A personal look by Robert Vas at 30 years' output of BBC Television, compiled from material in the BBC archives and with the opinions of British TV viewers. More than 100,000 hours of television have been transmitted by the BBC since 1936. In its archives, among 270,000 cans of film and 24,000 boxes of video-tape, the makers of television history sit side by side, from Richard Dimbleby to Muffin the Mule, from the News in Ulster to the Eurovision Song Contest. What is its impact on our lives and what role does it play in our society? What does it give and what does it take? Tonight's programme is a thoughtful, affectionate and sometimes irreverent browse along the archive shelves. Television looks at itself and what television is all about. The voices of viewers from all over the country provide the commentary. For some of them, television is a 'window on the world' and for others it merely 'fills a hole in the living-room.' Their spontaneous comments provide a taste of public opinion about television from 1936 to today.
