The role of the scheduling team is to ensure that promotional messages are communicated effectively to the right audience, and that all trails are tonally and editorially suitable for the slot in which they are placed.  The team explained that each trail is viewed by a lawyer prior to its transmission who will advise on any necessary restrictions (for example, post-watershed). If a trail is deemed to be unsuitable for children, it will not be placed in or around programmes that are aimed at children or have a high level of child viewing.

Often there will be two versions of a trail – a 40 second version and a 20 second version. In the case of the trail for Age 8 and Wanting a Sex Change (which attracted half a dozen complaints), the longer, more explicit trail was only shown after 8pm. The shorter trail was kept away from The Simpsons and early morning children’s programming, but was shown pre-watershed at other times of the day. Following a complaint from one viewer about the trail being shown around The Paul O’ Grady Show, the decision was made not to repeat the trail in that slot.

In the case of True Blood, the longer, more explicit trails were restricted to play only after 8pm, while the shorter version was kept away from any programmes aimed at children. The 20 second trail did appear around Hollyoaks and Friends but these programmes are aimed at and appeal to predominantly teenage and young-adult viewers rather than child audiences.

While the True Blood trail could be described as sexually suggestive in style as well as hinting at themes of violence, it was edited in such a way as to ensure that nothing unduly explicit or graphically violent was shown, and avoided any overt representations of sexual behaviour.

The on-air trails team reassured me they are very aware that viewers do not choose to watch trails in the same way as scheduled programmes and, as such, they try to ensure that trails are both appropriate and enjoyable. They do monitor viewer reaction carefully and – as shown in the case of Age 8 and wanting a Sex Change – will respond when it appears that the scheduling was not quite right.

See also Paula’s blog: Trails provoke an unusual reaction

Though many expressed praise for the programme, a significant number of viewers were critical of its narration – specifically, the way in which the narrator often referred to the children by their birth gender, rather than their preferred gender.

I spoke to commissioning editor Simon Dickson about this feedback – he was keen to explain the decision behind the narrator’s use of pronouns and offers the following response to viewers:

“Thank you to everyone that has contacted Channel 4 to share their views on Bodyshock: Age 8 and Wanting a Sex Change. The film has aroused a great deal of comment, almost all of it favorable, but I am sincerely sorry to hear that some members of the transgender community were upset by our use of biologically-accurate pronouns in the narration of the programme.

“It’s important to remember that the majority of our audience will have had little or no understanding of transgender issues. The decision to use the pronouns we did was based on our responsibility to make the programme comprehensible to a mainstream audience.

“As many viewers have pointed out, the parents featured in our programme always referred to their child by their “preferred” gender. We were happy that this made it absolutely clear that each family had accepted and were extremely supportive of their child’s decision.

“I hope you’ll agree that Age 8 and Wanting a Sex Change was a story worth telling, and a story worth telling to as many people as possible, even at the risk of causing some dissatisfaction amongst those who understand the subject well already.”

As ever, if you’d like to share your thoughts on this subject, please leave your comments below.

Anchored around five thought-provoking science documentaries to be broadcast from Oct 26, the season encourages viewers to delve deep into the subject of race with online features including a Define Race tool (which asks viewers to consider the true meaning of the word ‘race’) and a selection of exclusive video interviews that reveal why our programme presenters and C4 representatives believe the subject of race is such an important one to explore.

Full details of the season can be found on the official Race: Science’s Last Taboo website – alternatively, here’s a brief summary of the five featured documentaries:

• Rageh Omaar kick starts the season on 26 October with Race and Intelligence: Science’s Last Taboo – a documentary that sets out to find the truth, featuring the views of scientists who believe that races can be differentiated, as well as those who vehemently oppose the view.
• The Event: How Racist Are You? (29 Oct) sees controversial former schoolteacher Jane Elliott recreate the shocking exercise she used 40 years ago to demonstrate how susceptible we can all be to bigotry, and what it feels like to be on the other side of arbitrary discrimination.
• On 1 November, The Human Zoo: Science’s Dirty Secret explores the 19th and 20th century phenomenon of human zoos where thousands of ‘exotic’ and indigenous people from all over the world were put on display – intended not merely as entertaining freak shows but also scientific demonstrations of racial difference.
• In Is It Better To Be Mixed Race? (Nov 2), geneticist Aarathi Prasad sets out to challenge this idea of racial purity and examines provocative claims that there are in fact biological advantages to being mixed race.
• Finally, Bleach, Nip, Tuck: The White Beauty Myth (Oct 27 and 3 Nov at 10pm) examines the emerging trend for deracialisation surgery through the stories of six people who want to westernise their bodies and faces. It is right for a person to want to erase their inherited ethnic features to fit in to a predominantly white society?

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I suspect that viewers will have plenty to say about each of these programmes once they have been broadcast. If you have any comments you’d like to share, please leave them below. If your comment refers to articles or essays published by others, please include a link to that article where possible

Race: Science’s Last Taboo will be the focus of discussion on The TV Show’s studio debate on 7 November. More information can be found here. If you’d like to share your views as part of the studio audience, please contact thetvshow@princesstv.com

I spoke to Channel 4’s airtime sales team, who reassured me that the commercial content of these breaks was looked at in great detail and that a number of commercials had been removed as they were felt to be inappropriate. Commercials removed included those for airlines, telephone companies and also a movie which featured a plane crash and a person falling. Sadly the commercial for CSL Sofas was not available to view in advance and, with the benefit of hindsight, the team say they would probably have recommended it be shown at another time. Where possible, advertisement breaks for this programme were also sequenced so that the more upbeat commercials were broadcast in the middle of the break, in an effort to avoid a jar in tone when coming out and back into the documentary itself.

The number of commercial breaks and commercial minutes broadcasters are permitted to take in any programme is regulated by Ofcom. Within this programme’s 130 minute slot there were seven commercial breaks (the maximum permitted) that lasted 22 minutes and 30 seconds in total (less that the maximum 24mins 30s allowed in a slot of this length). Earlier this year, following an Ofcom review of these regulations, the number of breaks that can be carried during programmes lasting over one hour was increased. Under the old regulations, the 9/11 documentary would have been allowed to carry fewer adverts lasting less time (a maximum of 5 commercial breaks at 17m 30s) which may explain the unusual number of complaints that we received this week.

Since 2001, Channel 4 has regularly broadcast programmes about 9/11 at this time of year – the most recent being 9/11: Phone Calls from the Towers. On every single occasion commercial breaks have been inserted with very few complaints.

The sales team pointed out that Channel 4 has to balance its commercial ambitions with its creative output to ensure that viewers feel as little intrusion as is possible with a commercial channel. They acknowledged though that, on this occasion, for some people that balance was not quite achieved.

Traditionally, the festival kicks off with a keynote speech, delivered by an industry big wig, that’s intended to provoke or even outrage the gathered faithful – this year’s speech by James Murdoch (a very big wig with News International) did not disappoint, with a ringing endorsement of rampant commercialism as the best way to fund and protect good television.

During my time in Edinburgh, I attended a number of interesting sessions including one by the BBC’s Robert Peston about the reporting of the credit crunch, another about whether the way broadcasters interpret and apply the Ofcom Broadcasting Code is stifling creativity (your views on this welcome!), and an extremely timely session, chaired by Davina McCall, on the past, present and future of reality television. You can watch selected clips here.

One of the highlights of my trip, this session looked at the impact that reality TV can have on the lives of its participants. Those on the panel included Anna Nolan from the first ever Big Brother, Raef Bjayou from The Apprentice, Jungle winner Christopher Biggins, Steve Brookstein from The X factor, Heat magazine’s TV editor Boyd Hilton magazine, and celebrity agent Jonathan Shalit.

The consensus from the panel was that reality television has matured as a genre and that, as such, the audience, participants and media all now have clear expectations about what is likely to occur during and after a series has aired. This ‘new reality’ lies in stark contrast to the experience of BB1 housemate Anna Nolan, who told the audience she’d had no idea while in the house that people would even bother to watch the show, much less did she expect to forge a career in TV as a result of her appearance on the show.

Jonathan Shalit (who represents clients including Biggins, Myleene Klass, Jamelia, Konnie Huq and N-Dubz) talked about the necessity for celebrities to select carefully before agreeing to take part in reality shows. His rule of thumb is that clients should only take part in a show if the event itself – be it dancing, ice skating, or living in the jungle – is something that they will enjoy; genuine enjoyment will always translate well on screen, and the reverse is also true if someone takes part solely to boost a flagging career.

The conclusion of the discussion was that things have moved on greatly, from the ‘leap into the unknown’ that was the first Big Brother to the familiar genre that is now firmly established as a part of British television. And with the recent announcement that Channel 4 will bid farewell to Big Brother in 2010, the discussion further emphasised the way in which the series has helped shape the TV landscape over the last 10 years.

With the big finale of Big Brother set for next summer and many other changes and developments likely to take place across the ever-evolving television industry in the next 12 months, I’m looking forward to yet more thought-provoking and lively debates in Edinburgh 2011. If you get a chance to watch some of the debates from the festival, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the issues that were discussed.

Read the full press release over at the official Big Brother site.

It seems like a really big moment for me. As viewers’ editor, Big Brother has been a huge part of my job – I’ve shared the highs and lows of the Big Brother audience and been alongside the producers and commissioners during each series letting them know just what the viewers are feeling about their show.

I have mixed emotions about the decision, and a lot of that is a feeling that I may be losing contact with a great bunch of people who love the show and have never been shy about telling me how they feel – whether that has been critical or complimentary.

So on that note, here’s a chance to tell me how you feel about the end of Big Brother on Channel 4. The natural end of an era? Time for something new? An opportunity for different types of programming? The floor is yours…

Each one of the five episodes was led by a renowned artist tutor, beginning with distinguished painter, sculptor and printmaker Maggi Hambling, and also featuring portrait artist Humphrey Ocean and Judy Purbeck, who has been teaching life drawing for nearly 10 years.

If you missed the series, you can watch it again on 4oD.

Perhaps not surprisingly – given the inevitable presence of naked bodies in the series – Life Class provoked an interesting reaction from our viewers.  Roughly half of those that contacted the channel thanked us for broadcasting an ‘inspiring’ series. The other half complained that we had transmitted nudity at lunchtime. Comments left on Channel 4’s Life Class website were overwhelmingly positive.

Online debate outside of C4.com has been equally mixed. A discussion in the Netmums forum concluded that nudity with an artistic intention was perfectly acceptable, and suggested the programme title was a good indicator of what would included in the series, should a viewer wish to avoid such nudity.

The Sun – surely an authority on nudity – asked readers if they thought the programme was ‘a bare faced cheek’, but readers’ comments left in response to the article were largely in favour of the show

I’ve also come across evidence that Life Class inspired real creative output in some viewers – Katherine Tyrell and Kevin Levell are two viewers who used their blogs to share their recent drawings and comment on the series. Indeed, the official Flickr site for the series – where viewers were invited to share their drawings – indicates that a great number of you were inspired to take part.

As ever, I’d love to know what you think – did you enjoy Life Class? Did it inspire your inner artist, or were you opposed to seeing nudity on daytime television? Please share your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

With so many great shows in Channel 4’s back catalogue, it would be impossible for every programme be brought over to 4oD at once. To get things started though, our new media team have chosen a selection of the most requested programmes and most popular genres and, as such, you can already watch classic episodes of much-loved series including Brookside, Father Ted, Drop the Dead Donkey, Queer as Folk, Grand Designs, Dispatches, Vic Reeves’ Big Night Out and more. And it’s all free!

So for those of you who have recently contacted either The TV Show or Channel 4’s viewer enquiries to let us know you’d been experiencing some problems with the old 4oD application, we hope you’ll find the all-new 4oD a hugely improved experience, allowing you to enjoy the best of Channel 4 at the click of a button – whether you have a PC or a Mac.

As before, any programmes that are unsuitable for younger audiences will be labeled appropriately and viewers asked to confirm their age before viewing. Parents can also choose to ‘PIN protect’ certain content on their computers, ensuring that younger viewers will only be able to watch the programmes suitable for them.

So, please have a browse around the new 4oD and let us know what you think. Many more programmes will be added throughout the year, so keep an eye on the site to see what’s new. If you have an all-time favourite that isn’t yet available, please let us know and we’ll pass your requests on to the channel4.com team – there will always be content can’t be featured due to rights and legal issues, but if there’s a particular show you’d like to see again, we’d love to hear about it.

*Update: 21 August 2009*

Some further changes have been made to 4oD since this post was written – read more about these and a range of other new media developments at Channel 4’s Platform 4 blog, where you can also leave your comments. 

Comments are now closed on this blog post.

If you are still experiencing problems with 4oD service, please visit the FAQs page.

According to this research, we are more worried about slipping standards of behaviour in society generally (50% of those surveyed) than in programmes on television (just 14% of those surveyed). Dig a little deeper into such concerns as there are about television and we find swearing at the top of the list, followed by violence on television and sexual content on television.But this statistic hides some clear difference between different groups of viewers – younger men being the most tolerant of stronger language and parents of younger children and older viewers being most sensitive. And it seems that there is no simple list of words that you should or should not broadcast, as we react to the specific circumstances, the time of broadcast, who is uttering the words and how they are being used and our familiarity with the programme and the individuals. So the conclusions the BBC are drawing seem to be proceed with caution but always ask the question “is this word really necessary?”

We’ll be debating the issue on the next edition of The TV Show -  Channel 4, Saturday 4 July, 5pm – so if you’d like to let us know what you think, please add your comments below.  If your comment is a good one, we will be inviting you to join the audience for the show. Obviously we will have to work within the moderation rules for this site, so if you want to include a particular swear word, asterisks are recommended!

We have a small but steady number of complaints about the levels of background music in certain programmes that appear to be drowning out the commentary for some viewers.  A recent post on this website about the background music levels in Time Team: The Secrets of Stonehenge led me to a very knowledgeable person indeed – the series editor for Time Team was trained as a sound engineer at the BBC so he was able to explain to me in some detail how background music levels are set and what can go wrong between the perfect conditions of a recording studio and the ears of the viewer at home.

He told me that there is a universally agreed level that sound should not rise above, but that modern compression techniques tend to bring all the sound up to this level, making the overall effect that of a noisier programme, albeit one that is still within the agreed limits. This is often evident in commercials, which tend to be highly compressed to make them stand out more in a crowded environment.  Add to this trend a gradual deterioration in our ability to hear the higher frequencies as we grow older, which are important in distinguishing speech, and less than perfect conditions in many of our living rooms, and you have a situation where music, particularly percussion or synthesisers, will start to compete with the level of the voices and, in the more extreme cases, make the speech very difficult to hear.

In the case of the Time Team programme on Stonehenge, his review of the music levels on several different televisions showed that there was a danger that some people would not be able to hear Tony Robinson’s commentary clearly enough, and he immediately suggested that the sound levels should be rebalanced – ideally before the programme’s next transmission – to make sure that the programme was accessible to the widest possible audience.  So thanks to you for raising it and to Time Team for being such good listeners!

PS A quick update to let you know that the rebalanced version will be broadcast this Saturday (13th June) on More 4 at 10pm