BBC News Channel Presentation - 21/03/16 onwards

A Couple of tweets from Annita McVeigh about the changes coming in tomorrow morning, including Newsroom Live which starts tomorrow.

Rehearsals a few days ago for some changes we're introducing this week at 11am #BBCNewsroomLive @BBCNews pic.twitter.com/muONtZZk8v

— Annita McVeigh (@annita_mcveigh) March 20, 2016

Also look out for changes to a.m. news bulletins as part of @VictoriaLIVE @BBCNews

— Annita McVeigh (@annita_mcveigh) March 20, 2016

I'm guessing rehearsal time was during VD?

It seems the LED circle over the newsroom is displaying orange Newsroom Live animations rather than the usual red.

Joanna Gosling now presenting half hour news updates from the balcony during Victoria Derbyshire (must have been what Annita McVeigh referred to in her second tweet).

Newsroom Live doesn't seem much different, apart from extra references to the time and date.

Not bad remix to the music though.

Top of the hour theme slightly reworked, an a tad more orange going on.

Here is a video of the first opening .

Victoria Derbyshire was certainly an improvement today - the first fifteen minutes was made up of a full run-down of the day's news (much as it would have been previously when they did that 15 minute bulletin before VD started). More regular headline summaries and generally more stories seemed to be featured as well - there were a couple of longer segments in the first hour but flicking through the second hour they seemed to get through a nice mix of stories.

Perhaps the greatest improvement though, is that the weather actually ran to-time before 10am, and so they were actually a few seconds early beginning their TOTH sequence meaning people tuning in for the headlines won't have had to wait a good few minutes for once. Weather often seemed to end at around 10:02 before, meaning it was closer to five past before the news summary. Still only one forecast in the programme though.

I notice the NC now using the same tag as branded WN programmes now.

Despite the cuts, I can see the NC can still do well in breaking news mode!

Newsnight is an edited 30 minute version from 2330 tonight, which allowed for a 30 minute bulletin with Ben Brown in Brussels and Rebecca Jones.

Norman Smith appears to have been forced off air whilst reporting during a protest against disability benefit cuts:

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/mar/23/disability-campaigners-occupy-parliament-over-benefit-cuts

Good god, their anachronistic broadcast rules are ridiculous.