Stream Notes: 04/18/2025 DOCTOR AI? AI WHO?

As the resident Whovian on staff, it falls to me to do damage control regarding the Doctor Who topic from last Friday. I promise, that’s all the salt I’m throwing.

In all honesty, this is very cool. Someone found a practical and worthy use for A.I. Doctor Who is the first and longest running science fiction television series in history. It started in 1963 and ran until 1996, when it took nearly a decade break before returning in 2005. There have been 13 Doctors (by my reconning), 1 War Doctor, and dozens of companions spanning 60 plus years of this British television series. It is beyond being a cultural icon, it’s British history.

The lost episodes of Doctor Who are not lost to time (if you’ll pardon the pun), but lost to short-sightedness. In a crime against history, 97 episodes from the 60s and 70s were purged by the BBC. Now, as reported by FandomPulse, “a 71-year-old music producer and lifelong Doctor Who enthusiast, has spent over $130,000 of his own money to recreate 97 lost episodes using AI technology.”

As an extra bit of wholesomeness, Ian Levine is a cancer survivor, stroke survivor, and confined to a wheelchair.

So far, he’s spent roughly $91,000 of his own savings to finance this project. And it’s a real shame that very few people will get see it. BBC protects their IPs like Disney and Nintendo, with lawyers and plenty of them. Maybe one day…

Stream Notes: 04/18/2025
DOCTOR AI? AI WHO?

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DOCTOR AI? AI WHO?”