[Transmission]

I really did like those early days of News 24. We had cable so had the channel from launch, at a time when viewers on Sky were getting channels that took ages to get to us, it was nice to have something first for a change.

Radio Five Live was in its pomp at the time, not too long after the Atlanta Olympics which was when it really came into its own, and this was clearly an attempt to get some of that on TV - relaxed and informal but with a sense of pace when needed and generally a lot of life about the channel, whether it was from a bit of buzz from that newsroom set or the fact that they'd be doing things like Zero 30 at a time when these days you'd get an episode of HardTalk.

It's easy to see why the News Channel became what it did and how it evolved over the years, but I do miss that more dynamic, lively feel on a news channel, which Sky News doesn't quite have at the moment either. While I have real worries about the balance of domestic and international stories on the new version of the channel, some of the things we've heard about the future (more from the newsroom, for example) are quite promising.