Digital Planet
(previously known as
Click
and originally
Go Digital
) was a
radio programme
broadcast on the
BBC World Service
presented by
Gareth Mitchell
. Alternating as contributors are
Bill Thompson
,
Ghislaine Boddington
and Angelica Mari, who comment on items in the programme and discuss them with Mitchell. The show, broadcast weekly, covered
technology
stories and news from around the world.
[1]
History
[
edit
]
From 2001 to 2005, it was presented by Tracey Logan and during that time it was one of the BBC's few
webcast
programmes, with cameras providing a live feed. Regular guest presenter Gareth Mitchell, who had been with the show since 2001, took over as presenter full time on 11 January 2005.
[2]
[3]
Originally named Go Digital, the show was renamed
Digital Planet
on 28 March 2006.
[4]
It was again renamed
Click
on 29 March 2011 to make it easier to recognise its status as a sister programme of the TV programme
Click
, which is broadcast on
BBC News
and
BBC World News
.
[5]
The show's running time was reduced from 28 minutes to 18 minutes. In the episode aired 1 May 2019, the show announced that it had renamed itself back to
Digital Planet.
Closure
[
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]
On the 29th September 2022, shortly after celebrating its 21st anniversary with a special broadcast from the BBC’s Radio Theatre in Old Broadcasting House in London, it was proposed ending the show as part of a restructure of programming as part of the wider ‘Proposals for a digital-first World Service’.
[6]
[7]
At the end of the show
broadcast on Tuesday 21st March 2023
it was announced by the host Gareth Mitchell that the following week's episode would be the last ever edition.
After the end of
Digital Planet
, in April 2023, Mitchell and Thompson returned with a new technology podcast,
The Gareth and BillCast
.
[8]
At the end of October 2023, Ania Lichtarowicz, one of the producers of Digital Planet, released the first episode of a new weekly global technology podcast starring Gareth Mitchell along with new presenters and previous presenters:
Somewhere on Earth Podcast
[9]
Show format and topics
[
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]
Digital Planet
covers a wide range of issues affecting technology. The first broadcast each week is also live (at 20:30 UK time on a Tuesday evening), whereas before the 2011 changes, it was recorded.
[5]
The show is now around 27 minutes long. Often there are segments on technological solutions to problems facing charitable or humanitarian causes, with a speaker representing the cause being interviewed by Mitchell. One example is the segment on a screen saver which harnessed the power of idling home
PCs
to help perform complex
mathematical
calculations
to help
cure
malaria
.
Other topics covered have included:
Usually views sent either by
e-mail
,
Facebook
,
Twitter
or using the
BBC News
website
are read out and discussed briefly by the hosts.
A special pre- and post show session for podcast listeners is produced which cannot be heard by those listening to broadcast radio. The fan club's Prezzi created a special picture for the show, which was framed, delivered and discussed on line, and held a Google Hangout during the show where listeners discussed the show in real time, and engaged with the presenters - see Thompson engaging with the Hangout on Air. The presenters were interviewed for the Project Kazimierz Podcast in 2015.
From 2016 to 2023, the
"Digital Planet Listeners" Facebook group
had a running theme hashtagged #FlatDarkStanleyNet in which
Gareth Mitchell
's copy of
Jamie Bartlett
's
The Dark Net
containing a bookmark (made by the illustrator Justine Rykiel) of Mitchell in his familiar checked shirt was passed around among listeners. It was based on the
Flat Stanley Project
. The bookmark and the book went around the world and were eventually returned to Mitchell.
References
[
edit
]
External links
[
edit
]
This audio file
was created from a revision of this article dated 5 May 2019
(
2019-05-05
)
, and does not reflect subsequent edits.
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