BBC News: Nations & Regions

Probably because, of all the BBC English Regions, BBC London's TV patch is most similar to it's local radio patch. Cross promotion works extremely well in BBC London's region because people using one medium can very often get to the others. This isn't the case on, for example, Points West, where a cross promotion to Radio Bristol isn't a great deal of use to large chunks of the TV audience.

BBC Oxford is one other region similar to BBC London in terms of cross promotion and often promotes its local radio station during sub-opts. Although the Oxford TV transmitter is receiveable in many areas where Radio Oxford isn't, for the large part, their transmission areas are similar.

One thing you might notice increasingly over the coming months is the gradual dropping of the work "Radio". Some local radio stations have already rebranded (BBC Oxford 95.2FM is one example). Some are just about to. Southern Counties Radio becomes BBC Sussex and BBC Surrey soon AIUI (are there now separate programmes all day then? Or are there split jingles during cross-patch programmes?).

Separate programmes only at breakfast and drivetime at the moment, and that will remain the same after Monday's rebranding, so plenty of split jingles to look forward to! Still, it's a long overdue move, the demise of the 'Southern Counties' cannot come a moment too soon!

It's gone full circle, it started as 'Radio Sussex' and 'Radio Surrey' then became 'Radio Sussex and Surrey'. Southern Counties isn't a bad name, although it's a bit broad

Indeed, I was one of the (few) listeners of the original and very short-lived Radio Surrey! Even though I live in the area, 'Southern Counties' to me sounds remote and vague, and the name 'BBC Southern Counties Radio' is much too long-winded - indeed, one of the presenters has remarked that 'BBC Surrey' will be a lot easier to say!

Most presenters will have to say "BBC Sussex and BBC Surrey" though as their shows will be on both services. This takes longer to say than the previous name of "Radio Sussex and Surrey" which was changed to "BBC Southern Counties Radio" apparently because "Radio Sussex and Surrey" was considered too long.

One benefit I can see is that www.bbc.co.uk/sussex is a much better URL than www.bbc.co.uk/southerncounties

First time round, when the same programme was going out on both Radio Surrey and Radio Sussex, neither station's name was mentioned by the presenter, instead the station names only appeared on the jingles. It remains to be seen how they deal with it this time round.

The use of a telephone handset at 2'41" on the attached clip - is the handset "actually" used as a real telephone (i.e. the anchor and the correspondent hear each other via that handset) or is it just for "show"?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chaxKodFDU4

I suspect it's just a prop, but I don't know. What's more surprising to me is that on a double headed bulletin Nick Witchell doesn't get a look in until over 4 minutes into the programme.

Isn't that how the Six O Clock News operated though. Each day there was clearly a lead and secondary newsreader.

Yes it was. I have a few Six O'Clock News clips from the late eighties/early nineties with Anna Ford always leading when she presented, and people like Andrew Harvey not being seen until about 6.10pm.

Not sure, it depends if they had earphones back then. If that's the case then she's using the phone to hear what the correspondent is saying but the audio (the IFB or clean feed) to Luxembourg is coming from the sound desk. The other way of doing it would be to have the audio from teh phone coming out of speakers in the studio

It's similar to the way that Swap Shop/Going Live/Live and Kicking used to make their guests talk on phones - in that case the kids on the studio floor could also hear the callers so I suspect there they were props and the voice of the caller came out of a foldback speaker

[quote="TELEVISION"]

... this still continues to this day on the BBC News Channel one of the two presenters is always the lead and sits in the left chair, although it's not as pronounced as it used to be.