Martin left the BBC today

My good friend and colleague Martin Trickey left the BBC today after four glorious years. He's off to be the headmaster of interactive at Teachers TV. He will be sorely missed by me, but I know he'll be keeping chins up in the staffroom at TTV.

I joined the BBC (this time round) shortly after Martin and we quickly realised that the BBC had conspired to give us the same job, in different departments, and it was going to leave it to us to sort out the detail. It was apparent that together we were an unstoppable force of righteousness against corporate double-think and that we would lead the nation's EastEnders and Doctor Who fans on a shining path to interactive nirvana.

Luckily other, less travelled, paths opened up.

Martin earnt us a BAFTA for Celebdaq, shepherded a number of new Doctor Whos and a Ghost of Albion to the screen and was able to get drunk with Anthony "C3PO" Daniels *twice*.

So work will be a slightly less fun place without him. I'll miss his superb ability to wordplay with the most disconnected concepts and for appreciating my wilful, inappropriate and scatalogical misdirection of serious business. We won't be able to have any more grumpy old man remembrances of how it used to be back in '99 or knowing winks in meetings when someone leaps up to suggest something we already thought of three years ago.

I thank him for making my working life exciting and funny and for helping me keep it real at some of my most Kurtzean moments.

Good luck Martin. Love and respect.