Mounting a passionate defence, Alice Cahn, a director at the US PBS network (which had just acquired Teletubbies), dismissed the criticisms as "ludicrous". ![]() Ada Haug, head of pre-school programmes at Norway's NRK, accused Teletubbies of being "the most market-oriented children's programme concept I've ever seen". "Regressive" and "vaguely evil" were just some of the verbal shots fired. "Teletubbies: are they wising up or dumbing down?" posed the moderator at the summit's first session. The most comforting children's books ever But Tinky Winky, Laa-Laa, Dipsy and Po, with their proto chatter and penchant for repetition, had experts worried. Talk of wibbly-wobbly bottoms and Tubby Toast had swept the nation. It was a runaway hit with both adults and children. The preschool show, created by Ragdoll Productions for the BBC, had begun airing in the UK a year earlier, documenting the antics of four giant, alien-looking babies with antennae atop their heads and televisions in their tummies. Various topics were up for discussion – funding, regulation, new media – but one word was on everybody's lips: Teletubbies. ![]() They had come for the second ever World Summit on Television for Children. ![]() In March 1998 more than 1,500 television bigwigs from 82 different countries descended on the Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre in London.
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