Television.AU turns 20!

This website normally commemorates the anniversaries of others.

This time, it’s our birthday. Today, Television.AU turns 20!

The site was born out of an observation that, even then, there were plenty of websites out there tracing the history and development of television overseas — but there was very little for Australia.

We began on 14 February 2000 as a single, static HTML page hosted on a freebie server (xoom.com). It wasn’t long before more pages and articles were added, and the first Classic TV Guides published.

In May 2001, a companion mailing list was started up in Yahoo! Groups. The list grew to 170 members. (Technically, it’s still active but has not had any activity for many years)

In February 2007, a companion blog was established — Talking Television.AU — providing an updating timeline of posts and articles and covering key news stories, particularly those with a historical bent.

While we don’t profess to holding a video archive, a YouTube channel with a handful of videos (usually to support articles for this site) was added in 2008.

We joined Twitter in 2009.

In June 2012, the static website and blog were amalgamated into the one platform. Following some minor tweaks, it became the site that appears today.

Now, as well as the static pages from the legacy website, we have over 1700 blog posts and more than 600 Classic TV Guides. Amongst other things, there have been week-to-week reviews of TV Times magazines from 1978 and 1979, and TV Week from 1990 to 1996. We’ve charted the history of all the major networks and many of the regional ones, covered various TV Week Logie Awards presentations, recalled key events such as the launch of colour TV, pay TV and aggregation, and traced the conversion to digital TV. We’ve taken a look at some of the shows we’ve all loved, some that you may have forgotten, and some that the networks wish they could forget — and paid tribute to some of the talented people from both sides of the camera.

Here are some happy snapshots of the website from years gone by…

 

 

 

 

Permanent link to this article: https://televisionau.com/2020/02/television-au-turns-20.html

15 comments

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  1. Congratulations. I’ve been following the site for a long time now.

  2. This site is such a joy. Thank you for your passion for it, it is one that is shared and thoroughly enjoyed.

    1. Thank you Tracey 🙂

  3. Thank you Andrew for your long support. I do read your blog too 🙂

    • Luke on 15 February 2020 at 9:45 AM
    • Reply

    Greet site and let’s hope it continues to expand!
    Well done!

    1. Thank you Luke 🙂

    • Andrew M on 16 February 2020 at 4:06 PM
    • Reply

    congratulations on twenty years for bringing back memories years past keep up the good work

    1. So many Andrews here.

      Thank you Andrew “M” 🙂

    • Steven Pritchard on 18 February 2020 at 12:43 PM
    • Reply

    Hi Andrew,
    Congratulations on 20 years of ‘Television.AU’. Been a fan and regular visitor of your website since the early 2000’s. Thank you for the opportunity to contribute years ago with MVQ6’s history. Keep up the good work.

    Cheers,
    Steven Pritchard

    1. Thanks Steven your contribution is much appreciated 🙂

    • Mechsta on 20 February 2020 at 7:34 PM
    • Reply

    I remember when it first started. I’m actually pleased to see that the guides I submitted all those years ago are still there :-). Congrats on 20 years. An absolute milestone and I’m proud to have been a part of it.

    1. Thanks Paul, I have appreciated your contributions and having met up several times 🙂 Thanks for the kind words.

  4. Belated congrats Andrew. Incredible achievement. Keep up the passion & great work -David Knox.

    1. Thank you David for your very kind words and support over the years, and thank you for the mention on your Adelaide ABC article today 🙂

    • Brendon Agpasa on 14 March 2020 at 8:55 AM
    • Reply

    Well congrats Andrew. An excited achievement. Keep up the great work, look up for next year’s 65 years of Australian TV history in a few decades. -Brendon Agpasa.

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