U.N.I.T. (tie-in website)

U.N.I.T.
Main character(s):	UNIT
Main setting:	United Kingdom, 2005-2006
Key crew
Publisher:	BBC
Editor:	James Goss
Writer:	BBC webteam
Release details
Genre:	Science fiction
Release date:	18 April 2005
Format:	Transmedia fiction
Doctor Who tie-in websites
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You may be looking for the in-universe website.

U.N.I.T. was a website launched on 18 April 2005 to coincide with the 2005 series of Doctor Who, specifically World War Three, one of several websites created at that time. On 20 April, the Doctor Who website added a link to the U.N.I.T. website, visible as "Alien Hotline", after the site updated to focus on World War Three.

Everything on the website was told from an in-universe perspective, as if you were reading the very pages on the in-universe website itself. The website prominently featured many references to the original and early revival eras of Doctor Who.

Contents

#	Source	Main character(s)	Featuring	Release Date	Notes
1	UNIT History: Fighting the unknown			18 April 2005	First short story released on the website.
2	The Clocks Go Forward				Part of the UNIT Press Briefings series.
3	UNIT's Position on the Skaniska Incident	M Osborne	Martin Berry
4	UNIT's New York Operation Expansion	A. Frederick	A Highway
5	Computer Virus File Sharing Alert	D Judd
6	UNIT's Position on The London Incident	A. Frederick
7	UNIT Conferences				First feature to be released on the website.
8	UNIT Publications		A.O. Osgood
9	UNIT News		Martin Bury
10	Privacy Policy, Disclaimer and Terms of Use
11	Operation Mannequin	A. Frederick, D Judd, Catherine Petts
12	Operation London	Jenny Maguire, Annie Frederick, J Frinkstein, David Judd		22 April 2005	This story story coincided with Aliens of London.
13	Number Ten Pays Tribute to UNIT	C Powers	Harriet Jones	23 April 2005	This duo of stories coincided with World War Three.
14	Number Ten	Jenny Maguire, A. Frederick
15	Object Auction	J Frinkstein, Jenny Maguire		30 April 2005	This story coincided with Dalek.
16	untitled			c. April 2005	First and only game to be released on the website. This story coincided with World War Three.
17	Rose Tyler	Catherine Petts, A. Frederick, J Frinkstein, Jenny Maguire		14 May 2005	This story coincided with Father's Day.
18	Unexploded WWII Bomb Warnings	Alex Balfour		21 May 2005	This story coincided with The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances.
19	Cardiff Earthquake			4 June 2005	This story coincided with Boom Town.
20	Guinevere One	Catherine Petts, A. Frederick	Richard Blake	c. December 2005	This trio of stories coincided with The Christmas Invasion.
21	Alien Life
22	Project Rooftop	Catherine Petts, Jenny Maguire, A. Frederick	Richard Blake

Notes

• Prior to the BBC's usage of the domain, the url unit.org.uk belonged to a group of artists.
• While large portions of the website indirectly reference alien incidents, and by extension, confirms that they undeniably exist, the UNIT Press Briefings somewhat contradict this where the alien incidents, both pre- and post-Rose, are covered up. Though the final UNIT Press Briefing, Alien Life, shows UNIT explicitly confirming the existence of alien life.
  • Similarly, the short story UNIT History: Fighting the unknown acknowledges the UK's 1970s Mars missions, however, the website also directly ties into The Christmas Invasion, which entirely ignores the 1970s Mars missions.
• The stories on the website attributes dates to both the classic and revival era UNIT stories; while the dates given to classic stories align with a common dating practice of setting them on their respective broadcast dates, the dates given to the revival era stories are more arbitary and inconsistent. Some are said to occur on their broadcast dates, such as the date given for Rose being 26 March – the real world broadcast date – it gives seemingly random dates for other stories, such as 28 June 2006 for Aliens of London in Operation London, it is neither the real world broadcast date of the story (which was 16 April) or is consistent with the "one year later" setting of Aliens of London (as it therefore should be around 26 March 2006, logically) or even consistent with the date given for World War Three in Number Ten Pays Tribute to UNIT, which was sometime prior to 26 May, setting the second part of the Slitheen duology about a month before the first part.
  • A possible explanation, though speculative, is inferred from Rose Tyler — Major Jenny Maguire, upon learning of Mickey Smith's ownership of Defending the Earth!, suggests planting misinformation on the website, and while this is seemingly denied by Staff Sergeant Annie Frederick, the insertion of misinformation could have been agreed to offsite.
• The characters Annie Frederick, M Osborne and C Jones seem to be either be homages and/or self-inserts of Annie Frederick, Michelle Osborn and Claire Jones, all employees of the BBC in 2005.
• The website domain seems to have been bought by the BBC on 23 November 2004.
• The feature UNIT Publications was written on a train by James Goss.

The United Nations' Legal Actions

Main article: UN's legal actions against the UNIT acronym

It was because of this website using the original UNIT acronym (United Nations Intelligence Taskforce), the real world United Nations took legal action against the BBC and the acronym was hastily changed to the Unified Intelligence Taskforce.

External links

• U.N.I.T. via the Wayback Machine