[DTV]

It's difficult to sum everything I've seen today up in one word - but I guess inconsistent would be it. And I don’t just mean the graphics and the studios which have been very well documented here, but editorially you’ve had a mix of a reasonable balance (around one-third UK news) and the old World News balance (about 10-15% UK news) across different hours. Obviously, the running order will always shift throughout the day, but a more consistent target balance would probably be better going forwards.

Of course, it's day one and the BBC have said themselves that they'll learn from mistakes and fine tune the channel as time goes on and I do think there's a solid channel underneath it all if they strike the balance right. Presentationally things could definitely be improved and I can't say I'm too fond of the more gimmicky features, but the underlying journalistic quality is obviously still there. And, although I'm in the minority on this, I feel the breaking news opt worked quite well and looked good for what it was, even if they could have padded for time better - will have to see it used a few more times to make a more definitive judgement.

Overall, I think one of the easiest, though most beneficial, tune-ups could be to find a better structure to the standard hour - pace was another thing that was very inconsistent throughout the day - some hours about right, some way too slow. As I said earlier, I think that short hourly segments/News in Briefs are a good way of keeping things moving and covering a broad range of second-tier stories; a UK news one would be a simple way of keeping a greater range of domestic stories there without being too intrusive for global viewers. I'd also rather have shorter, regular Business and Sport segments than see two or three seemingly randomly placed across the day.

Also, even though this was a growing issue before the change, I have really felt the absence of proper reports. Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer a story to be summed-up in a polished 1.5-2-minute package, complete with any necessary explainer graphics, than to be subjected to slow 4-minute down-the-(often not broadcast quality)-line interviews that can struggle to get to the point and are accompanied solely by B-roll. That said, I don't think using unintroduced VTs for the 'Across the UK' breakfiller works - a presenter-read UK in Brief or even text-based breakfiller would be better.