back to article Tomorrow's World comes back to the future

For 38 years, TV show Tomorrow’s World wowed audiences with its coverage of futuristic developments from the world of science and technology. It was axed in 2003, but now the BBC has brought the show back from the dead, sort of. From today, anyone after an insight into how advancements in technology led to computerised banking …

COMMENTS

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Fantastic stuff!

    I ended up in IT and science fields due to my late Mum and Dad sitting me down and encouraging me to watch TW since I was knee-high to a grasshoppers eye!

    Kids today, don't know they're missing!

  2. Grease Monkey Silver badge
    Joke

    Marmalade

    But if you spread marmalade on the archive will it still play?

  3. simon 43
    Thumb Up

    memory lane

    Now they've done TW, I wonder what the chances of seeing something similar with Horizon from the days when it was actually a science program? There's not even any information on the Beeb site for programmes earlier than '96!

    Perhaps my videoed episodes might come in useful afterall!

  4. Richard Jukes

    OH YEH!

    Tomorrows World used to be our only glimpse into a world of technology and what the future could possibly hold! Bring it back - I used to love watching it.

    Still waiting for the flying bloody cars tho. *Grumble*

  5. Alien8n
    Joke

    @ AC 11:47

    Yeah, it was great stuff back then.

    Mind you, nowadays kids have Mythbusters, which while not looking at the future is an excellent way of teaching kids how not to do science :)

    Discovery Channel, all the best bits of YouTube rolled into one :)

  6. Bilgepipe
    Gates Horns

    Mobile Phone

    I bet that "mobile phone" gets better coverage than, say, O2, to pick a random telco.

    Or Orange.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Great TV!

    Used to love it as a kid, guess it wasnt "luvvy" enough for the BBC...

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Me too

    I used to love watching TW as a kid. In the late '80s as a BBC engineer I even got to work on it :)

  9. Dan 63

    past, present and future

    so my licence fee contribution is going towards making something that we (most of us) have seen before that was about something that might be in the future that is in fact now in the past. oh good.

  10. IndianaJ
    Thumb Up

    Mmmmm

    Maggie Philbin. Always though I'd marry her. Damn you Cheggers.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Shame...

    that the Beeb's bloody rights system won't let those outside the UK enjoy a little bit of their childhood!

  12. Andy 97
    Thumb Up

    Excellent news

    I'm so glad The BBC hasn't forgotten that some people actually like to be mentally stimulated.

    Looking forward to this.

    ITV and $ky, are you listening you low-rent bunch of IQ-retarding eejuts?

  13. Lionel Baden
    FAIL

    i still dont get why it was axed

    Everybody i know liked it and misses it :/

  14. groovyf
    Unhappy

    Surprised...

    Unless I'm being blind...I don't see the Compact Disc episode in the ones they've "cherry-picked" which is a shame. I would have thought that would have ranked quite highly.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    "Not available in your area"

    Well, fuck you too, Auntie.

  16. Citizen Kaned

    me too AC...

    that and johnny ball. :)

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Sigh..

    At the risk of sounding like a grumpy old man, actually, sod it.

    Ah yes, tomorrows world, when TV still had some dignity.

    I remember watching Tomorrow's world as a kid and loved it, serious yet not without humour. It was class.

    What do we have now? The fucking Gadget Show, where they can't even look at a new piece of hardware without microwaving it whilst shooting at the microwave with a paintball gun in order to test its "durability". No wonder everyone is a complete fuck whit.

  18. Paw Bokenfohr
    Go

    bring it back

    With the vast slew of, well, lets face it, poo, on TV right now, TW would be welcomed back to our screens, at least by me. I'm not talking about as it was in its latter days, where it seemed more consumer review show than *tomorrows* world, but as it was when it was really looking forwards, including the dodgy and non-functioning live demos. It's not a problem to have things that don't quite work right when it's cutting edge.

  19. JB
    Thumb Down

    Not in your area...again

    Damn! All this wonderful stuff and I don't get to see it. Like this stuff's potentially commercially very lucrative or something! Looks like I'll have to shell out for a VPN in lieu of a TV licence!

  20. Anonymous Coward
    IT Angle

    Agree with AC 11:47

    Between TW, the BBC Micro and Johnny Ball we turned out an entire generation of some of the brightest innovators in the blossoming computer industry. That was back when the BBC was a public service broadcaster rather than a ratings chasing tax funded clone of ITV1.

    I say leave the ratings war popularity contest to ITV and keep the BBC for the TV that _needs_ to be made. High quality non sensationalist news, educational content and well researched documentaries.

    And Dr Who.

  21. Planeten Paultje
    Thumb Down

    Seriously DUH!

    "There is fog in the Channel. The Continent is isolated."

  22. andy 45
    Thumb Down

    @Sigh.. by AC

    Dude, you spelt Fuckwit wrong...

  23. Bo Pedersen
    Black Helicopters

    Ah memories

    Yes where is the unscratchable cd?,

    I am sure I remember an episode that had computer communications (modems) in it.

    and about how the world will be this big free place where everyone can talk electronically to everyone else.

    Obviously providing you are in the right region.

    Black helicopters because its all about control in the end...

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Go

    @"not available in your area" and "Shame"

    SSH tunnel SOCKS5 proxy and a handy bit of software called Proxifier, nuff said

  25. Number6

    @Alien8n

    Actually, Mythbusters does attempt to be properly scientific, in that they first attempt to do it properly and when that fails to blow up, get Frank and his mates to come in and do a proper (and safe) job. They do show all the safety stuff to show that it is possible to have fun doing silly things and stay safe.

    It's interesting to see that some stuff survived the TW curse, many things appeared on there and disappeared without trace, but I guess that's no worse than investing in startups now, where probably 8/10 will fail, one will just about break even and one will be a success.

  26. Alfonso Vespucci

    You can stick your Nostradamus up your ***

    So you're telling me that in 1965 they predicted that 40 years in the future a TV show would be made about policing in the 1970s. That's bloody brilliant that is.

  27. Grease Monkey Silver badge
    FAIL

    @AC Sigh

    "No wonder everyone is a complete fuck whit."

    I love it.

    Firstly I think this shows you have a problem with cause and effect. TV has dumbed down because the population has dumbed down, not the other way round. The vast majority of the viewing public would rather see Richard Hammond microwave a CD rather than watch Michael Rodd explain how one works. So that's the TV that gets produced. You need to accept that you are in a minority that is not catered to by the mainstream channels.

    Secondly, (and the bit I really love) it's "wit" not "whit" you fuck wit.

  28. Sergie Kaponitovicz
    Thumb Up

    @ James Sherwood

    James,

    Thank you for posting this article.

    Like many others, I have fond memories of this programme.

    And for younger viewers, the host, Raymond Baxter, was a WW2 fighter pilot

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Baxter

  29. Eponymous Cowherd
    Joke

    String

    No round-up of TW is complete without The Goodies "It might as well be String" spoof.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13EZ62rsYT4&NR=1

    At 7:40

  30. Sam Tana
    Pint

    @AC

    Come come! The Gadget Show might have fun with it's gadgets - but Tomorrow's World could do some daft stunts, too. And at least The Gadget Show doesn't have the boringly earnest medical reports that used to be on TW, and made my heart sink everytime Judith Hann would appear, sounding all worthy and concerned.

  31. Sam Liddicott
    Coffee/keyboard

    cakes from straw

    I remember the episode where they got really excited about being able to make gateau from straw.

    Sadly it was one of those inventions that made it to market.

    Which makes me ask, why do food suppliers so often take a really successful recipe, spend loads of money working out how to make something different out of muck, but that looks the same, and then sell it as the original thing?

    I want my cakes made out of butter and sugar and flour, not straw and hydrogenated oil and corn syrup.

    Sam

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Why it was axed

    Tomorrows world, by the early 90s, had developed a reputation of being the destroyer of technology. The majority of developments it showcased were from small groups who didn't have the manpower to finish their work and handle the phone calls it generated, so many of the things which appeared on TW failed specifically because they appeared on TW.

  33. Lloyd
    Alert

    Personally

    I always thought "Look Around You" was the best science programme, it encouraged me to become a scientist, I worked heavily on the parachute/airbag system for the Beagle II probe.

  34. Graham Marsden

    Don't forget...

    ... we now have Bang Goes the Theory (aka "Mythbusters did it first"...)

  35. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Yes!!!!

    @Not available in your area

    "Well, fuck you too, Auntie."

    - Well fuckin' said (from Canada)

    @"Sigh.. "

    - Couldn't have put it better myself.

  36. David 45

    Nostalgia

    Went out live from the studio, if I remember rightly and things did not always go to plan. Remember Judith Hann mixing some chemicals (can't remember why). The reaction created a lot of heat and she splashed some on her hand and she was in agony.

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Light pen

    Possibly the most patronising episode on there!

    No sign of Flippa Forrester anywhere tho :-(

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    Yes, but

    Where's my flying car?

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    BBC science archives

    Anyone know what happened to the original series of BBC's 'The Planets' with Heather Cooper? I found it much better than the remade CGI version from a few years back.

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