[harshy]

Who did the morning shifts today? I gather Celia Hatton was on from 08.00 to 10.00 CET and also did Breaking News opt outs. Was Victoria in her early morning slot? The rest of the day was as usual, with Maryam in for Matthew.

Just trying to see who else is appearing. Clearly the fab group in Martine's photo does not seem to be scheduled at the moment.

Unless I imagined it, it was Sally Bundock.

[Worzel]

This post by Martine has really touched me this evening.

Just look at the solidarity and at what we appear to have lost...

www.instagram.com =

Oh to have been a fly on the wall!

It really is sad state of affairs isn't it. I know everyone involved are grown adults but the atmosphere around the NBH newsroom must be at an all time low. Mix in the redundancies, screen testing some of the most skilled people in the most humiliating way with people vying for a small number of jobs, an on air recruitment process largely squeued to World News presenters, overstretched staff and a really bodged relaunch - just how do the BBC manage to mismanage things so, so badly?

Monday 3rd April was supposed to be the launch of the new channel, whether you call it a soft launch or not, it was where they drew the line in the sand. The fact that so many bodged things have made it to air which shouldn't have on even a basic bare-bones channel shows there's very little in the way of proper project management. Its not as if what they're doing is groundbreaking either. It's largely static presenter shots, crossing to reporters, playing packages and hitting timed junctions.

- Why have 2 separate galleries which are running the same output, one updated with revised but bodged titles/graphics/wipes and the other which hasn't been updated and is running what would be classed as 'old branding'?
- Graphics that are obscured by the ticker or are bodged
- The ticker which sometimes works, sometimes doesn't
- Why have 2 newsroom positions with people framed so tightly they could be broadcast from anywhere (with a dodgy frame rate to boot)?
- Crashing in and out of things.
- Why is the One still coming from E when the Six and Ten have moved to B?

This should have ALL been picked up in rehearsals by senior managers who are supposed to oversee these things.

It's not like this the BBC's first dive into running a 24 hour news channel or a new start up. They've run 2 separate news channels for over 20 years. How can you combine them, and running order aside, fumble it so badly?

And before anyone says I'm being unfair, this post isn't criticising those running the galleries, behind the scenes operational staff or on the front line. Goodness me, they must feel just as frustrated as we are watching it unfold. I really, really feel for them.

To me it feels like there's some internal politics and a battle going on between the big wigs (the suits and blouses) who have their 'vision' and the staff down the chain who (it looks like) have to roll out the product with little support, money, guidance and man power.

It's the latest balls up to happen under Tim Davie's watch. There must be another DCMS committee session due soon. That'll be an interesting one as several, let's just say, 'issues' have happened since his last appearance. The Alex Belfield business, Gary Lineker and now the news channels. John Nicolson in particular is going to have a field day.

[Juicy Joe]

Why is the flipper/ticker no longer working? Seriously, is it really because they've sacked the staff who type it up? It isn't really a rolling news channel without it. If it's now defunct, then they should remove that white bar from cluttering up the screen. The previous graphics, although also fairly boring, were far more minimalistic than these.

[Kojak]

REALLY dodgy opt into Newsnight tonight. As Louise Lear handed back to Huw Edwards, the channel faded to the filler countdown, then after about 30 seconds, into Newsnight.

[News76]

This post by Martine has really touched me this evening.

Just look at the solidarity and at what we appear to have lost...

www.instagram.com =

Oh to have been a fly on the wall!

It really is sad state of affairs isn't it. I know everyone involved are grown adults but the atmosphere around the NBH newsroom must be at an all time low. Mix in the redundancies, screen testing some of the most skilled people in the most humiliating way with people vying for a small number of jobs, an on air recruitment process largely squeued to World News presenters, overstretched staff and a really bodged relaunch - just how do the BBC manage to mismanage things so, so badly?

Monday 3rd April was supposed to be the launch of the new channel, whether you call it a soft launch or not, it was where they drew the line in the sand. The fact that so many bodged things have made it to air which shouldn't have on even a basic bare-bones channel shows there's very little in the way of proper project management. Its not as if what they're doing is groundbreaking either. It's largely static presenter shots, crossing to reporters, playing packages and hitting timed junctions.

- Why have 2 separate galleries which are running the same output, one updated with revised but bodged titles/graphics/wipes and the other which hasn't been updated and is running what would be classed as 'old branding'?
- Graphics that are obscured by the ticker or are bodged
- The ticker which sometimes works, sometimes doesn't
- Why have 2 newsroom positions with people framed so tightly they could be broadcast from anywhere (with a dodgy frame rate to boot)?
- Crashing in and out of things.
- Why is the One still coming from E when the Six and Ten have moved to B?

This should have ALL been picked up in rehearsals by senior managers who are supposed to oversee these things.

It's not like this the BBC's first dive into running a 24 hour news channel or a new start up. They've run 2 separate news channels for over 20 years. How can you combine them, and running order aside, fumble it so badly?

And before anyone says I'm being unfair, this post isn't criticising those running the galleries, behind the scenes staff or on the front line. Goodness me, they must feel just as frustrated as we are watching it unfold. I really, really feel for them.

To me it feels like there's some internal politics and a battle going on between the big wigs (the suits and blouses) who have their 'vision' and the staff down the chain who (it looks like) have to roll out the product with little support, money, guidance and man power.

It's the latest balls up to happen under Tim Davie's watch. There must be another DCMS committee session due soon. That'll be an interesting one as several, let's just say, 'issues' have happened since his last appearance. The Alex Belfield business, Gary Linekar and now the news channels. John Nicolson in particular is going to have a field day.

And I warned that this would happen (but got shouted down that they we're doing it for budget reasons) and look what's come to pass in the past 3 days-surely we are now at the point where things cannot not go on like this-something has got to be done even it it means going back to 2 separate news operations and doing some u-turns.

Why on earth did Ofcom agree to this.

[Manget1]

Newsnight seems to have extremely poor audio quality tonight, sounds like they're talking through a compressed telephone. (At least on the iPlayer feed). BBC 2 iPlayer feed sounds completely fine, something is clearly wrong with the NC feed.

[ALV]

It really is sad state of affairs isn't it. I know everyone involved are grown adults but the atmosphere around the NBH newsroom must be at an all time low. Mix in the redundancies, screen testing some of the most skilled people in the most humiliating way with people vying for a small number of jobs, an on air recruitment process largely squeued to World News presenters, overstretched staff and a really bodged relaunch - just how do the BBC manage to mismanage things so, so badly?

I feel like the relaunch is more of like rushed and unprepared.

Revisting posts made by various insiders, presenters etc... I found some of their statements to be conflicting at times. For example, it was suggested Studio C will be fully utilized 24/7 but at the end we get Studio C and E... A lot of staff inside BBC probably don't know the plans until very late.

My assumption is that there were a lot of unconfirmed details made by top management over the months leading to the relaunch, and a lot of last minute decisions was probably made weeks or days before April 3rd. This probably led to short rehearsals, new running orders being built in a hurry without a lot of QA testing, lack of coordination between different teams etc... which in result led to the relaunch becoming a botched mess.

The newsroom touchscreen area is a sign of rushed implementation. These screens are only seen installed in the newsroom about 2 weeks (?) before April 3rd, as observed by us in the trundle intros. The camera positions, equipment are probably set up in a hurry, hence the awkward positioning, low framerate, roughness in presentation in general. 1-2 weeks is probably not enough to fine tune all logistical and technical details, let alone training staff on the new workflow...

[Reith85]

Where is the attention to detail on this channel? How are the same mistakes being made three days on? Basic things like the absence of the flipper and the need to avoid the Newsnight astons clashing with the channel's lower thirds - are these so difficult to remedy, or is what remains of BBC News just choosing to ignore these things?

Have they really sacked all their staff to the point where it's just a skeleton body remaining on the news floor? It is embarrassing for what is meant to be a broadcaster of global repute. It's depressing.

[Juicy Joe]

Newswatch will have a field day on Friday night - Samira Ahmed will be all over this shambles at 11.30pm!

[DTV]

How the hell did we end here-This whole relaunch has been an unmitigated disaster and unless Ofcom finally wake up, there's not a thing we can do it about unless the BBC themselves realize  that one news service was never a good idea regardless of money.

You've actually held out longer than I thought you would. But, in short, as to how we've ended up here - the BBC's licence income has been repeatedly slashed in real terms meaning that it has had to make multiple rounds of increasingly severe cuts - the latest being £400m in annual savings. At some point, the BBC News channel being one of only two TV/radio stations not to have had a real term cut in its budget in the last decade became unsustainable.

Now, I know your position is that the NC's budget should actually have been increased, but even keeping things as they were just wasn't realistic or reasonable - especially not given the duplicative nature of the channel in multiple senses. Ultimately, all the plausible paths for the News channel's future would have been downgrades.

Also, I'm not really sure that it's been the 'unified' element of the channels that has been the 'disaster'. While there are some editorial decisions that were questionable and somethings that I'd structure differently, it's been more justifiable than the interim period and none of it has really been wrong in a way wouldn't be fairly fixable and I expect emblematic of the fact it's early days. Most of the actual issues are presentational, with the serious faults being operational - though, in both cases, again fixable. Even if a full-scale reversal was possible, which it isn't, I don't thing calls of irredeemability are justified at this point - even if, yes, it is overall a weaker service (but, again, all options were).