A TV channel aimed squarely at the over 50′s is set to launch on Sky and Freesat in September.

The new TV channel, Vintage TV, will launch on the 1st of September 2010 offering unique content focussing on music and popular culture from the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. The station will be fronted my music man and former Radio 1 star Paul Gambaccini.

Vintage TV plans to offer content from a number of TV company archives, as well as some home-grown content. Vintage TV will also broadcast new music videos for number of classic tracks that were recorded before the days of the music video.

Expect Vintage TV from 1st of September.

Struggling channel Five is up for sale. The station’s owners, RTL, have started up a tender process for organisations to bid to take on the channel that reportedly £37 million last year.

One company keen to get a foot in the door of terrestrial broadcast, is BSkyB, who could well look to take on the channel. Other possibles are ITV and Channel 4, who’ve has their own financial struggles of late too. We’ve also heard rumours that Big Brother owners Endemol, or the US studio Warner Brothers could be interested im making a bid too.

Hot off the press, a brand new show from our Podcast team. Our presenters Pete and Carl talk about the future of TV, radio and the Internet, as we look at how the Government’s new, and controversial, Digital Economy Act affects you.

As well as looking at what the digital future has in store, we also look at the first 3D TV to hit the market, and see what’s new in the world of HD TV. We also answer our listener’s questions, and have a little fun testing out walkie-talkies and a rather pointless sound machine.

As this show covers some important topics, we’d ask that you download the show or listen online to this month’s podcast, Show 51, to make sure you don;t miss out. You’ll find it at http://www.frequencycast.co.uk/latest.html.

If you have an iPod or iPhone, you can get today’s show and sign up for the next shows via iTunes.

Remember, our shows are free, and we’d ask that if you enjoy our shows, you sign up, and tell your friends via Facebook, Twitter, email, or, of course, in person!

Fan of 3D? You can now get the 3D experience at home, as it’s now possible to buy a 3D LED TV set for the home.

Samsung’s been first across the line to release a 3D for the UK, to maximise on the current 3D hype – the Samsung UE40C700 40 inch 3D Ready TV has a built-in Freeview HD receiver, and will set you back £1,799. It’s available direct from

You’ll also need at least one pair of Active Shutter Glasses.

For more on Samsung’s 3D TV, take a look at the Samsung 3D TV launch advert:

Note that as well as the 3D glasses, you’ll also need a source for 3D content, such as a Blu-Ray player, or a Sky+ HD box.

Update: You might also want to check out the cheaper Samsung LE40C750 from Comet Online, which at the time of writing, is £1199.99

As we reported in December 2009, the digital text service from Teletext vanished from our screens. The owners, Associated Newspapers, stated that the service had been making a loss and that there was no longer a viable business model under which the service could continue. The service finally switched off on the 16th of December 2009.

That’s not the end of the story though, as some teletext services from Teletext Ltd are still being broadcast, notably Teletext Holidays (which presumably is still able to generate some cash) and some services for Channel 4.

A couple of days ago, Ofcom, the UK regulators, announced that it has revoked Teletext Ltd’s licence to provide a public teletext service. The reason? Teletext is no longer providing news and regional content. Ofcom contacted Teletext Ltd, and on the 26th January, Teletext wrote back, stating that they’d not be reinstating the news and regional content. Accordingly, OfCom had no choice by to revoke Teletext Ltd’s licence.

As far as we can tell, the revocation applies to the public service licence for analogue TV and Freeview – which means that commercial services are probably not affected, and services on other platforms, such as Sky, need not be affected either.

At this time, it’s not clear to us what services will continue to be offered by Teletext Ltd. A service (of sorts) is still available on Freeview channel 101, and other text services in the 100 number range are still operating. We’re not sure whether any of these are set to cease as a result of the revocation, or whether the licence now gets open to a potential new licensee (although in this current climate, we suspect this is unlikely). We’ve been told that subtitles service on page 888 won’t be affected.

Anyone out there actually using any of the various text-based red button services out there? Would you miss any of the services if they were switched off?

Show 48 of the UK’s TV and Tech podcast, FrequencyCast is out today.

Brought to you with a little help from Radio & Telly, the show takes a look at ways to get more from your telly and gets hands-on with two media players. We also run down the latest tech and TV news, and answer listener’s questions. If you ‘ve bot yet given the show a try, please do – you might just like it…

You can download Show 48 direct to your MP3 player or listen online at http://www.frequencycast.co.uk/latest.html.

If you have an iPod or iPhone, get shows faster by signing up via iTunes.

Comments on the show, subject suggestions, and your questions, are always welcomed!

Share and Enjoy,

The FrequencyCast team
www.frequencycast.co.uk

On the 7th of January 2010, the Tiscali TV service switched brands to “TalkTalk TV”.

This follows last year’s acquision of Tiscali by the Carphone Warehouse.

The Tiscali TV offering continues under the TalkTalk brand with no noticable changes, but at this time, we’re not clear on what Carphone Warehouse has in store for its new digital TV service.

More on TalkTalk TV

As we reported a few weeks back, Channel 4 is planning a week of 3D programming.

The date has been confirmed, and 4′s 3D week is set to begin on the 16th of November – If you want to be part of the Channel 4 3D week, pick up one of the 10 million pairs of 3D coloured glasses available now from Sainsburys supermarkets up and down the land.

More on 3D TV: http://www.radioandtelly.co.uk/3d.html

We’ve had a couple of mails from site visitors asking out coverage of the UFC 100, now that Setanta Sports is no more.

We understand that tonight’s Ultimate Fighting Championship event will be shown on Sky in the UK tonight (11 Jun 2009) on Racing World, channel 433. Programming starts from 9pm, with the main event starting at 3am UK time on Sunday.

For details of Sky’s sporting content, go to packages.sky.com/see/SportsMix.aspx.

The event will not be available on terrestrial TV, Freeview or Virgin Media. If you don’t have Sky, you can access tonight’s event at UK.UFC.com.

Discussions are ongoing for a permanent home for UFC in the UK.

Show 25 of this site’s online radio show, FrequencyCast, is now online.

In this show, we discuss what to look for when buying a new tv, explore Audio Description, and run through a roundup of the latest Freeview, Sky, TV, Radio and Gadget news. Listen online or download the show from www.frequencycast.co.uk/cast25.html