[DTV]

Apologies I’ve not been keeping totally up to date with all the changes, but is there anything in terms of content and style to differentiate between these new named programmes, or a standard hour of BBC News?

There isn't really much difference in terms of format or presentation to what was there before - though there were already some minor differences between shifts (Yalda Hakim's 'programme' was more interview-based) - but it is all broadly indistinguishable from a standard hour, bar the different title graphics.

On the odd occasions in the past when I watched BBC World News when abroad, I never quite understood the point of the various programmes like Impact or whatever, and what their purpose was, above and beyond standard output. Obviously I get stuff like World News America or World Business Report which speak for themselves, but what’s the actual raison d’être of these shows with the vague names?

When these 'colourful' branded programmes began in 2010, there was actually a good deal of difference between them. Not just were they all presentationally different (well, as different as N8 would allow), but they all had their own regional focus (carried over from the previous WNT editions) and some differences in format, particularly in the back-half (Impact, for instance, was a bit magaziney, and they all had different business/sport segments). They also differed from the standard news bulletins by spending longer on the main stories and having non-correspondent interviews (which was rare on a WN bulletin at the time).

Starting around 2015/6, when they were extended, and particularly since their return post-Covid, the differences between them did decrease - the regional focus was less clear and they tended to follow the same broad format. Once they all came from Studio C, they also became presented in an almost identical manner.

As for their raison d’être, it was originally questions of marketability - it is easier to promote individual programmes to a generic one that is on all day and you can then tailor that programme to a specific (premium) audience. When the first World News Today was launched in 2006, it was explicitly designed and heavily promoted as a morning programme for the US audience. Of course, they then launched half-a-dozen other editions of World News Today, which made them harder to promote - so you ended up with each getting its own name.