BBC plans programmes for phone

The BBC is planning a comedy show that can play out on TV, online and on mobile phones.

Writers are being asked to come up with sketches that will work well on the small screen of a phone – slapstick routines are expected to work better than dialogue-heavy scenes, for example.

And as well as the phone content and the actual TV transmission, stories could also be developed from the same show for exclusive broadcast over the web.

The ambitious project is part of the BBC’s experiment into delivering programmes via new media, which has already seen the entire series of BBC Three’s The Mighty Boosh, pictured, posted online, and clips from Nighty Night sent to mobiles. This pilot scheme, called TV Plus. runs until Christmas.

Corporation director of television Jana Bennett told trade paper Broadcast: ‘We want to get to the next level, where we’re actually commissioning specifically for that [cross-platform] format from scratch.

Published: 18 Sep 2005