Central News East

I really must disagree that Central is to blame for its decline. Since the Carlton takeover, very little high-level decision making has happened at Central at all.
One very small example of this was when Central was forced to rebrand to Carlton, and before that use the modified Carlton idents. If something as trivial as presentaion was forcibly changed, then it seems obvious that other more important decisions were made by Carlton executives in London, not in Birmingham. After the takeover, the board of Central was effectively dispanded and replaced with a managing director.
Carlton definately made the decisions which have slowly destroyed Central.

What's the betting that during the first 18:00 edition of CNeast to come from Brum, the presenters refer to the new look studio/set as something ambiguous, like "our new home", rather than specifically mentioning "Birmingham", so as to downplay the unpopular relocation as much as possible?

it'll be interesting if central east use the "central court, birmingham, b1 2jt" postal address ... or use their newsroom address in notts.

I still don't understand why production can't stay in Nottingham even if it at the new newsgathering centre.
They could easily add a second level, even if it's only a small balconey that overlooks the newsroom, now that would be impressive. They've got to keep people in Nottingham anyway, so why can't they keep production there, very, very strange.

Won't they have to have a satilitte set up at the location to send stories to Birmingham anyway?

Neither do I. This the hardest bit to follow, mainly from the quality assurance perspective. All the back-office services, including graphics production, IT and admin support, weather presentation, libraries, specialist correspondents, and even some package editing could be collected together almost anywhere.

There may be a cost gain realised by having the presenters at the back-office, possibly studio operating costs and flexibility, and possibly even some avoided technical cost.

But, the main loss is in quality. Why? Because the presenters are journalists, and journalists work in teams. The editors will be part of the sub-regional gathering operation, i.e. it is there that the agenda and hence the show will be driven. Surly, as journalists the presenters have to be part of that process, in order for the on-screen appearance to be of a seamless presentation. Modern trend is for a level of comment, if only responsiveness, to accompany the delivery of news. In order to do this the journalists need to know the area, be immersed in its culture and politics, and know the people. Ie, live there, work there and drink there.

For CNE to be presented from Brum is about as dis-functional as having Jeremy Paxman present Newsnight from a studio in Jersey.



From a fixed location presumably this would be a land line. If the local outfit were handling the studio components as well, then, if these were live, they might need a back up cct as well. Although the back-up could be by satellite, militating against this would be the fact that capacity would tend to be a premium during the UK regional news shows.

Won't they send the stories via a dedicated fibre optic line to Brum?

Er has Gas Street fixed it's power problems from the last couple of years now ?

It would be rather embarassing if both Central News' 'went down at the same time !

Theortically should West, East & South back up for one another, like the Beeb do, or not(assuming someone's awake at either Brum or Notts, otherwise maybe London?) ?

They'll use a newsroom address that's actually in the region. Much like South Today Oxford or Anglia News do.

http://www.rp-networkservices.com/tvforum/uploads/cne_studio_copy1.gif

Is Central News East still in this studio?

That's the first time I have seen that studio, it looks wierd, its predecessor looked better. Don't suppose anyone has anymore pictures of it, or the other Central region which isn't on Sky. Also, why are CN East and South not on Sky ?

Because at the moment ITV only have 3 transponders on Astra - and are already over-compressing (and running at a lower resolution than most other broadcasters) to squeeze their existing line-up in. If they added any more versions with no increase in capacity you'd end up with picture quality lower than that currently offered.

ITV1 is the poorest quality main channel on satellite by a country mile - softer, blockier and more prone to motion break-up than BBC One, Two, Channel Four or Five. Channel Four comes second - and I think Five normally beats most of the BBC services - or it did.

AIUI the only English franchise with two regions carried on satellite (ITV arrange their uplink independently of Sky - who only handle the encryption) is Meridian - where the South variant was recently joined by the South-East. Every other ENGLISH franchise only carries one variant - only HTV and Border (which both broadcast to two countries) have two variants (though I think HTV West is now branded ITV1 West and closer editorially to Westcountry these days)

ITV HAVE just bought some more capacity on Astra 2D (as I think have C4) so more regional variants may appear - as well as more interactive services.

Yes they are, and it's bloody horrible and crap. In desperate need of a new one and soon.

And I'm hoping to see East on Sky really soon.