[1] Recorded close to transmission, it made use of contemporary news events to give the programme a greater sense of realism.

According to Swedish comedian Kryddan Petersson, he and the group behind Helt Apropå had come up with an idea for a show like this, which they presented to British colleagues some time around 1989–90.

[3] The series' story began with the acquisition of GlobeLink by media mogul Sir Roysten Merchant, an allusion to either Robert Maxwell or Rupert Murdoch.

Indeed, Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin note on their DVDs that it was fortunate for their libel lawyers that the two men shared the same initials.

The series is mostly based on the ongoing battle between the staff of GlobeLink,[4] led by editor George Dent, as they try to maintain the company as a serious news organisation, and Sir Roysten's right-hand man Gus Hedges, trying to make the show more sensationalist and suppress stories that might harm Sir Roysten's business empire.

It's just something stupid that they imagined might be shouted out in the tense few minutes before a news broadcast.Unusually for a sitcom, the show was topical, and was usually written and filmed in the week before broadcast.

In most offices people normally converse while looking at monitors, clipboards or newspaper crosswords; the cast of the show reproduced this while actually cribbing their lines.

The ending contradicted the novel Drop The Dead Donkey 2000 by Hamilton and Alistair Beaton (1994) ISBN 0-316-91236-0, in which the company is almost destroyed in a bomb blast at the turn of the millennium.

In May 2023, it was announced that a stage version, written by Hamilton and Jenkin and reuniting the surviving members of the main cast, would tour the UK in 2024.

[10] As well as Susannah Doyle, Robert Duncan, Ingrid Lacey, Neil Pearson, Jeff Rawle, Stephen Tompkinson and Victoria Wicks, the show features Julia Hills and Kerena Jagpal.