Dave is a British free-to-air television channel owned by UKTV, a subsidiary of BBC Studios. It broadcasts mainly comedy, with some factual programming. The channel took the name Dave on 15 October 2007, but it had been on air under various identities and formats since October 1998. History UK Gold Classics and UK Gold 2 (1998–2003) UK Gold Classics, UKTV's first digital-only channel, was launched on 2 October 1998 and was only broadcast from Friday to Sunday on Sky Digital from 6.00 pm to 2.00 am. Around this time, UK Gold began to move towards newer programmes instead of older ones; the 'classics' line-up included a number of early shows, including some black-and-white programmes, which had been acquired in the early years of the UK Gold service. They also showed some recent shows from the main channel, but the main purpose of the channel was older shows from the early years of UK Gold. On weekdays, the channel was off air, showing a still caption of all the UKTV channels and start-up times. The 'Classics' format lasted just six months; the channel ended on 28 March 1999, and from 2 April 1999, the channel was renamed to UK Gold 2, and screened morning programmes from UK Gold time-shifted to the evening of the same day instead of classic shows. UK G² and UKTV G2 (2003–2007) The channel was relaunched with a completely new programme line-up and renamed UK G² on 12 November 2003. It was promoted as being an edgier alternative to UK Gold; like that channel, the output was mainly comedy series from the BBC with some shows produced in-house. A fair amount was similar to the comedy output of UK Play/Play UK before that channel's closure; however, unlike Play, the channel did not include music videos. Along with the rest of the UKTV network, the "UK" prefix was changed to "UKTV" on 8 March 2004 and therefore, the channel name changed to UKTV G2. Initially, the channel broadcast in the evenings only, but during the 'G2' era, the decision was made to expand hours into the daytime; to expand the programming line-up, comedy was joined by popular-factual and magazine shows which were already running on UKTV People (then Blighty, now Drama) such as Top Gear and Airport. G2 programming On 7 October 2005, it was announced that they would show sports programming. This new line-up was called UKTV