BBC Genome is a digitised, searchable database of programme listings initially based upon the contents of the Radio Times and was established in 1923 and concluded in 2009.
BBC Genome is not the BBCs first online searchable database; in April 2006 the BBC gave the public access to Infax, the BBC's programme database at the time. Infax contained around 900,000 entries, but not every programme ever broadcast, and it ceased operation in December 2007. The front page of the website is still available to see via the Internet Archive here. After Infax stopped, a message on the site said that it would be incorporating in the information into individual programme pages. In 2012, it was replaced by the database Fabric, but this is only for internal use within the BBC.
Radio Times[]
BBC Genome entry for First Episode of EastEnders
In December 2012, the BBC completed a digitisation exercise, scanning the listings from Radio Times of all BBC programmes 1923-2009 from an entire run of about 4,500 copies of the magazine. They identified around five million plans, involving 8.5 million actors, presenters, writers and technical staff. The listings are as published, in advance, and so do not include late changes or cancellations which were reflected on Infax. However, they do include vast numbers of early radio and television broadcasts, and "DJ shows" from BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 2 which were rarely kept officially, which were not listed on Infax (which also did not usually include repeats of archived programmes prior to 1976) because they were not in the BBC archives.
Screenshot of an OCR error (since corrected) in Genome
The issues were scanned at high resolution, producing TIF images and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) was then used to turn the text from the page into searchable text on the Genome database. BBC Genome was released for public use on 15th October 2014. This project aims to allow researchers to be able to find out information more comfortable and to help BBC Archives to build up a picture of what exists and what is currently missing from the archive. Corrections to OCR errors and changes to advertised schedules are crowdsourced, with over 440,910 user-generated edits accepted after editorial review as of mid-December 2018. Each listing entry has a unique identifier which may be expressed as a URL. A broadcast programme might have more than one such id if it was broadcast (and thus listed) on repeat occasions, or in different regions.
Digitised editions[]
Digitised editions of entire magazines (including front covers, prose articles, advertisements, and other non-listings content) from the 1920s were added in March 2017; for the 1930s in December 2017; and for the 1940s in December 2018.
Previous missing listings[]
Due to the Radio Time only starting in 1923, the listing from 1922/1923 were not available initially. Additionally Radio Times has more missing listings when there was industrial action. These missing listing were added using further research e.g.) BBC Records and Newspapers.
| Issue Date | Listings Affected | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| 14 May 1926 |
|
General Strike |
| 21 February 1947 |
|
Fuel Crisis |
| 28 February 1947 |
|
Fuel Crisis |
| 8 September 1950 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 13 October 1950 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 20 October 1950 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 27 October 1950 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 1 August 1981 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 2 April 1983 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 9 April 1983 |
|
Printing dispute |
| 3 December 1983 |
|
Printing dispute |
Other BBC Databases[]
Internal[]
BBC Infax Logo
Infax[]
Infax was the BBC's programme database, containing 966,244 BBC programmes dating back to 1938; Infax catalogued all TV and selected radio until 2008, but was only used to catalogue news up until 1994. The Star catalogue was used to catalogue news from 1994-2008. In 2004, the Sports Library database took over cataloguing sport until 2008 when sport was taken over by the Digital Library database.
It was reported that Infax was due to be switched off in March 2014, but due to technical issues with Fabric, it remains operational at a cost of £780,000 a year to maintain.
Strix/Cinegy[]
BBC Infax Internal Database
From 1992, the BBC Northern Ireland Archive used Strix to catalogue factual, sport, current affairs, entertainment programmes and news output until March 2009. As of April 2009, all news was catalogued and stored using the Cinegy database. The Cinegy database allows for video material to be viewed on a BBC desktop computer.
Fabric[]
BBC Fabric Database
In 2012, a new programme archive database was introduced to replace Infax at a cost of £3m a year. In 2013, Fabric failed a number of times and the BBC has identified key limitations with the database.Again in 2014, the BBC's internal Ariel newspaper reported that Fabric has had a series of fixes, but the feedback was mixed, and Infax will continue to operate. In an interview for Ariel, Maggie Lydon (Head of Media Management) insists that only 'a very small amount' of information has not been transferred from Infax to Fabric.
Public[]
Infax[]
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BBC Infax EastEnders Episode 111 (11 March 1986)
A web version of this database was made available to access to the public in April 2006. It ceased operation in December 2007. The front page of the website is still available to see via the Internet Archive. After it ceased, a message on the website said that it would be incorporating the information into individual programme pages.
However, in 2009, an email reply from the BBC showed that the reason for its removal was due to a data protection concern. Infax was also incorporated into the BBC Motion Gallery website (now Getty Images). In mid 2014, a data protection issue was flagged and public access was disabled. As of October 2012, a version of the BBC programme catalogue is available to view exclusively in British Library in the St Pancras (London) and Boston Spa (Yorkshire) reading rooms. 2.2 million searchable catalogue records and 225,000 programmes up to June 2012 are available to view.
Gellery[]
