Tony Ageh

{{Short description|American executive}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Tony Ageh

| honorific_suffix = OBE

| image = Tony Ageh at BBC Television Centre.JPG

| alt =

| caption = Ageh in 2012

| birth_name =

| birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1959}}

| birth_place = Chelsea, London

| death_date =

| death_place =

| nationality =

| other_names =

| occupation = Chief Digital Officer

| employer = New York Public Library

| known_for = BBC iPlayer – BBC Genome

| module = {{Listen |embed=yes |filename= Tony Ageh.ogg |title= Tony Ageh's voice |type= speech |description= recorded November 2013 }}

}}

Tony Ageh OBE, (born 23rd December, 1959) was until 2023 the New York Public Library's Chief Digital Officer {{ Cite web | first = Jemima | last = Kiss | url = https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/apr/06/bbc-tony-ageh-new-york-public-library | title = BBC digital expert Tony Ageh poached by New York Public Library | website = The Guardian | date = 6 April 2016 }} having previously been Controller of Archive Development at the BBC.

His first job as a school leaver was production assistant on Home Organist, working for Richard Desmond, subsequently the proprietor of Express Newspapers.

He then moved to Publishing Holdings, which owned list titles including What Mortgage and What Telephone.[http://www.themediafestivalarts.com/speakers-detail.cfm?officeContactId=667 Speakers: Tony Ageh"] {{webarchive|url=https://archive.today/20130702151108/http://www.themediafestivalarts.com/speakers-detail.cfm?officeContactId=667 |date=2013-07-02 }}, Media Festival Arts 2010 With four colleagues he set up and ran publishing co-operative Brass Tacks, publishers of Mortgage Magazine, during which time he helped football fanzine When Saturday Comes to gain national distribution and upgrade its production to magazine quality. Also during the 1980s he joined Richard Branson's short-lived London listings magazine, Event, set up while Time Out journalists were on strike, then became publisher of City Limits magazine, rival to listings magazine Time Out, which eventually ceased publication in 1993.

He was invited to join the Guardian Media Group in 1990Jemima Kiss [https://www.theguardian.com/media/2010/nov/01/tony-ageh-interview-bbc-archive "Tony Ageh on the BBC Archive and how to remake the internet"], The Guardian, 1 November 2010 by Jim Markwick, then managing director. By the mid-1990s he was head of product development at The Guardian where he launched "The Guide", a listings supplement, Wired UK and introduced online content to a UK national newspaper for the first time. From The Guardian he rejoined Branson to work on the launch of virgin.net, originally a portal for the Virgin group of companies, now part of Virgin Media.

He joined the BBC after quitting the UK listings and information service UpMyStreet in 2002.Owen Gibson [https://www.theguardian.com/media/2002/aug/08/newmedia "Co-founder quits Upmystreet.com"], Media Guardian, 8 August 2002 At the BBC he led the team which devised and developed the BBC iPlayer, which necessitated no fewer than 84 internal BBC presentations. In October 2008 he was appointed as the Controller of BBC Archive Development {{cite web|accessdate=2009-02-18|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2008/10_october/10/ageh.shtml|title=Tony Ageh appointed BBC Controller of Archive Development|date=2008-10-10|work=BBC Press Office}} in which he championed the public service use of the BBC's archive through products such as BBC Genome{{cite web|title=About this project|url=http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/about|publisher=BBC|accessdate=21 October 2014}} and The research and education space (RES){{cite web|title=The research and education space (RES)|url=https://www.jisc.ac.uk/rd/projects/research-education-space|website=JISC|accessdate=31 March 2016|ref=RES}} built in partnership with JISC and the British Universities Film & Video Council, working with former Guardian colleague Bill Thompson{{cite news|last=Bunz |first=Mercedes |url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/pda/2009/nov/02/bbc-archive-bill-thompson |title=Pair behind first Guardian website back together for BBC Archive |publisher=Guardian |date= 2 November 2009|accessdate=2010-11-28 |location=London}}

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He was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2015 New Year Honours.{{cite web|url=http://www.voice-online.co.uk/article/bbc-iplay-creator-gets-royal-seal-approval|title=BBC iPlay creator gets royal seal of approval|date=30 December 2014|publisher=The Voice|accessdate=18 January 2016}}