The Newsroom

London bombings - TV news coverage

ALSO: Birmingham security alert - p40 onwards (July 2005)

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BO
boring_user_name
Quote:

I simply cannot share your opinion. So, ITV have "audacity" because they have compared one terrorist attack with another terriorist attack? The difference in the number of deaths between yesterdays events and 9/11 is completely immaterial. Sky, the BBC, Channel 4, and other channels have all made observations about 9/11, therefore saing that ITV were/are the only channel to be making such comparisons is ridiculous.


I notice the BBC's, Sky's, and all the rest of the channels had comparisons to poverty, animal deaths, and physcial abuse yesterday didn't they.... No!


Agreed, I shouldn't have just applied this criticism to itv.


Quote:

I would love to know what dramatic music has been used by ITV News yesterday, if anything, as pointed out on this forum, it's background music for the ITV News Special was very downbeat - unlike Sky's brash typical start of hour fanfare - which played out as usual.


It was dramatic because it was so heavy and downbeat. It sounded like the sort of thing used in crime reconstructions to create a particularly tense mood. It was tabloid and nasty.

Quote:

Trevor said that "we shouldn't allow this attack to change anything" - of course, but jeez, we're talking about British resolve here, not television presentation. If us Brits changed the way we acted after events such as this, the terrorists would be winning - and its important that our lives do not change.


And what exactly would 'the terrorists winning' be? People seem to talk about not letting the terrorists win, but they seem to have little idea of what that would mean. These terrorists don't all have the same goal, so talking of 'the terrorists winning' is meaningless. And what would 'changing the way us brits acted' mean? What value would change?
You just seem to be reitterating Blair and Bush's propaganda.

Quote:

TV presentation-wise, I don't think any of the channels did anything out of the ordinary.


You are correct as far as BBC News and Channel 4 did nothing out of the ordinary. But ITV certainly did; they changed nearly every aspect of their presentation!

Quote:

A few VR sets, background video walkthroughs from both ITV and Sky, good street-map zooming graphics from the BBC etc. I thought that ALL channels dealt with matters extremely well - especially Sky for the first couple of hours of the event.

PS: The desk only changed colour because it reflects the background of the set!


I have nothing against VR sets and video walkthroughs, and I didn't say that I did. I also made no remark about Sky's coverage. I didn't watch it, so how could I? My objection was and remains that ITV News changed its presentation becasue of this attack. That was a deliberate move to change the tone of the programme, and indeed to create more fear than would have been created if they had retained their usual presentation set. Whatever the reasons for the change, it was irresponsible.
In a rather uncertain time following events such as yesterday's, media organisations should remain calm and report on events in a clear, considered way. ITV News overreacted. Would the ITN of yesteryear have done that? No!
SC
scottishender
This Morning with Philip and Lorriane are talking about it too. They've got all their experts on the show
TW
Time Warp
It may sound wrong, but I dont want all this coverage. I know the facts, and have been depressed by them with my fellow Londoners and the whole of Britain, but I think we need to show the world that London stands strong, we need to move on, and this is why I feel we need to return to normal schedules asap. I do not want to turn onto the TV and see al the terrestrial channels engulfed by news specials and news channel coverage, as the time has passed, and yes, we need to pick up the pieces, but it is not goig to help if we are seeing constant pictures of destroyed symbols of our City.
DA
DAS Founding member
time_warp posted:
It may sound wrong, but I dont want all this coverage. I know the facts, and have been depressed by them with my fellow Londoners and the whole of Britain, but I think we need to show the world that London stands strong, we need to move on, and this is why I feel we need to return to normal schedules asap. I do not want to turn onto the TV and see al the terrestrial channels engulfed by news specials and news channel coverage, as the time has passed, and yes, we need to pick up the pieces, but it is not goig to help if we are seeing constant pictures of destroyed symbols of our City.


For someone so keen to post a sensationalist knee-jerk post over at Metropol about terrorism without knowing any facts (although prepared to edit it without the decency to admit editing it), I'd say you could do with the coverage.

The day after a terrorist attack on a city and you expect it to vanish from the news? I think Londoners would like to know what the current condition of their city IS the day after? Wouldn't you? I think perhaps a wider group of people would also like to know the developments with regards to what actually DID happen, and what WILL happen in the wake of the incident?

No?
TW
Time Warp
Yes, but can't this be covered in full for the whole hour on the Lunchtime News?
AN
Andrew Founding member
boring_user_name posted:


It was dramatic because it was so heavy and downbeat. It sounded like the sort of thing used in crime reconstructions to create a particularly tense mood. It was tabloid and nasty.

Yet if BBC News has used a special downbeat theme, everyone would have been getting excited, asking if anyone had captured it etc, yet when ITV do, its a bad thing!
LO
Londoner
The people who are complaining about too much coverage should remember that if they feel they have heard all that they need to hear about yesterday's events they could alway - shock, horror, turn the TV off and do something else.
AP
Aphrodite007
Sorry if already mentioned, but BBC America carried a live feed of BBC News 24 all yesterday.
SC
SCBNI
Strangely just has Julian announcing into the ITV Lunchtime News! Wonder why he's in to work so early?!
TE
teleonline Founding member
Poor John Ray, interrupted yet again during his live report, this time by Andrea with Tony Blair's speech at Gleneagles.
OH
ohwhatanight Founding member
ALL channel's coverage was great yesterday and shows how many great news organisations we have in the UK.
I was flicking around them all and all provided a very coherent and comprehensive coverage.

I've got nothing bad to say about any of them but I would like to comment about ITV News in particular! If ITV News can change the colour of the desk easily - why not? They have this big virtual wall (and studio) and people always complain that it is not used enough and so I felt it was a simple touch to illuminate the desk red and the background graphics changed to red and black. I dont feel the choice of colour scheme was a bad decision.
The theme music to the ITV News Special was extremely similar to the current version but without as many high thrashy sounds and was more mellow and slower - I feel this was a good choice - because when the ITV Lunchtime news began at 12:30 everything with no music of effects(as they felt the current set of sounds wouldnt suit) but this sombre music would've suited the Lunchtime News aswell.

Sir Trev NOT looking at the live link is extremely annoying - everyone else can see the feint image projected onto the background - why can't he?

Also, on a lighter note, I see John Raey was reporting live from Gleneagles and just as he started Andrea Catherwood cut him off to go to a Tony Blair live. He must surely be getting paranoid by now - he was cut off at least three times in the ITV Lunchtime News yesterday by Andrea!
JW
JamesWorldNews
It's probably already been posted above, but I don't have the time to scroll through all the posts, but here on BBC World, we had quite a bit of N24 last night, plus we also got the BBc Six O'Clock News, with Sophie Raworth and George Alagiah (George - it's time you were back out on the road, you just did not handle yesterday's coverage well at all).

Sophie was very good IMO.

We also got Newsnight Special with Jeremy Paxman, and Julain Worricker was very good on N24.

CNNI coverage was also excellent, with Fiounalla Sweeney and Becky Anderson anchoring rolling coverage all day from London, and with Quest out on the streets of London. It was dramatically ruined, though, when they decided to show Sir Trevor McDonald's "live" programme at around 9pm UK time??? It was hideous. Sorry to say.

CNNI are continuing with excellent coverage today.

Sky were probably the best of all, though.

James

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