''The Net'' is a TV series made by the BBC and shown from 1994 to 1998. It ran for four series, beginning with a premiere episode broadcast on

BBC2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

on 13 April 1994, produced by Stephen Arkell, edited by John Wyver, and with reportage by Rajan Datar and

Susan Rae Susan Scott Rae (born 2 June 1956)Jonathan Rhys-Evan"The Accent's on Success" ''Glasgow Herald'', 18 April 1984 is a Scottish newsreader and continuity announcer on BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4 Extra. Rae was born and raised in Dund ...

, a discussion of audio design for games by Thomas Dolby, and a 5-minute segment with IT expert

Davey Winder Davey Winder, previously known as "Wavey Davey" or "dwindera" but now settled as "happygeek", is a United Kingdom IT pundit who has worked as a consultant, writer and journalist. He was the 'IT Security Journalist of the Year (UK)' three times ...

explaining how to dial into Internet services of the time like

Compuserve CompuServe (CompuServe Information Service, also known by its initialism CIS) was an American online service provider, the first major commercial one in the world – described in 1994 as "the oldest of the Big Three information services (the oth ...

and CIX. Andy Baio
"BBC2's The Net, first episode from April 1994"

Waxy.org Andy Baio is an American technologist and blogger. He is the co-founder of the XOXO Festival, founder of Upcoming.org, a former CTO of Kickstarter and the author of the Waxy.org blog. Career In 2003, Baio launched Upcoming, a collaborative e ...

, 31 March 2008. The focus of the programme was primarily the Internet explosion of the time, though it also dealt with other emerging technologies and series one had a computer games review section. The series was responsible for one of the BBC's earliest efforts at establishing an online presence, when the BBC Networking Club established a web page and a BBS named "Auntie" later in 1994.John Browning
"Prime Time Online"
'' Wired'', 1 November 1994. Following viewer complaints, the games review was dropped for series two, which began on 15 May 1995. It was felt that games reviews were already well catered for by other programmes, such as Channel 4's ''

GamesMaster ''GamesMaster'' is a British television programme which originally aired on Channel 4 from 1992 to 1998. In 2021, it returned for a new series on YouTube and E4. It was the first UK television programme dedicated to video games. Dominik Diam ...

'' and that they did not really fit into ''The Net''.

References

BBC Television shows BBC television documentaries Documentary television series about computing {{BBC-tv-prog-stub