Christopher Price, Panic Mechanics,Douglas Adams, DVD Watch

Liquid News presenter Christopher Price was found, April 22^rd , dead in his London home. Only 34, Price was on an upward career spiral hosting both the internationally seen Liquid News gossip show and the upcoming Eurovision Song Contest coverage for the BBC. As of this writing the cause of death is still unknown.

Price, an amiable, self effacing presenter who's style was campy but dry, was a personality with great promise and I was surprised at how much the news of his death bothered me. I suppose the fact that he was relatively young, compared to many of the UKTV celebrities who had recently passed away (John Thaw, Dudley Moore, Spike Milligan), made his demise all the more disturbing.

Liquid New goes on with a series of guest hosts including camp clown Dale Winton, veteran presenter Jonathan Ross and comedian Phil Jupitus.

This past week saw the final nail into the coffin of pay-TV provider ITV Digital (think DirecTV or Dish Network). Once seen as part of the inevitable technological revolution leading Britain to an all-digital television future crashed and burned so badly that a stuffed monkey mascot may be it's most valuable asset.

The unfortunate downfall of ITV Digital can be pinned on, to a great extent, the obscene amount of money it paid for the rights to broadcast lower division football games and a limited menu of channels that left it's competitors looking like far better values. Still it's a shame whenever market choice becomes more limited and one can only hope that the next licensee to go digital will learn from ITV Digital's mistakes.

The long awaited return of the classic dramedy Auf Wiedersehen, Pet (http://www.bbc.co.uk/drama/pet) did brilliantly for BBC1 which will hopefully lead to a stateside airing of both this new series and the first two outings originally broadcast nearly two decades ago.

While PBS brings us the excellent Frontier House (http://www.pbs.org/wnet/frontierhouse/ ) which is co-produced by the team behind The 1900 House, our British cousins are enthralled by yet another fish out of historical water reality show - Channel 4's Edwardian Country House (http://www.channel4.com/history/microsit... On Edwardian Country House it's Upstairs Downstairs time as participants take on the roles of both masters and servants in the titular home circas 1905.

Rise, the new demographically tweaked breakfast show on the somewhat struggling Channel 4, received decidedly lukewarm reviews and frankly poor ratings for it's debut. Rise, developed for viewers with short attention spans and itchy remote fingers features an informal atmosphere and revolving duty, among the presenters, for the weather forecasts.

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