[Rhys j]

In continuing to discuss and try and roll back on some disrespectful comments about the presenters on the BBC news channel, this thread is just getting too personal about the professional position and calibre of on screen staff. Describing them as “interns” or doubting their “top class journalism” is incredibly condescending.

Please let’s draw a line under this whole subject and move on.

This is an important aspect of BBC News' presentation and how it's perceived. Obviously I don't condone being disrespectful or naming people individually, but...

I think it's fair to say the presentation of the channel due to missing some of the regular experienced presenters has impacted how the channel is perceived and the quality of broadcasting breaking news.

As you say, I wouldn't call them interns or not good at their jobs, as many of them are great reporters in the field.

[Stockland Hillman]

The One moving really does beg the question was the refit of Studio B really necessary? From the 3rd of June it'll only house two 30 minute national bulletins and the evening and late BBC London News too. All of these programmes could easily be housed in other studios within NBH (as was the case pre-2022). Sunday with LK could also be moved elsewhere.

Its only other use case are elections and other special programming, both of which I do think benefit from the larger studio, however I think it would be far more useful with a less permanent set that could be changed out when needed. Due to the camera tracks in the current set, it's hardly any more flexible than Studio C/E, it's just a bigger and more modern version of them.

Normally I would have no problem with the BBC spending a large amount of money on refitting a studio, even if it wasn't used much. However, with BBC News being as cash strapped as they are, it seems very odd that so much was spent of Studio B where it seems like it could be far better used elsewhere.

The regular reminder that a £5.7 Billion revenue organisation isn't cash strapped; although it has had significant reductions on what it would have received - like every major broadcasting organisation in the entire world, small or large.

It's chosen to spend huge sums on BBC sounds podcasts , some with downloads in the hundreds, at huge expense. It's chosen to spend £60m or so on BBC Verify 'journalism' rather than regular journalism.and many many other priorities of the organisation that dont necessarily match public expectation of whst the BBC should be about.

So a couple of million for a heavily automated studio in a redundant space in its expensive central London HQ isn't a big deal, it's probably a similar sum to that spent on keeping talent off air who's face's apparently didn't fit the plans.

[W. Knight]

Seems like BBC News has a new half-hour programme directed at the Indian elections since March… The titles are, unfortunately, the red circles again, though the traditional patterns is a nice touch.
www.youtube.com 

[Chud]

Very comprehensive coverage this afternoon. Bethany Bell already in Bratislava reporting live, and a lot of other relevant people to speak to about the shooting. Matthew doing great as usual.

[Rolling News]

New promo for the BBC News Channel featuring Lucy, Matthew, Maryam and Christian

x.com 

[DTV]

Slick, but also a great encapsulation of why I have largely stopped watching the channel - all talk of 'debate, debate, debate' and blah blah blahing about questions. What I want from a news channel, and a BBC news channel in particular, is simple news reporting, not a never ending talk show.

[harshy]

New promo for the BBC News Channel featuring Lucy, Matthew, Maryam and Christian

x.com 

Nice promo but at least two of the branded programmes do you not have a programme strap on the lower thirds?

[interestednovice]

Slick, but also a great encapsulation of why I have largely stopped watching the channel.

Indeed, and a very American feel that is far too personality-driven for my taste. It’s more “trust these 4 people”, rather than “trust BBC News”.

The way it ends with them all standing in the newsroom is also extremely cheesy American in my view - something not out of place selling the local news team of affiliate-WGNY-wherever and I don’t think it looks particularly good as it again makes the BBC look like a bit of a low-rent operation. An empty newsroom just comes across as that they don’t cover a whole lot of news, because they don’t have journalists hard at work 24/7.

Whereas think back to NBH launch, and we were being sold on “The World’s Newsroom”, with only the BBC having the unparalleled experience and global reach of correspondents everywhere covering every story live - and NBH as the exciting and dynamic operation where it all came together in state of the art studios. A decade on, that’s all gone now.

I accept that some of it is part of wider trends in news, and perhaps the only competitor with true equivalent global reach was CNN (and look at how they’ve scaled back and become a domestic politics focused network) but I agree that it’s not what many of us want from news.

[Independent]

I accept that some of it is part of wider trends in news, and perhaps the only competitor with true equivalent global reach was CNN (and look at how they’ve scaled back and become a domestic politics focused network) but I agree that it’s not what many of us want from news.

AJE seems to be the only ones resisting this terrible trend.
I've seen some argue AJE is the one with true global reach over the years (not necessarily in overall ratings) in addition to actually covering news around the world rather than restricted to a few places. Apparently some claim (I would like to see some hard evidence) it's more popular than the BBC and CNN across the "Global South". Obviously many of us in wealthier places who like to have old school journalism also tune in so adding the two together I can see why these few individuals make that claim.

[bkman1990]

That promo for the News Channel is a very good video.

But their own impression of BBC News nowadays doesn't gel to me how their on screen mistakes that have occurred with their own presentation of the news wasn't a major broadcasting blip. That promo for BBC News has all of the hallmarks of trying to be the best news organisation in the world. But it didn't need to tell me that when I was watching it since it made the move to BH in 2013.

If people actually asked me how the BBC News Channel looks and feels to the audience right now in 2024; it really doesn't sell a lot to tell me that it really is the best news organisation in the world at the moment. They had that reputation within them about 10 or 20 years ago. However; the decline in that usefulness of BBC News in recent times has been a really hard pill to swallow since they merged their news channels together due to major cutbacks in their licence fee funding from the British Government. That impression of failure within BBC News was not apparent to me when I was watching it over the past 10 years.

Other competitors like Sky News are just beating the BBC News Channel out of the water now in terms of how they present the news to their own audience. And it shows in how they are committing themselves to making huge investments on the news studios and award winning journalism. Sky News have been pumping money into their improving/expanding their studios left, right and centre to actually make great use out of their content for their own audience. The Sky News journalists actually don't produce that many on screen mistakes at all when compared to the mistakes going out on BBC News Channel.

The BBC News Channel on the other hand have some investments to their studios here and there due to the current strangle hold of their TV Licence settlement with the British Government. Some of that investment that has gone into improving the studios for BBC News has been very slow & very cheap to date.

Although if Erron Gordon can make some major improvements in how BBC News can become more accessible to their audience.

I would be very interested to see how he gets on with making those improvements become a lot more useful in the future.