1 00:00:00,380 --> 00:00:01,380 Psst, hey! 2 00:00:01,380 --> 00:00:04,130 I’m going to let you in on a little secret, but you can’t tell anybody, okay? 3 00:00:04,130 --> 00:00:06,890 I would be ruined if this got out. 4 00:00:06,890 --> 00:00:09,080 So you know those segments at the end of my videos? 5 00:00:09,080 --> 00:00:12,190 The ones where I express my support for a product or service? 6 00:00:12,190 --> 00:00:16,720 Well there’s actually a bit of a… conflict of interest: these companies have been bribing 7 00:00:16,720 --> 00:00:17,999 me to endorse them. 8 00:00:17,999 --> 00:00:19,369 Wait, what was that? 9 00:00:19,369 --> 00:00:20,659 You already knew that? 10 00:00:20,659 --> 00:00:23,609 I haven’t been doing a good job at keeping that a secret? 11 00:00:23,609 --> 00:00:28,070 Well at least it’s a better-kept secret than this place: the BT Tower. 12 00:00:28,070 --> 00:00:34,620 You see, the BT Tower is an iconic part of London’s skyline, and a major tourist attraction—since 13 00:00:34,620 --> 00:00:39,510 the day it opened in 1964, it’s been visited by millions of people, operated a rotating 14 00:00:39,510 --> 00:00:43,820 restaurant, and even maintained the title of tallest building in London for nearly 16 15 00:00:43,820 --> 00:00:44,820 years. 16 00:00:44,820 --> 00:00:46,290 So why am I making a video about it? 17 00:00:46,290 --> 00:00:49,490 Well, it’s not because I’ve run out of content; that’s going to happen in about 18 00:00:49,490 --> 00:00:50,490 four months. 19 00:00:50,490 --> 00:00:56,420 I’m making this video because the BT Tower—in all of its shiny, rotating glory—was technically 20 00:00:56,420 --> 00:01:01,489 classified as a secret location under UK law for decades. 21 00:01:01,489 --> 00:01:04,070 Now at this point, you’re probably saying, “Wait, what? 22 00:01:04,070 --> 00:01:06,049 How was a tourist attraction a secret location?” 23 00:01:06,049 --> 00:01:09,390 And, well, obviously that’s what I was building to, so shush. 24 00:01:09,390 --> 00:01:16,219 In the 1960s, the UK was facing two mounting pressures: the first was the Cold War, and 25 00:01:16,219 --> 00:01:20,840 the second was a dangerous scarcity of ugly-looking towers covered in microwave dishes. 26 00:01:20,840 --> 00:01:25,749 In a stroke of total genius, the General Post Office devised a solution that could address 27 00:01:25,749 --> 00:01:27,530 both problems at once. 28 00:01:27,530 --> 00:01:32,049 Specifically, the UK needed to design a new communications network that would stand up 29 00:01:32,049 --> 00:01:36,869 to a nuclear attack, because the UK’s existing modes of long-distance communication—namely 30 00:01:36,869 --> 00:01:40,189 coaxial cables and yelling at mummy—just wouldn’t cut it. 31 00:01:40,189 --> 00:01:45,240 The original plan was to build a “skeleton cable network,” which would feature around-the-clock 32 00:01:45,240 --> 00:01:49,920 coverage of all things skelet—wait, sorry, wrong skeleton cable network. 33 00:01:49,920 --> 00:01:53,819 This skeleton cable network would reinforce the UK’s existing cable network with a series 34 00:01:53,819 --> 00:01:58,390 of extra nodes that would bypass major cities like London, Manchester, and Birmingham by 35 00:01:58,390 --> 00:02:01,020 between 30 and 60 miles. 36 00:02:01,020 --> 00:02:04,770 This would mean that if the Soviets had nuked London, the data could reroute through the 37 00:02:04,770 --> 00:02:08,950 backup network outside of London, and everybody who wasn’t just sent to whatever the British 38 00:02:08,950 --> 00:02:14,860 version of heaven is could watch live footage of their own imminent demise, completely uninterrupted. 39 00:02:14,860 --> 00:02:18,260 But seeing as this backup cable system was a complex infrastructure project that would 40 00:02:18,260 --> 00:02:22,700 take years to implement—and still wouldn’t be entirely reliable when completed—they 41 00:02:22,700 --> 00:02:28,090 decided to speed things up by also doing another complex infrastructure project: a supplementary 42 00:02:28,090 --> 00:02:30,280 network called “Backbone.” 43 00:02:30,280 --> 00:02:34,260 Instead of building this Backbone network out of coaxial cables—which could be severed 44 00:02:34,260 --> 00:02:40,330 by a nuclear explosion or a single Capitalist-hating mouse—they decided on a radio network instead. 45 00:02:40,330 --> 00:02:44,170 This system would stretch from south-east England to Scotland, using microwave radio 46 00:02:44,170 --> 00:02:48,770 towers to transmit both civilian and military data up and down the UK. 47 00:02:48,770 --> 00:02:53,540 Now, if you remember the BT Tower from all the way back 2 minutes ago, it just so happened 48 00:02:53,540 --> 00:02:58,820 to be one of the major towers in this brand-new half-television/half-military-secrets communications 49 00:02:58,820 --> 00:03:03,910 network, and as such, it was designated a “secret location” under the Official Secrets 50 00:03:03,910 --> 00:03:05,760 Act of 1911. 51 00:03:05,760 --> 00:03:10,320 This meant that its address was not considered public information, and disseminating information 52 00:03:10,320 --> 00:03:12,760 about it was technically illegal. 53 00:03:12,760 --> 00:03:17,790 But unlike the UK’s better-kept secrets—like Hugh Laurie being British or Australia 2—the 54 00:03:17,790 --> 00:03:21,070 BT Tower couldn’t be easily kept under wraps. 55 00:03:21,070 --> 00:03:25,290 Because it needed line of sight on the other radio towers at all times, it couldn’t risk 56 00:03:25,290 --> 00:03:29,880 being blocked by any other local buildings or extremely-tall Soviet spies, so just to 57 00:03:29,880 --> 00:03:32,630 be safe, they made it the tallest thing in London. 58 00:03:32,630 --> 00:03:36,380 Of course, convincing everyone to pretend like something they see every day simply doesn’t 59 00:03:36,380 --> 00:03:41,150 exist is impossible if you aren’t my middle-school bully, so the laws around the BT tower’s 60 00:03:41,150 --> 00:03:42,960 secrecy were generally pretty lax. 61 00:03:42,960 --> 00:03:46,790 But while you weren’t going to go to jail for typing its address into Google Maps—or 62 00:03:46,790 --> 00:03:51,510 since it was the 60s, I don’t know, Ye Olde Google Maps—that doesn’t mean that its 63 00:03:51,510 --> 00:03:54,460 secret status was completely unenforceable. 64 00:03:54,460 --> 00:03:59,069 In 1978, for example, a journalist was tried and convicted under the Official Secrets Act 65 00:03:59,069 --> 00:04:04,130 for collecting information about similar locations, and the judge ruled that any secret location—including 66 00:04:04,130 --> 00:04:08,790 the BT Tower—could not be legally named; instead, the BT Tower was given the affectionate 67 00:04:08,790 --> 00:04:10,750 pet name “Location 23.” 68 00:04:10,750 --> 00:04:12,819 So, am I finally going to go to jail? 69 00:04:12,819 --> 00:04:14,980 Is this finally the end of Half as Interesting? 70 00:04:14,980 --> 00:04:19,250 Well, sorry to disappoint, but I’m not about to let some tiny island nation out in the 71 00:04:19,250 --> 00:04:22,880 middle of the Atlantic stop me from retrofitting Wikipedia articles with bad jokes for money. 72 00:04:22,880 --> 00:04:28,960 And besides, the BT Tower was ceremoniously declassified in 1993 when MP Kate Hoey invoked 73 00:04:28,960 --> 00:04:34,040 parliamentary privilege to confirm its existence and address, so I can talk about it all I 74 00:04:34,040 --> 00:04:35,040 want. 75 00:04:35,040 --> 00:04:36,440 It’s all public information now. 76 00:04:36,440 --> 00:04:41,430 I can even tell you about the insane experiments they’re conducting in the baseme— 77 00:04:41,430 --> 00:04:44,840 Y’know who else doesn’t harbor evil secrets? 78 00:04:44,840 --> 00:04:46,670 Our sponsor, Skillshare. 79 00:04:46,670 --> 00:04:50,520 That’s because their whole thing is sharing the equally-evil secrets behind things like 80 00:04:50,520 --> 00:04:54,420 YouTube 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