[Kojak]

I actually think much of the content over the past few days has been okay. Not fantastic, or even necessarily great, but certainly all right. It definitely needs work, but overall I don't think it's been that bad.

The presentation, on the other hand... ghastly. No other word for it. Absolutely atrocious. I certainly don't blame anyone at the coalface, because they're by and large just doing their jobs as best they can (in what I'd imagine is a very febrile atmopshere). The higher-ups, though... just who signed off on those titles? Who on Earth thought it would be a good idea to simulcast Newsnight, when they know that its timings never dovetail cleanly with what's on either side of it? Who decided to plonk 5 Live on for two hours in the morning?

I do still think - and I have said this time and again, as have you and others on this forum - that there could have been other ways. It's probably fair to say most of us here understand why the BBC has done what it did, as much as we largely dislike it. It was always going to be a difficult task to try and combine two very different news channels into one, and to equally satisfy international and domestic audiences. But... it was (and is) doable. Not that we've seen much evidence of that so far this week - in their traditional and inimitable way, the BBC seem to have come up with a fudge that has annoyed everyone.

But there has been some rather odd and iffy editorial calls as well.

Throughout the whole Paul Murrell story breaking this morning (and correct me if I'm wrong) not once did a Political Correspondent appear on air? It was largely handled by 2 general news reporters in the Glasgow newsroom, initially on the phone and then DTL. For example, previously we'd have seen Nick Eardley, Ione Wells, Vicki Young, Ian Watson or Alex Forsyth appear from Westminster. Yet no one from the Political team did, which even though it is Easter holidays, stuck out like a sore thumb.

Shoving that story way down the running order (which they did on the channel) in the afternoon is just the way of igniting the touchpaper on accusations of political cover-ups/bias etc by general viewers who haven't twigged the channel is World News in all but name. What happens if the next alleged scandal involves a member of the other main parties? It's just asking for trouble.

I think that's the issue with it being a combined channel - there seems to be a tug-of-war as to whether (and which) international or domestic stories get priority. Though I'd argue that the husband of the de-facto leader of the Scottish independence movement being arrested could have been a big story worldwide (although he was later released without charge). So quite how they are deciding which stories go where in the running order is a bit beyond me. You'd think the SNP story would be the sort of thing the breakout stream was made for - but presumably there was no one there to do it, as they would have perhaps been preparing for the blood verdict later?

It seems also that the powers that be are a little confused about what the new BBC News channel should be. Do they want it to be a sort of extended World bulletin each hour, with lots of interviews and lives - or are they going to drop everything and busk whenever there is a breaking story, a la Sky News? At the moment we've seen both approaches, often at the same time! 

I'd like to think there may be some sort of reversal in the near future (albeit, given tight budgets, a very limited one!). They could have so easily kept the One team on for a couple of extra hours of UK-only news. Hey, maybe this will happen after the inevitable backlash. If it carries on like this (and I'm not saying it will, by any means - it's only been three days, after all!) I can't see it going down at all well.