"BBC WORLD"

I think James Reynolds is an excellent correspondent. He's done several specials since Christmas in the Gaza strip, many walkabouts in Neve Dekalim in the weeks leading upto today.

He captures the atmosphere really well and has a very good piece-to-camera technique.

Except for a little slip of the tongue from Lyse this morning saying that "an old copy of the Koran, the jewish holy book, was being moved out of the synagogue"... at which point her interviewee (an elderly israeli lady) almost burst out!
Amazed to see such a lapsus from someone like Lyse...

WTF! did anyone else see that?

BBC World News start as normal, then when it came to the business headline it continued playing for a few seconds after aaron finished saying it then it when straight into the titles but no bang, the headline bed just mixed in with the video from where it began.

At the end of the titles the headline aston appears, and a headline pops and then goes away then pops up then goes away, then when it was on Lindsey, the Explosion of the titles flash on screen overtop of Lindsey then headline aston and dog, disapeard and now the backup graphics are on.

BBC World made a right cock-up this morning. The news of British politician Mo Mowlam's death broke at 08.30 this morning. Nisha Pillai did the news summary, and then said "News just in that Mo Mowlam has di..." before being interrupted by the BBC World ident. There was then an announcement (which itself was wrong - it was for Talking Point) and we went straight into Talking Movies. How unprofessional can you get?

Yes only the day, they made a complete cock up as well but not as bad as what you have said itsrobert.

It's now about a month since they suppresssed the Asian round up on the Friday 2230 CET edition of the WBR. How do you feel about it? I am more and more convinced they've got a problem with biz news: the pieces they show are increasingly focused on anectotal stories poorly relevant for those looking for factual information about the state of the world economy. I remember the first time they didn't show the asian business review they had an additional report about the new kind of summer camp American children increasingly attend. This is not consistent with a "putting news first" philosophy.So along with less corporate news - what happened to "The business diary" which I certainly found useful although the music was awful ?- the WBR no longer provides a global perspective: the 2230 edition is almost exclusively focused on America, the 1245 edition on Europe, etc. Only the early morning editions remain truly global. What's more I tend to think they should have a more extensive coverage as far as the Asian region is concerned. Just like they show Asia Today around the globe, every one should be able to watch Asia Business Report at least once a day. And in terms of the importance attributed to the business news on this channel: remember that when back in January much of the editions of Asia Today were focused on the relief effort in the wake of the tsunami disaster, they chose to keep the sport bulletin but there was no time for the business. I feel like corporate Asia is being neglected.

The thing that bugs me about Asia Today is the way the sport bulletins very often contain non-Asian stories. I tuned in one day to find a report about the English Premiership football league, which didn't mention Asia once! It seems they are just broadcasting anything to fill air time. Since last year, BBC World has gone downhill rapidly. It used to be a respectable channel, but now BBC News 24 is beating it - it NEVER used to be like that.

itsobert hits on a crucial point: in all the years I've been reading these forums, the endless posts bemoaning how superior World was to News 24 and how it really ought come to the UK filled the board. Now, it seems very few fifteen year olds go abroad (from the UK) and beg for this channel on their return.

News 24 nowadays looks far superior on screen. As itsrobert says: it never used to be like that. Years of underinvestment finally showing through.

I don't think it has had much impact. I think that however viewers might have felt about the studios, they had decided that 10 years of the same design was enough, that they were showing their age and that it was about time to change. But it has to be said that the changes occured gradually. Thinking back to november 2003, they had the programme presentations being replaced by a programme trailer that also features weather and market news (which is likely to have been welcomed by the greater part of the viewers). But I guess those
changes have to be related to a shift in policy: brand new studios for a brand new BBC World.
When the channel was spirited with a "making sense of it all" or "demand a broader view" philosophy, they
strived to deliver viewers a range of programmes aimed at bringing them a global picture of how the world is fairing geopolitically, and economically, what problems, issues and challenges communities, nations and countries have to tackle, address or simply cope with: they intended to provide in-depth analysis about the current global state of the world, with such programmes as Panorama, Correspondent, Simpson's World, Earth Report and Tales from the global economy. Even BBC News featured pieces focusing not just on the latest twists of the major news stories, but on more broader developments. It truly helped you to understand the world as a whole.
Now that they have adopted CNN's "be the first to know" policy, they are dedicated to making breaking news coverage a priority, so that they bring you the latest news as it unfolds. The programming has become more superficial, in fact it reminds me of Bloomberg's "World news updates" that provide viewers with the latest developments without any background coverage, without any broader analysis.
"BBC World gives you more news than ever before" they say. They're right, because BBC World now puts news first: it affects everything in the programming, from those recently-introduced 15 second summaries of the stories the next few bulletins will be concentrating on, that appear during the breaks, to the brand new weather look: no more satellite animation to show you what's happening on a continental scale, but instead maps featurting with accuracy the areas in which it will be dull, sunny, raining, etc. They used to provide you with the means of understanding the weather developments on a vast scale, now the forecast is purely factual: no more understanding, it is all about knowing with accuracy what the weather will be like in your particular area. That's "putting news first". From those extra editions of the WBR, to the introduction of News extra, that features in-depth reports that used to be aired in the 25 minute main news bulletin, at the time BBC News was about more than just briefing you on what's emerged from the very latest headlines. The world affair -oriented programmes aren't shown on weekdays any more, and fewer of them are likely to be produced by the BBC itself, as the majority will be simply bought. And even these programmes, like most of what's seen in "The
world uncovered", aren't what they used to be. Putting news first....

To come back to the studio changes, since november 2004 (one year after the programme trailer was put in place, and half a year after BBC news 's incidental music and credits were changed) they have been changing the design of the New York bureau several times, till they reshaped it completely in June.
So I don't think all those changes in terms of design are worth it, but it has a deep meaning: the introduction of a completely-reshaped version of BBC World. In fact a BBC World that is no longer outstanding, but still, as one mentioned on this forum, "miles ahead of CNN".

As BBC World.s biggest supporter over the years, I am saddened to say that I feel that it no longer is miles out in front of CNN International. I was never ever a fan of CNN, but now find that its structured and seamless styles of presentation and consistency across its regions, is far more credible now than BBC World has been for quite a few months now.

I think World needs to re-structure the style of bulletins and also re-introduce proper closings and also sort out this horrendous break filler and opt out cock ups.

Its also time to shift the presenter rosters about a bit and bring a bit of freshness to certain parts of the output.

James

I think the main difference between World and CCN (and what makes World superior in my opinion to the latter) is that BBC World remains pragmatic and never asserts things they aren't able to confirm. This difference can be noticed in the news, but more importantly in the scientific programming: I prefer by far "Horizon" to "CNN presents", some editions of which really sounded like a sci-fi show.
As for the programme trailers, they sometimes drive me crazy too. But it isn't new, remember when they changed "making sense of it all" to "demand a broader view", they showed that presentation with the strings and the hands over and over again. They have a long habit of showing the same things till it makes you go mad, during the breaks.
As for the news presenters, I think it is preferable not to change them too often, so that viewers can familiarize with each of them.

I would like a new roster along the following lines:

Weekdays

0500-0800 - Mike Embley or David Eades
0800-1200 - Nik Gowing or Lyse Doucet
1200-1600 - Lindsey Brancher or Martine Dennis
1600-2000 - Adrian Finighan or Nisha Pillai
2000-2030 - Peter Sissons or Zeinab Badawi
2030-0100 - Mishal Husain or Anita McNaught

Weekends

0600-1200 - Ben Brown
1200-1900 - David Jessel
1900-0100 - Keshini Navaratnam