The Newsroom

The RTE News Thread

Discussion about RTE News (August 2016)

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LS
Lou Scannon
Worth remembering that UTV Ireland has local news bulletins during its Good Morning Britain simulcast. Whilst not usually more than 2/3 minutes in length it was certainly more than RTÉ.


UTV Ireland was sold to the "TV3" Group (as it still was, at that time), and the channel was renamed as "Be 3". The channel has since changed again, becoming "Virgin Media Three" following a takeover (with the "TV3" and "3e" channels becoming "Virgin Media One" and "Virgin Media Two" respectively).
NW
nwtv2003
Worth remembering that UTV Ireland has local news bulletins during its Good Morning Britain simulcast. Whilst not usually more than 2/3 minutes in length it was certainly more than RTÉ.


UTV Ireland was sold to the "TV3" Group (as it still was, at that time), and the channel was renamed as "Be 3". The channel has since changed again, becoming "Virgin Media Three" following a takeover (with the "TV3" and "3e" channels becoming "Virgin Media One" and "Virgin Media Two" respectively).


Oh yes I’m very much aware of that. I should have put former or had in my comment.
PC
p_c_u_k
In my experience of visiting Ireland, notably Dublin, most places seem to have Sky News on at all hours. I think certainly there are those who look towards the UK for breakfast TV.


Sky News had a little run where it tried to heavily target Ireland, creating Ireland-only news bulletins. It treats Ireland as part of its broadcasting patch so it's going to be slightly more relevant to people in the country than the BBC, which has never quite worked out what to do with Ireland and seems to leave it to Northern Ireland to cover.
WH
what
In my experience of visiting Ireland, notably Dublin, most places seem to have Sky News on at all hours. I think certainly there are those who look towards the UK for breakfast TV.


Sky News had a little run where it tried to heavily target Ireland, creating Ireland-only news bulletins. It treats Ireland as part of its broadcasting patch so it's going to be slightly more relevant to people in the country than the BBC, which has never quite worked out what to do with Ireland and seems to leave it to Northern Ireland to cover.

RD
rdd Founding member
It only lasted two and a half years, and was two half hour bulletins at 7pm and 10pm. Started promisingly, but then someone decided, in the wake of Sky News 2005 “appointment to view” schedule revamp, that it was a good idea to move the 7pm bulletin to 6:30pm.

Right up against Six One.
PC
p_c_u_k
In the grand scheme of things Ireland really isn't a priority for Sky. It can do opt-out advertising without providing the public service commitments of Irish broadcasters. And if you're tuning into Sky, you're tuning in on the concept you can dip in and out of breaking news, not that you're tuning in at a specific time for Irish headlines. There are linear channels who already offer that service.

There's a limited population base in Ireland, and beyond that a limited audience for news. And they're all watching RTE.
JK
JKDerry
In terms as a television provider, Sky are excellent in Ireland. They provide all the channels Sky have in their UK line up, along with their sports and cinema channels.

Only the national channel line up are different. All of the Irish Saorview channels are there, RTE, Virgin Meda, TG4 etc, and under their UK/Irish Favourites they also include on their EPG BBC One NI, BBC Two, BBC Four, CBBC, Cbeebies, Channel 4, E4, More4 and Film 4 - with the easy way of tuning in the other BBC channels, and all of the ITV and Channel 5 channels too - something which you can not do on Virgin Media Ireland cable or the broadband television of Eir TV and Vodafone TV.
CH
chinamug
In the grand scheme of things Ireland really isn't a priority for Sky. It can do opt-out advertising without providing the public service commitments of Irish broadcasters. And if you're tuning into Sky, you're tuning in on the concept you can dip in and out of breaking news, not that you're tuning in at a specific time for Irish headlines. There are linear channels who already offer that service.

There's a limited population base in Ireland, and beyond that a limited audience for news. And they're all watching RTE.


There is a limited population but News is big in Ireland, they're not all watching RTE either. RTE has easily the biggest share of the News market, but the most successful Programmes on Virgin Media are the News programmes. Their 5.30 news has 100,000 viewers over 15 on a reqular basis. Their Tonight show has close to 100,000 viewers most nights.

Channel 4 and BBC News are also watched a lot as is UTV were available. It's part of the story that RTE put out that they're the centre of News in Ireland. They're very important but a lot of people I know watch no RTE at all, they get their News from UK TV sources and the Internet.

As for Sky News it's the go to News station for a lot of people in Ireland. When you go into waiting rooms and banks it's often on in the corner. The reason this came about was RTE's own fault. In 1989, RTE 1 used to show Sky News from 12.00pm-2.30pm on RTE 1. It gave a lot of people a taste for it and Sat Dishes went up all over the place.

Sky News still has more viewers in Ireland on a monthly basis than More 4 or E 4.
BBI45, London Lite and p_c_u_k gave kudos
BK
bkman1990
The main newsreaders in Studio 3 now have new laptops applied with new round signage with the current logo up on the main news desk.
JK
JKDerry
I wonder when they will be kicked out of Studio 3 for the refurbishment? It must be happening soon, as apparently early 2019 will be the relaunch of RTE News.
BK
bkman1990
RTÉ News & Current Affairs must have had been through a very busy period today on Armistice Day because they had to cover the events this morning & the Inauguration of Michael D Higgins second term as President of Ireland. The staff at RTÉ must have done a great job today to cover the events today. Their news reports on the Nine O'Clock News tonight are giving an excellent round up of today's events.

I wonder when they will be kicked out of Studio 3 for the refurbishment? It must be happening soon, as apparently early 2019 will be the relaunch of RTE News.


On most occasions over recent years; the RTÉ News had kept studio 3 as their main news studio right up to when it was imminent in getting it's new look. But now; they have an extra mini studio in their newsroom that they can use which is currently for the weekend summaries while the building of their new home is taking place behind the scenes in Studio 3.

I'm talking about this studio right here. RTÉ News have a lot good potential to use this one for now when the upgrade is in progress.

*

They really have a lack of facilities elsewhere in RTÉ to give their regular news bulletins. Using this studio above on a temporary basis would make a lot of sense for RTÉ News to have in the time being. It has worked out very well presentation wise before when it was used for full weekend bulletins that came up sometimes for viewers on RTÉ One.

If anyone else thinks would not be a good idea to use at what is nearly approaching to be a critical transition period for RTÉ News; you would really have a good reason why you would be against this idea.

My own feelings on it is that a specific job of revamping a news studio is really not an easy task for many people to do overnight. That is an impossible goal to achieve for any broadcaster. It does take a lot of time & effort to actually getting the equipment testing & working in the right way so there are fit for broadcast TV news for the viewer especially when a new look is put in place for it's broadcaster. RTÉ, in particular, are in a real tight spot on nearly every occasion with how they will attempt to revamp their current facilities in Studio 3 with a new look every time. It is a very demanding task for them to do at Montrose in that everything has to be organized well in advance of beginning construction. It does not become easy when they have to do three main news bulletins out live to viewers everyday while not including their news summaries in the off peak periods of the day.

Virgin Media Ireland did not have any real issue with building their own current news setup in Ballymount. They were very resourceful in how they kept their news bulletins on air while having their old news studio on site providing very little distruption in giving the news to their own viewers. To have that flexibility was great for Virgin Media to do their job of rebranding their news output properly right up to the time when they launched their new look for 3 News Ireland from Day 1. They then, after such time, rebranded to Virgin Media News with very little physical change in the studio desk & news wall because of changes to TV3 News went ahead when Virgin Media took over the company. Yes; it is great for a commercial broadcaster to allow that flexibility coming in from Virgin Media.

But then again RTÉ do not have that luxury as of now. With all of their staff newsroom being stuck in the same place in Studio 3. They have to make do with what facilites they have now in order to make the quality of their output better. And that is a huge challenge for RTÉ News to do that very quickly. If RTÉ had newer studio facilities on hand in Montrose as of this moment in time; the changeover to a new look may not require a whole lot of effort in execution. The delays in building of a new home for RTÉ is currently going at a snail's pace. But with time; they are going in the right direction with how they are trying to modernize their site to let it make way for it's new home if it eventually gets the green light from the planning authorities in the state.
JK
JKDerry
Does anyone know what Studio 2 at RTE is used for at the moment? It is a good size studio which could be used as a stand by studio for RTE News whilst Studio 3 is refurbished. Since RTE afternoon show Today is made in Cork City, is Studio 2 less used now?

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