BBC News - General

And all the reason to watch News at Ten tonight IMO.

As ITN have loads of journalists better than John Simpson don't they...? Don't they?

And loads of better stories than Madeleine McCann.

Running a tabloid-friendly Madeleine McCann exclusive on the Ten really is such a cynical, cheap way of trying to lure away some of News At Ten's target audience.

Surely to compete effectively, the BBC needs to focus on providing a quality, broadsheet agenda, for which the Ten has already developed a reasonable reputation. Hopefully this is just a one-off for the launch night, and we won't see this 'if you can't beat them, join them' attitude continue.

I find the BBC's bravado attitude to be quite surprising really. We've had several articles from BBC News people criticising ITN and Huw Edwards is on Radio 2 this afternoon promoting the Ten O'Clock News. I wonder if he'd have been on today had NAT not been launching? Hmmm. It seems to me as though the BBC are actually crapping themselves at the thought of direct competition. The amount of publicity given by ITV to NAT is quite remarkable, especially for a news programme. I've heard several people talking about NAT today. I think the BBC have suddenly realised they might be in for a fight and are now using these cheap, underhand methods to try to hang onto their audience.

Yeah, the Madeleine thing is a bit disappointing, but Simpson brings a lot of clout and whenever he's on the news I sit up and watch.

So the BBC go into attack mode against N@10 with John Simpson undercover in Zimbabwe tonight and an interview with Marat's mother (McCann Arquido) according to a trailer just shown on N24.

I wonder whether this is going to work.

Didn't ITV News run a week-long undercover investigation in Zimbabwe a few months ago? I wonder where the BBC got that idea from....

This is really disappointing on the BBC's part. If this is the way things are going the only stalwart of decent news left on the Beeb will be Newsnight . Which, rather conveniently, starts directly after News at Ten on ITV.

By turning the Ten into a televised Sun Newspaper (probably later to become Heat Magazine ) the BBC are shooting themselves in the foot, just as News at Ten relaunches with what I expect will be quite a large audience.

I have a feeling that these exclusives and adverts might continue for a few weeks, considering how well publisiced News at Ten's return has been, but after everything's died down a bit they'll probably return to normal.

I think I might start doing that. I've usually always chosen to watch the ITV bulletin at 2230 for the last few years and have missed Newsnight. I couldn't have watched both the BBC 2200 bulletin and Newsnight as it is too much BBC. With the new arrangements, I will be able to watch News at Ten and then flick over to Newsnight for the BBC perspective and more in-depth analysis. It's the perfect schedule really.

Maybe the BBC and ITN have signed some kind of gentlemen's agreement, and have agreed to swap their viewerships.

And Trevor McDonald, Julie Etchingham and Jeremy Paxman in the same night is the journalistic equivalent of the Slashdot omlette.