BBC News Channel & World News to merge?

This could end up as an improvement for both UK and International audiences, if they do it the right way. They could just pair up NC & World presenters and have a real rolling news channel again that can cover both UK & world topics. Sky News has been doing it ever since it started and it's been perceived as both a UK and World news channel.

NC is a mess currently while World is in it's usual sleepy mode with a schedule that's too fragmented and lacking basic news bulletins.

If we're talking about sleepy news channels, France 24 is one big yawn fest, although they pull something out of the bag during Cannes, but otherwise the French style news format doesn't really transfer well into the Anglophone world.

How anyone can say GMT, Global and Outside Source are sleepy beggars belief.

Yes, both Farsi and Arabic should be axed first.

As for merging the two english news channels, it will only work if NC is replaced entirely by World News with Domestic opts. The editorial integrity of World News must not be contaminated by UK news that is irrelevant to international viewers.

Half of the Weekend bulletins on World News are only short summaries. These could easily be simulcast allowing the same presenter to cover the domestic news as well. Potentially meaning an entire gallery could be vacated for several hours during the day. I'm pretty sure the 2am bulletins are done like this already as recorded programmes air on world from 2:10. (Caveat: not sure if this is all regions.)

If all the current BBC One/Two simulcasts continue, the weekday daytime schedule could be exactly as it is today. (I cant see them simulcasting any of the Studio B 'branded' news programmes or World News America.) However, I'd like to see them drop ALL of the domestic simulcasts. (Breakfast, Derbyshire, 1, 6, & 10) and the pointless Newsnight repeat. Thus giving the UK viewer 6+ additional hours of programming daily.

And for goodness sake dont call this new combined channel 'The BBC News Channel'. The name 'BBC World News' is a bajillion times better.

EDIT: Rolling news needs to die, so i dont agree with ginnyfan's idea. Also, many of the World presenters are of a higher caliber to domestic. I'm also not sure that pairing presenters up would solve any problems.

I don't feel that the BBC World programmes have translated all that well to the News Channel. I think (I stress the word think) that a lot of people just want to tune into it to get the headlines, or a bit more analysis on a rolling news story, and not any kind of appointment to view programme like Outside Source. In fact I posted about this last year and my feelings haven't really changed. When BBC News isn't showing traditional rolling news I tend to switch to Sky News or Al Jazeera.

Merging both news channels won't work. In broad terms, people tend to be less interested in world news, they prefer UK based stories. You'll end up with an uncomfortable mix that suits nobody.

Not Euronews then?

I know there is endless possibilites, but could we see for example the BBC News At One presenter be on duty for a period of time (1-6) for example in case of UK breaking news. Then the BBC News at Six presenter be on duty from 6-10 etc? Not just for breaking news, but also maybe UK headlines.

I know its been mentioned on here several times and reasons have been given as to why what's done is done, but it still seems daft for, quite frequently a separate presenter to present say a 15 minute BBC One summary on a Saturday evening, which has (quite often) just gone on out the news channel by the duty NC presenter word for word.

The lunchtime updates on the weekends presented by the duty news channel presenter don't cause viewers to leave in droves because, as some seem to think, viewers are going to be scratching their heads saying 'who's this, i've not seen them before' rather than watching the content of the bulletin.

A month or two ago Clive Myrie was presenting a weekend evening summary on BBC One on the same evening that a duty NC presenter (I believe Martine Croxall) was off unwell, so Clive stayed on to present that evenings late NC shift, so it can be done.

In these times of cuts at BBC News, when we're told that every penny needs to be saved - avoiding some duplication may at least save a little cash in the longterm.

No, it does what it says on the tin. It's a dip in service.

Roger Mosey in the Guardian from July 2015. The comments are just as relevant now.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/jul/09/the-bbc-news-channel-must-be-saved?CMP=share_btn_tw

You'll find it is -

All about bringing the world to the UK and the UK to the world.

All here - http://www.bbc.co.uk/corporate2/insidethebbc/whoweare/publicpurposes/world.html

I think that's the least of their problems, don't you...