Russell T Davies, the writer and executive producer of Doctor Who, who successfully brought the show back in 2005 after a nine year hiatus, is stepping down. He'll complete the four "specials" showing in DW's gap year in 2009, before handing over to Steven Moffat for series five onwards.

This has to be one of the best headlines ever on the BBC News -

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7390109.stm

It's currently top of the "most read" stories, surprising really for an ornithological piece..

The Beeb has made someone remove their DR Who knitting patterns from the web.

They're normally fairly lenient on fan activity, but it seems some idiot started selling them on eBay. So Auntie has told everyone to stop it.

I'd include an image, but I don't want to bring the lawyers over to this planet.

There's an interesting article over on the Register about the growing acrimony between the BBC and ISPs over Iplayer. The basic problem is that the Iplayer, the BBC's new system for making its programming available online, is very popular - and since it's video, it also takes a lot of bandwidth. Internet Service Providers in the UK are finding that carrying all this data to so many users is quite costly, and we're supposed to feel sorry for them.

The Register is generally quite scathing about the BBC, and predictably they're taking the ISP's side in this argument as well. The BBC are being branded as arrogant and abusive of their position in setting up Iplayer in the first place, and in criticising the industry's suggestions that they should subsidise the ISPs in some way for having to carry all this extra content.

The BBC have confirmed that the long awaited series four of Doctor Who will start soon - on Saturday 5th April.

The series, which features Catherine Tate reprising her role as Donna Noble, and more guest appearances than you can shake a stick at, will be the last full series until 2010 - and is widely expected to be the last for both David Tennant and writer/producer Russell T Davies, although there will be a number of "specials" through 2009.

This is a massive, massive spoiler. It confirms something for Series 4 that you really don't want to know about. I'm ashamed of myself for posting this. Please, please don't click the "Read More".

The BBC have announced they are (finally) going to remake cult 70's sci-fi classic Survivors, bringing the Terry Nation-created serial up to date for the late noughties.

If you're not familiar, Survivors was an excellent, if flawed drama which originally ran for three series from 1975 onwards, about the aftermath of a worldwide virus outbreak. The first episode showed most of the world being killed of by a rogue virus, with just a handful of those left - the survivors - having to adapt to the overnight loss of civilisation. Terry Nation, who wrote the first series, was also the creator of such classics as Blakes 7, and the infamous Dalek characters in Doctor Who.

I happened to rewatch some of the original recently, and in fairness it all looks incredibly dated now - quite poor production values led to a lot of wobbly sets and sometimes hammy acting - but the stories are good and the whole thing is definitely ripe for a modern day remake. I'm quite looking forward to this...

It's a good news/bad news day for fans of the Doctor - the BBC have confirmed the future of the show until at least 2010, but there's a but - there will be no full series in 2009.

Series four, to be shown next year, will be the last until the fifth series in 2010 - but there will be the usual Christmas specials and three "special" specials to look forward to in 2009, filling the gap between the series. Interestingly both David Tennant and showrunner Russell T Davies are confirmed for these - but their involvement in the eventual series five is less clear.

That august journal The Sun has published the latest in a long line of supposed Doctor Who spoilers, concerning a certain bit of very interesting casting... don't read on if you don't want to know!

Yes I know, another Doctor Who story, but what can I do? Following on swiftly in the latest string of announcements comes the news that the Doctor's full-time companion in series four will be none other than Catherine Tate, reprising her role from the Christmas Special as Donna, aka the runaway bride.