BBC Three

BBC Three, the successor of the similar BBC Choice, is a British television channel from the BBC broadcasting only on digital cable, terrestrial and satellite.

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BBC Three was launched on February 9, 2003, eleven months after its originally planned launch date (and that of BBC Four). The delay was due to debate over its proposed format - some felt it would not be sufficiently different to existing commercial channels catering to young people.

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The channel is described by the BBC as an outlet for "New drama, New talent, British comedy, top films and accessible news". The channel is on-air from 19:00 to 04:00 each night, in order to share terrestrial digital bandwidth with the CBBC channel.

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Unlike its commercial rivals, 90% of BBC Three's output is from Britain and other European Union countries. 80% is original, covering all genres, from current affairs, to drama, to comedy to animation. BBC Three has a unique '60 second news' format. This was adopted so that operation of the channel could be completely automated, without the complication of dealing with variable length live news broadcasts.

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The channel's idents (developed by Lambie-Nairn) feature a range of cute orange cone shaped creatures ('the blobs') provided by Aardman Animations.

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The station was launched and is now run by Channel Controller Stuart Murphy, who previously ran BBC Choice, and before that UK Play, the now-disbanded BBC music and comedy channel on which ran Rock Profiles, by Matt Lucas and David Walliams (who went on to star in Little Britain). At 33, Murphy is the youngest channel controller in the country, a title he has held since launching UK Play at the age of 26. The scheduler is Damian Kavanagh, who used to schedule BBC One.

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BBC Choice: BBC Choice was a TV station from the BBC, which launched on September 23, 1998. It was the first British TV channel to broadcast exclusively in digital format....

British: The word British has several different uses. See the article on Britain for more details on the development and use of the word Britain....

BBC: The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is the national broadcaster of the United Kingdom. It produces programmes and information services: broadcasting on television, radio, and the Internet....

BBC Three related Images and Photos (experimental)

Three	Galapagos (BBC) (BD)	Galapagos (BBC) (DVD)	Hamlet (2009) (BBC) (DVD)
Three C's	Three Cats	Three Kois	Three Pears
Three Pears	Three Chefs	Three Pears	Three Faces