Afghanistan) (On Gangs) (A Kenya Special) (Meets the Glue Kids)

Sky also acquired rights to premiere screenings of the Star Trek franchise, beginning with Season 4 of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Programmes commissioned by Sky1

Sky has commissioned a number of UK-made programmes such as Dream Team, a drama series based on a fictional football team; The Strangerers (a science fiction sitcom that was dropped after one series and never repeated); Al Murray's sitcom Time Gentlemen Please; and Baddiel's Syndrome. Hex, another sci-fi show, had proved popular but was cancelled in April 2006 and Mile High also proved quite popular but it only lasted from 2003-2005. Sky One commissioned Terry Pratchett's Hogfather for Christmas 2006 proving to be their most successful programme ever. Sky also co-produces The 4400 and co-financed the first season of Battlestar Galactica.

It also screens many "reality" shows such as Cruise with Stelios, Road Wars, Shock Treatment, World's Deadliest Gangs, World of Pain, Road Raja, Ibiza Uncovered, Cirque de Celebrité and the most recent series Hairspray: The School Musical. It also recently has received success with entertainment science shows Brainiac: Science Abuse and spin-offs, Brainiac: History Abuse and Brainiac's Test Tube Baby and also Mission Implausible. Less successful shows include Harry Enfield's Brand Spanking New Show.

Sky1 have also commissioned a number of game shows including Blockbusters. The most recent game show is from Mark Burnett, Are You Smarter Than a 10-Year Old, based on a United States format. On 30 January 2008, Sky One announced plans to bring back the UK 1990s game show Gladiators.[1]

Ratings

Sky1 (the main Sky channel) is one of main cable channels, its top show Lost rivals that of some Five and Channel 4 (both two of the main five analogue channels in the UK) ratings on certain shows. Sky1 special commissioned movies have generally pulled in over a million viewers (the average viewership of Lost). Here are some of the latest:

TV Movie	Première	Finale	TV season	Viewership (Millions)
Terry Pratchett's Hogfather	17 December 2006	18 December 2006	2006	2.15
The Colour of Magic	23 March 2008	24 March 2008	2008	1.64
Skellig	12 April 2009	12 April 2009	2009	1.16
Going Postal	TBA	TBA	2010	TBA

Voice-over

Current NME Radio DJ Claire Sturgess has been a "voice" of Sky1 since 1998, and was the sole announcer from 2001 until 2005. As one of Sky1's only two announcers, her voice-overs are pre-recorded once a week and played out by an automated system. Dave Kelly is the male voice-over who does live links and Faye Bamford does live links on Wednesday and Thursday nights.

External links

• Sky1 – official website