1.
Dominic West
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Dominic Gerard Francis Eagleton West is an English actor, musician, and director. He stars as Noah Solloway on the Showtime drama series, The Affair, West was born and brought up in Sheffield, the sixth of seven siblings in a Roman Catholic family, largely of Irish descent. His mother, Pauline Mary Moya, was an actress, and his father, Thomas George Eagleton West, West attended Eton College and Trinity College, Dublin. He graduated from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 1995, wests screen appearances include True Blue, Chicago, Richard III, and Mona Lisa Smile. His most notable role has been as the American police detective Jimmy McNulty on the HBO television police drama The Wire. West was praised for the accuracy of his characters American accent, during his stint on The Wire, West directed the season 5 episode Took. West starred as Lysander in the 1999 film version of William Shakespeares A Midsummer Nights Dream, in feature films, he portrayed the heavy metal guitarist Kirk Cuddy in the 2001 film Rock Star. In 2006 West made a guest appearance as an actor in a sketch in The Catherine Tate Show, in 2007, he played the Spartan politician Theron in 300 and Detective Poppil in Hannibal Rising. West played the supervillain, Jigsaw, in the 2008 film Marvels Punisher, in 2010 he had a role as General Virilus in Neil Marshalls adventure thriller Centurion. West starred in the UK ghost film, The Awakening, West has done other work on TV and radio. He appeared in the role of Oliver Cromwell in the Channel 4 series The Devils Whore and he also performed as Dr. West, the opening track on Eminems 2009 album Relapse, as a doctor discharging Eminem from a rehab facility. West played the part over the phone in January 2009 while Eminem was recording it in a Miami studio, in 2011, West appeared as a news presenter on the BBC-TV period drama series The Hour. In 2012, West was offered the role of Mance Rayder in the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones and he played gay activist Jonathan Blake in the 2014 film Pride about the 1984-1985 miners strike in the UK. West stars as Noah Solloway on Showtimes series The Affair, which premiered October 2014, the series was renewed for a third season in 2015. As a theatre actor, West has played Edward in Harley Granville Barkers The Voysey Inheritance directed by Peter Gill at the Royal National Theatre in 2006. He took the role in Simon Grays classic comedy, Butley. In the September he returned to his native Sheffield to play Iago to his former Wire co-star Clarke Peterss Othello at the Crucible Theatre, from mid December 2012 to January 2013, West starred as Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield. In 2015-16 he starred alongside Janet McTeer in Les Liaisons Dangereuses at the Donmar Warehouse in London, in 2009, West starred in a series of online films known as The Carte Noire Readers
2.
BBC Four
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BBC Four is a British television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite, and cable. BBC Four launched on 2 March 2002, with a running from 19,00 to 04,00. The channel shows a variety of programmes including comedy, documentaries, music, international film, original programmes, drama. An alternative to programmes on the mainstream TV channels and it is required by its licence to broadcast at least 100 hours of new arts and music programmes,110 hours of new factual programmes and to premiere twenty international films each year. BBC Four launched on 2 March 2002 at 19,00 GMT, BBC Four began originally as a late schedule to BBC Two, before it received its own channel, along with BBC Three. Curiously, BBC Four had to launch before BBC Three as a result of the government delaying approval plans, BBC Four would rebrand this channel, and bring it into line with the well recognised BBC One and Two brands at the same time. Planning for the new channel, along with the new BBC Three, had been in progress since October 2000, however, the BBC Four plans were approved earlier, and as a result launched before BBC Three. BBC Four was different from the old BBC Knowledge, the channel would be more heavily promoted with more new and original programming and the channel would not be broadcast 24 hours a day. This was because on the Freeview digital terrestrial platform, BBC Four is broadcast in a statistically multiplexed stream in Multiplex B that timeshares with the CBeebies channel. As a result, BBC Four broadcasts from 19,00 to around 04,00 each night, with an hours down-time, on 12 May 2011, BBC Four was added to the Sky EPG in the Republic of Ireland on channel 230. It later moved to EPG211 to free up space for new channels, BBC Four forms part of the BBC Vision group, and as a result, the channel controller is answerable to the head of this executive department, Emma Swain, as of 2012. The channel direction is determined by the channels remit, set by royal charter and the governing body. On 20 January 2016, Kim Shillinglaw announced that she had decided to leave the BBC as the Controller of BBC Two & BBC Four, as a result of the reorganisation, the post of Controller BBC Two and Four will close after her departure later in 2016. On 16 July 2013, the BBC announced that a high-definition simulcast of BBC Four would be launched by early 2014, the channel launched on 10 December 2013, and rolled out nationwide up to June 2014. The channel broadcasts on the BBCs new HD multiplex on Freeview, prior to launch, the majority of BBC Fours HD output was broadcast on the BBC HD channel before its closure on 26 March 2013. The first evenings BBC Four programmes were simulcast on BBC Two, BBC Four further supports foreign language films with its annual World Cinema Award which has been running since 2004. On weekdays at 19,00 and weekends at 21,00 and it screens a number of documentaries such as The Century of the Self and The Trials of Henry Kissinger. The channel is also home to many political travel shows such as Holidays in the Axis of Evil which features investigative journalism, drama has given the channel some of its most popular programmes, with The Alan Clark Diaries and Kenneth Williams, Fantabulosa
3.
BBC
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The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. It is headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, the BBC is the worlds oldest national broadcasting organisation and the largest broadcaster in the world by number of employees. It employs over 20,950 staff in total,16,672 of whom are in public sector broadcasting, the total number of staff is 35,402 when part-time, flexible, and fixed contract staff are included. The BBC is established under a Royal Charter and operates under its Agreement with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. The fee is set by the British Government, agreed by Parliament, and used to fund the BBCs radio, TV, britains first live public broadcast from the Marconi factory in Chelmsford took place in June 1920. It was sponsored by the Daily Mails Lord Northcliffe and featured the famous Australian Soprano Dame Nellie Melba, the Melba broadcast caught the peoples imagination and marked a turning point in the British publics attitude to radio. However, this public enthusiasm was not shared in official circles where such broadcasts were held to interfere with important military and civil communications. By late 1920, pressure from these quarters and uneasiness among the staff of the licensing authority, the General Post Office, was sufficient to lead to a ban on further Chelmsford broadcasts. But by 1922, the GPO had received nearly 100 broadcast licence requests, John Reith, a Scottish Calvinist, was appointed its General Manager in December 1922 a few weeks after the company made its first official broadcast. The company was to be financed by a royalty on the sale of BBC wireless receiving sets from approved manufacturers, to this day, the BBC aims to follow the Reithian directive to inform, educate and entertain. The financial arrangements soon proved inadequate, set sales were disappointing as amateurs made their own receivers and listeners bought rival unlicensed sets. By mid-1923, discussions between the GPO and the BBC had become deadlocked and the Postmaster-General commissioned a review of broadcasting by the Sykes Committee and this was to be followed by a simple 10 shillings licence fee with no royalty once the wireless manufactures protection expired. The BBCs broadcasting monopoly was made explicit for the duration of its current broadcast licence, the BBC was also banned from presenting news bulletins before 19.00, and required to source all news from external wire services. Mid-1925 found the future of broadcasting under further consideration, this time by the Crawford committee, by now the BBC under Reiths leadership had forged a consensus favouring a continuation of the unified broadcasting service, but more money was still required to finance rapid expansion. Wireless manufacturers were anxious to exit the loss making consortium with Reith keen that the BBC be seen as a service rather than a commercial enterprise. The recommendations of the Crawford Committee were published in March the following year and were still under consideration by the GPO when the 1926 general strike broke out in May. The strike temporarily interrupted newspaper production and with restrictions on news bulletins waived the BBC suddenly became the source of news for the duration of the crisis. The crisis placed the BBC in a delicate position, the Government was divided on how to handle the BBC but ended up trusting Reith, whose opposition to the strike mirrored the PMs own
4.
Girl Guides
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Girl Guides and Girl Scouts are a Scouting movement, originally and still largely for girls and women only across various national associations. These organisations evolved from as early as 1908, with girls wishing or demanding to take part in the then grassroots Boy Scout Movement, in different places around the world, the movement developed in diverse ways. In some places, girls joined or attempted to join Scouting organisations, in other places, girls groups were started, some of them later to open up to boys or merge with boys organisations. In other instances, mixed groups were formed, sometimes to later split, in the same way, the name Girl Guide or Girl Scout has been used by groups at different times and in different places, with some groups changing from one to another. The World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts was formed in 1928 and has member organisations in 145 countries, WAGGGS celebrated the centenary of the international Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting Movement over three years, from 2010 to 2012. There are now more than 10 million Guides worldwide, There has been much discussion about how similar Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting should be to boys Scouting programs. While many girls saw what the boys were doing and wanted to do it too, even when most Scout organisations became mixed-gender, Guiding has remained separate in most countries to provide a female-centred programme. For example, the UK Scout Association introduced mixed-sex provision in 1976 with the Venture Scout programme, for all age-based sections in 1991, Girl Guiding in the UK remains limited to girls. In regard to transgender girls, they are allowed to join Girl Guiding, lieutenant-General Robert Baden-Powell was a British soldier during the Second Anglo-Boer War in South Africa. When he came home, he decided to put his Scouting ideas into practice to see if they would work for young boys, and took 21 boys camping on Brownsea Island, near Poole in Dorset. The camp was a success, and Baden-Powell wrote the book Scouting for Boys, soon boys began to organise themselves into Patrols and Troops and called themselves Boy Scouts. Girls bought the book as well and formed themselves into Patrols of Girl Scouts while other girls, in 1909 there was a Boy Scout rally at Crystal Palace in London. Among the thousands of Boy Scouts at the rally was a group of girls from Pinkneys Green and they asked Baden-Powell to let girls be Scouts but he decided that separate single-gender organisations were a better solution. In 1910 Baden-Powell formed The Girl Guides in the United Kingdom, many, though by no means all, Girl Guide and Girl Scout groups across the globe trace their roots to this point. Baden-Powell chose the name Guides from a regiment in the British Indian Army, the Corps of Guides, in some countries, the girls preferred to remain or call themselves ‘Girl Scouts’. The first Guide Company was 1st Pinkneys Green Guides, who still exist in Pinkneys Green, Maidenhead, agnes Baden-Powell, Baden-Powells sister, was in charge of the Girl Guides in UK in its early years. Others influential in the movement were Juliette Gordon Low, founder of the Girl Scouts of the USA, Olga Drahonowska-Małkowska in Poland, Things that are shared amongst all Guide Units are, The Guide Promise – Girls become Guides by making their Promise. Each country has its own Promise, but historically all have the three parts, duty to God or to your religion, duty to your country and keeping the Guide Law
5.
Kelly Holmes
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Dame Kelly Holmes, DBE is a retired British middle distance athlete. Holmes specialised in the 800 metres and 1500 metres events and won a medal for both distances at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens. She set British records in events and still holds the records over the 600,800 and 1000 metre distances. Inspired by a number of successful British middle distance runners in the late 1970s and early 1980s and she joined the British Army, but continued to compete at the organisations athletics events. She turned to the athletics circuit in the early 1990s and in 1994 she won the 1500 m at the Commonwealth Games. She won silver in the 1500 m at the 1998 Commonwealth Games and bronze in the 800 m at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, Holmes won the 1500 m at the 2002 Commonwealth Games and the 800 m bronze at the Munich European Championships that year. The 2003 track season saw her take silver in the 1500 m at the World Indoor Championships and the 800 m silver medals at the World Championships and first World Athletics Final. She took part in her final championship in 2004 — she turned in a double gold medal-winning performance at the Athens Olympics. For her achievements she won awards and was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005. She retired from athletics in 2005 and has made a number of television appearances. She participated as a contestant in the 2015 series of Bear Grylls, Holmes was born in Pembury, Kent, the daughter of Derrick Holmes, a Jamaican-born car mechanic, and an English mother, Pam Norman. Her mother,18 at the time of her birth, married painter and decorator Michael Norris, Holmes grew up in Hildenborough, Kent, where she attended Hildenborough CEP School, and then Hugh Christie Comprehensive School in Tonbridge from the age of 12. Her hero was British middle distance runner Steve Ovett, and she was inspired by his success at the 1980 Summer Olympics, in the Army, she was initially a lorry driver in the Womens Royal Army Corps, later becoming a basic Physical Training Instructor. Holmes then elected in June 1990 to attend the first course to be run under the Armys new Physical Training syllabus, although militarily quite young, Holmes athletic prowess was impressive and she was encouraged to attend the course selection for full-time transfer to the Royal Army Physical Training Corps. Holmes eventually qualified as a Sergeant Class 1 PTI, although she remained in the Adjutant Generals Corps after the disbandment of the WRAC in 1992. At another event, she competed in and won an 800 metres, a 3000 metres, for several years she combined athletics with employment in the Army, until increased funding allowed her to become a full-time athlete in 1997. At least once, she considered suicide, but she sought help from a doctor and was diagnosed with clinical depression. While she could not use anti-depressants because it would affect her performance,2004 saw Holmes arrive at a major competition, the Athens Olympics, with no injury worries for just about the first time in her career
6.
Clare Short
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Clare Short is a British politician, and a member of the Labour Party. She stood down as a member of parliament at the 2010 general election, Short was Secretary of State for International Development in the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair from 3 May 1997 until her resignation from that post on 12 May 2003. Clare Short was born in Birmingham, England in 1946 to Irish Catholic parents from County Armagh, Short was briefly married to a fellow student at 18 after she had a child at 17. Their son was given up for adoption, and did not make contact with his mother until 1996. She discovered that her son, Toby, was a Conservative supporter who worked as a solicitor in the City of London, and her second marriage, to former Labour minister Alex Lyon, ended when he died from Alzheimers disease in 1993. Short is a cousin of Canadian actor Martin Short, their fathers were brothers, with a degree in political science from the University of Leeds, she became a civil servant in the Home Office. At the start of her career she was firmly on the wing of the party. She gained some notoriety shortly after her election in 1983 when she implied the governments Employment minister Alan Clark was drunk at the despatch box. Clarks colleagues on the government benches in turn accused Short of using un-Parliamentary language, Clark later admitted in his diaries that Short had been correct in her assessment. In 1986 she gained attention for campaigning against Page 3 photographs of models in The Sun. For this she was nicknamed by The Sun killjoy Clare, one paper bought and published alleged photographs of Short in her nightwear from her first husband. She stated they were pictures of somebody elses body with her face superimposed and she supported Margaret Beckett for the Labour leadership in 1994 against Tony Blair and John Prescott. She also called for the withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland and she rose through the ranks of the Labour Front Bench, despite twice resigning from it – over the Prevention of Terrorism Act in 1988, and over the Gulf War in 1990. She became Shadow Minister for Women, and then Shadow Transport Secretary, at the 1995 Labour conference, Short denounced Liz Davies as unsuitable after Davies had been selected as a Parliamentary candidate by a constituency Labour Party in Leeds North-East. This was seen as an attempt to win the favour of the wing of the party. However, in 1996, Short was moved to the Overseas Development portfolio, Short has also called for the legalisation of cannabis. She retained this post throughout the first term of the Labour government, on her appointment to the DfID, journalists asked Short whether she would be good. She replied Im going to try to be good but I cant help it and this remark caused great offence to the Montserratians and others, Labour MP Bernie Grant said that She sounds like a mouthpiece for an old 19th century colonial and Conservative government
7.
Kate Silverton
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Kate Silverton is an English journalist, currently employed by the BBC. Silverton has two sisters, Claire and Amy, Silverton attended West Hatch High School in Chigwell, Essex, where she was a junior swimming champion. She also competed in the triathlon and she was a Girl Guide and gained the Queens Guide Award. Silverton graduated from Durham University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology, having previously studied Arabic, Silverton went to Zimbabwe with Raleigh International, spending her gap year working for them in Egypt and Lebanon. Silverton worked for a London-based bank before becoming a journalist and she trained with the BBC, working on Look North news before becoming a reporter and presenter at Tyne Tees Television. She was a panellist on Channel 5s The Wright Stuff and she also featured on The Heaven and Earth Show, Big Strong Boys, and Weekend Breakfast on BBC Radio 5 Live, before joining BBC News. In 2003, Silverton allegedly hit Rod Liddle, the editor of BBC Radio 4s Today programme. Liddle said, I made a comment about the disabled which Kate rightly took exception to. From 2005 until December 2007, Silverton was a presenter on BBC News 24, in December 2007, Silverton was named as the presenter of the BBC News - a 90-second round up of the news shown on BBC One, which she presented for two months. She presented the BBC News at One from February to August 2008, in August 2010, BBC Scotland apologised to viewers after Silverton swore at the end of a news bulletin on live television. Viewers in Scotland were the ones who heard the words. A spokesman for BBC Scotland said, Kate thought she was off-air at the time, the microphones hadnt been faded down and the mistake only went out in Scotland. In October 2011, Silverton took maternity leave and returned to the News at One in April 2012, until May 2012, she was the deputy presenter of the BBC News at One, presenting on Mondays and when main presenter Sophie Raworth was unavailable. Sian Williams later took over this role, Silverton returned to the deputy role in October 2013 to cover for Sian Williams leave however Williams later left the BBC. Sliverton returned to the BBC News in July 2015 but was seconded to BBC Radio 4 and she returned from her secondment in April 2016. On 1 April 2008, alongside the historian Dan Snow, she presented coverage of the celebrations held at RAF Fairford for the 90th Birthday of the Royal Air Force. In 2008, Silverton joined the team for Big Cat Diary on BBC One. She co-presented coverage of New Year Live aboard HMS Belfast in London on 31 December 2008 on BBC One with Nick Knowles, in April 2009, she appeared as a mentor in the BBC Two series The Speaker, offering her advice on good storytelling and public speaking
8.
BBC Online
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BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBCs online service. The website has gone through several branding changes since it was launched, originally named BBC Online, it was then rebranded as BBCi before being named bbc. co. uk. It was then renamed BBC Online again in 2008, however the service uses the branding BBC, the web-based service of the BBC is one of the most visited websites and the worlds largest news website. As of 2007, it contained two million pages. On 2 March 2010, the BBC reported that it cut its website spending by 25% and close BBC6 Music. On 24 January 2011, the cuts of 25% were announced leaving a £34 million shortfall. This resulted in the closure of several sites, including BBC Switch, BBC Blast, 6-0-6, and this led to the official launch of BBC Online at the www. bbc. co. uk address in December 1997. Later, BBC Online launched licence fee funded web sites for Top of the Pops and Top Gear, Beeb. com was later refocussed as an online shopping guide, and was closed in 2002. Beeb. com now redirects to the BBC Shop website, run by BBC Worldwide. In 1999, the BBC bought the www. bbc. com domain name for $375,000, previously owned by Boston Business Computing, as of 2005, www. bbcnc. org. uk no longer exists. In 2001, BBC Online was rebranded as BBCi. the website launched on 7 November 2001, the BBCi name was conceived as an umbrella brand for all the BBCs digital interactive services across web, digital teletext, interactive TV and on mobile platforms. The navbar was designed to offer a similar system to the i-bar on BBCi interactive television. Interactive TV services continued under the BBCi brand until it was dropped completely in 2008, the BBCs online video player, the iPlayer has, however, retained an i-prefix in its branding. The widget-based design was inspired by such as Facebook and iGoogle. The new homepage also incorporated the design used in the 1970s on the BBCs television service into the large header. The new BBC homepage left beta on Wednesday,27 February 2008 to serve as the new BBC Homepage under the same URL as the previous version. On 30 January 2010, a new design became available as a beta version. This homepage expanded on the idea and the customisation theme
