8pm BBC News summary axed

60 seconds, 5 stories - nothing to get exhausted over
60 seconds, 6-10 stories - truly exhausting

The pace isn't too dissimilar, if not the length.

I think it's more the combination of pace and length. 100 'stories' in 10 minutes. 200 'stories' in 20 minutes, that's more exhausting than 5 stories in a minute.

So that's what happened to her. I knew she went on maternity leave, and didn't return to the 8pm update afterwards.

I think they got rid of the dedicated 8pm news summary presenter role altogether to reduce costs.

I wonder if this has any impacts on any regions. For Look East (Norwich) the Wednesday bulletin was presented by Alex Dolan - who I noticed never held a script for backup. No idea if they paid extra for the bulletin or not.

I know on Look North if nobody suitably young was on shift, they would get someone from Radio Leeds to do it, someone who would never appear as a newsreader on TV at any other time.

I’m not quite sure how much cost is going to be saved by axing it, as nobody will have been employed just to make it, and it won’t add up to a full time position.

Not sure age is that big a factor, Phil Bodmer did it often enough.

It did cause a redistribution of staff and change in hours in some regions though - in some the 1830 director stayed on to do it as it wasn’t technically possible to achieve the CSO and Wipes in the pres gallery. In other regions an editor would need to stay on to cut and treat the pictures. In any case the story selection and writing style was quite different to normal operations, so it did take a decent amount of time to put together from the newsroom side. It will have a knock-on, but should mean more time for the regions to prepare for their late bulletin, which is now longer and more complex than it was when the 8pm summary began.

Really ?! 30 seconds worth of colloquial copy ! ?

If so, it's no wonder the regions can't cope with 'breaking news' !

This does feel like the old problem of some regions being small operations with few big stories to break, some being areas where regional news is of limited value (eg London), and some being actual nations. One size does not fit all, whether it be whether they need half an hour, an integrated national news hour or a 30 second bulletin later in the night.

For me, a post-EastEnders slot for news was the definition of PSB. Politics would mean you couldn't do this, but the ideal solution for me would be a full national bulletin with an opt-out point for nations and regions who want to/have the resources to insert their own output.

Did BBC NI used to do their own bulletins in primetime?

I vaguely remember that they did, with a countdown clock and all.

In fact, here’s an example: