[steve]

I wonder what the blue lighting was for.

I'd guess was meant to be some 'space/moon' lighting and graphics. But clearly the studio's a bit broken (they must have thought was fixed though) as it's been the locked off main shot for the whole bulletin other than that.

[AndrewP]

Does anyone have any screen caps at all? Sounds intriguing.

[Rolling News]

Does anyone have any screen caps at all? Sounds intriguing.

Here’s a video just posted on X

x.com 

[DTV]

Budget wise, it's already paying 5 presenters a full-time salary consistent with experience and long service, PLUS freelance and acting up costs. Divert those additional costs to producer roles, political producers/reporters will already be at the likely events needing airtime. The additional studio director, production journalists and support for a mon-fri 9-1 shift would come in under 750k (marginal in a £5.7billion pound revenue organisation) a UK feed world still access world content and domestic reporting as now.

There are likely some additional costs, but actually getting 'a programme' for a News channel on air is fairly cheap. You could actually have a basic separate UK daytime service - i.e., intros + VTs, live feed coverage (speeches, parliament, press confs, etc.), in studio contributions from BBC reporters - for only a few £m. It's things like external contributors and breaking news flexibility where the non-newsgathering costs start to rack up.

In fact, I've always been very surpised the BBC didn't go more down the 'rolling bulletins' route for the relaunched channel. Not just would it be cheaper, but it's something the BBC was actually a market leader in - they're always good for simple, straight reporting. Breaking news was never their forte, panel discussions are ten-a-penny and the slowed 'analytical' style they've (unsuccessfully) attempted only works as a complement to basic news.

[Radio_man]

As much as you're right the news cycle this year means the news channel operation needs to cater to two different audiences I just can't see much changing. At best we may get a UK election focused programme in the mornings (which may or may not be simulcast) but in all honesty I suspect they'll just put the Nicky Campbell phone in back on air to tick that box.

Whilst the 5 Live phone-in was taken off air due to the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war, even before this it was often interrupted for breaking UK news or a political speech etc. Over the next 12 months that'll be happening much more frequently with agenda setting political speeches usually scheduled between 9:30-11am.

I've always thought mid-mornings should be UK focussed and branded as such for both global and UK audiences. The channel has a European focus 5 - 9am, and a US & Asian focus in evenings and overnight, I don't think any global viewers tuning into "BBC News" will be surprised to have a few hours dedicated to UK news during UK weekday mornings.

[DTV]

I have never understood the UK morning set up on the new News Channel. Before the merger morning used to have very few viewers after European breakfast which is why there would often only been news summaries at the top of some of the hours and the shared 10am hour produced by the news channel team. This implies that it was not cost effective to produce a world bulletin during this time.

Would it not make more sense for the morning to have a slightly larger UK focus for announcements and speeches, between 9 and 12 and then switch to the global focus at midday. After all the US are sleeping at this time and it's is late afternoon in the Far East so people will still be working.

Yeah, there's definitely room for more UK content in that slot, which has always been a graveyard shift internationally - they did briefly try and do something special there around 2008 (double-headed hour-long bulletin with David Eades and Lucy Hockings), but that didn't last.

As a side note, a broad guide to when people are watching around the world can generally be found by looking at schedules from around 2007. Anywhere with 'branded' news programming (World News Today, World News America) is usually when viewership peaked, while anywhere that still had pre-recorded (or repeated) back-half hours is where the troughs were.

[Rolling News]

I'd guess was meant to be some 'space/moon' lighting and graphics. But clearly the studio's a bit broken (they must have thought was fixed though) as it's been the locked off main shot for the whole bulletin other than that.

Yeah and Clive handed over to the regions from the desk. Seems there's still issues now as Sophie has done the whole intro on the Six on the locked off main shot from the desk and there was no studio wide shot after the titles. Obviously with E now closed for refurbishments they can't just pop the bulletins in there like they did before.

[Brekkie]

Although the only advantage in switching to E is doing the top story from the catwalk - arguably better to use no screens than obviously inferior screens.

[ViridianFan]

Although the only advantage in switching to E is doing the top story from the catwalk - arguably better to use no screens than obviously inferior screens.

Just as the camera went to the pan you could see that a couple of the LED panels on that front monolith were black.

It feels like B has more issues which put it out of action that than E did when they first move. When you think E was in far more use than B is.

Whilst impressive I sometimes question the bbcs route of being incredibly heavy of tech if that makes sense. Whilst the studios when they first moved into NBH were huge improvements compared to the set up at TVC they weren’t so heavily dependent. With b if something goes wrong with the screens they don’t have a studio as such.

[Keith]

Would it not make more sense for the morning to have a slightly larger UK focus for announcements and speeches, between 9 and 12 and then switch to the global focus at midday. After all the US are sleeping at this time and it's is late afternoon in the Far East so people will still be working.

I think there's certainly a case in the morning for reinstating programmes into the back half-hours for non-UK viewers, which used to occur pre-merger. They could even show the 'top stories' summaries for all viewers, before using a sting to enable the split.

This would then enable the UK to 'opt-out' of that programing, and instead have a UK focused bulletin. It would also avoid the need for an additional presenter, though presumably some additional gallery staff might be needed to handle the opt.

They might not be able to use this same option in the afternoons though, due to USA audiences being more awake. I seem to recall pre-merger (and Covid) there tended to be more rolling or branded news in the afternoon, rather than pre-recorded content.

The 'around the UK' break-filler is/was also rather weak. When I last saw it that consisted of one random regional piece. It would be more useful if they could have something akin to what Breakfast put out during the English regions news strikes. For instance, instead showing a piece where a reporter gives a roundup of news from the nations. Provided that was updated a few times during the day it wouldn't have to be live, and it would in my opinion be an improvement.