british tv

A 1983 interview clip in which David Bowie questions MTV VJ Mark Goodman about why the channel played so few videos by black artists.

Linus Tech Tips warns against cheap Android TV boxes, many of which ship with preinstalled malware. It looks at several boxes and suggests safer alternatives such as Chromecast and Nvidia Shield.

A short stand-up clip from James Acaster's Netflix special about the British Empire and museums that display things taken from other countries in glass boxes.

A clip from Charlie Brooker's BBC show Screenwipe showing how reality TV uses editing to manufacture emotion and narrative. It demonstrates how the same footage can be cut to give very different impressions.

A short clip of Stephen Fry explaining the differences between American and British comedy. He attributes them to cultural attitudes such as optimism versus pessimism.

Tantacrul analyzes how stock music in reality TV uses blunt, repeated tropes to manipulate viewers, comparing it to nature documentaries. He ties it to ideas of reification and cultural homogenization.

A 2017 Apple TV commercial for the iPad Pro in which a kid asks "What's a computer?" while using the tablet. It pitches the all-screen iPad Pro as something that goes beyond what people think of as a computer.

The Map Men explain why British place names are so hard to pronounce, tracing it to layers of Viking, Anglo-Saxon, Celtic and Norman influence, with a pronunciation guide.

The pilot of the British comedy series Look Around You, a deadpan parody of 1970s and 80s school science programmes, in which the scientists examine calcium.

An overview of the PTVS 2.0 beta feature for debugging Python and C/C++ together in one session in Visual Studio.

Technology Connections explains the early history of analog color television, from the 1954 start of modern color broadcasting, and how shadow masks work in CRTs. It is the first in a series on how analog color TV works.

Jeff Geerling looks at a Sharp NEC commercial display with a slot for a Raspberry Pi Compute Module. It is a large screen without built-in smart TV features or tracking.

A Vox explainer on how many of the British Museum's treasures were taken during British imperial rule, focusing on the Benin Bronzes and requests for their return.

Tom Scott explains the design of the British BS 1363 plug and socket, including fuses, shutters and safety features, and why he thinks it beats other plugs.

A clip from the BBC series Britain from Above showing UK peak power demand. It shows a grid engineer preparing for the surge as millions put the kettle on when a popular show ends.

Part 1 of an episode of the British educational TV series The Secret Life of Machines, about how vacuum cleaners work and their history. It mixes humor with explanation of household technology.

An Engineering Giants documentary episode following a British Airways Boeing 747-400 through a D-check, the heaviest maintenance inspection, in Cardiff. The aircraft is stripped down and inspected nearly everywhere.

The opening credit sequence of the 1960s British spy series The Prisoner, with Patrick McGoohan. It is a short intro to a cult TV show.

A one-minute NCIS scene in which two characters type on the same keyboard to fight off a hacker. It is widely mocked as absurd TV hacking.

Archive footage from 1964 of Royal Marine Commando volunteers filmed on a field exercise after taking LSD at Porton Down. It documents a British military drug trial.

Short British Pathe newsreel footage of the 1940 collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge as it twisted and swayed in the wind. The only casualty was a dog left in a stalled car.

Matt Parker explains the history behind NTSC television running at 29.97 frames per second rather than 30, tracing it to the backward-compatible addition of color. He walks through the arithmetic behind the odd ratio.

A short Yes Minister clip in which the civil servant explains why Britain joined the European Union, delivered as satire of British foreign policy.

A one-minute 2012 Microsoft television commercial for Internet Explorer 9, set to Alex Clare's 'Too Close'. It pitches a 'more beautiful web' with fast one-click access to favorite sites.

Tom Scott plays the Royal Game of Ur against British Museum curator Irving Finkel, who deciphered its rules from a cuneiform tablet. Finkel teaches the game and explains its history as the oldest playable board game.

Stanford physicist Leonard Susskind gives a public lecture on the holographic principle, the indestructibility of information and the nature of black holes. It asks whether the world could be a hologram.

British Museum curator Irving Finkel teaches how to write cuneiform, with a colleague following along. It is a short, lively introduction to the script.

An Adam Ruins Everything comedy segment on why US hospitals are so expensive, covering opaque price lists, surprise bills and penalties for the uninsured.

A short scene from the British sitcom Yes Prime Minister in which officials describe 'salami tactics' for invading a country slice by slice. Each small step is too minor to justify a major response.

The original trailer for Threads, the 1984 British TV film depicting the aftermath of a nuclear attack on Sheffield. The trailer hints at the film's bleak tone.

An Onion News Network sketch in which two teenage girls appear on TV to plead for their kidnapped friend's release, then start gossiping about classmates. It is a satirical parody of teen behavior and sensational news.

Moishe Lettvin, a former Google engineer, shares lessons from 250 interviews and his time on the hiring committee. He tells how the committee given anonymized packets, including its own, would hire almost none of them.

DIY Perks shows how to turn old or smashed TVs and monitors into realistic artificial window lights, using the backlight and Fresnel lens to simulate distant daylight.

Channel 4's George Clarke visits a council estate in Vienna and is surprised by amenities such as swimming pools and private TV channels. It showcases Vienna's high-quality social housing.

Hartverdrahtet by Akronyme Analogiker, the winning PC 4k intro at Revision 2012. It is a realtime demo with music and fractal visuals in 4096 bytes.

Paul Taylor's first stand-up special, recorded in Paris in 2018, in which a British comedian living in France riffs on French culture, language and bureaucracy. It is the full 70-minute show.

The Slow Mo Guys film a TV and screens with a high-speed camera to show how displays build an image. The footage includes CRT-style scanning and how pixels light up over time.

The BBC TV version of the Babel Fish passage from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, with Ford and Arthur aboard a Vogon ship, narrated over the show's hand-drawn animated Guide entry.

An ABC7 News Bay Area reporter rides in a driverless Waymo robotaxi through San Francisco and documents the trip, including a couple of awkward moments. It is a short TV news segment showing what a robotaxi ride is actually like.

Kevin Spacey, giving the MacTaggart Lecture at the Edinburgh Television Festival, urges TV channels to give viewers control. He points to Netflix's House of Cards release as evidence that audiences want to watch on their own terms.