Royal News Coverage

Sadly, the BBC has been one disaster after another all weekend. I watched the entire river pageant and was appalled by their coverage. I then sat through the entire concert and until the very last moment I thought the BBC had redeemed itself... then came the ridiculous decision to obliterate the fireworks with pointless end credits and a voiceover. Insane! If they *had* to show the credits then why couldn't they do what ITV did today and scroll them across the bottom, rather than having them centred in the middle of the screen? A total lack of thought there. And the less said about today, the better. The only saving grace was Huw Edwards - the stuff with Fearne Cotton was just cringeworthy.

ITV have certainly moved into the role the BBC has recently vacated; that of mature, intelligent analysis punctuated by light-hearted moments at appropriate times. Unlike Mark Austin's performance, the BBC's attempts at lighter material just completely flopped; it wasn't funny at all. I think you summed up ITV's coverage perfectly there when you said it felt like a family. I thought exactly the same thing during the proceedings. The way the newsreaders were all bouncing off one another was wonderful. I think the BBC ended up being a victim of its own vast size. It tried to do too much at once with presenters that just don't go together. Huw Edwards and Fearne Cotton in the same programme is too much for me. They're worlds apart. At least the lighter material on ITV was conducted by journalists with some skill and background knowledge.

I was always going to be biased about ITV's coverage but like many of you on here I absolutely loved it. From Julie and Phil leading the coverage to Lucy Manning's interview with David Cameron the entire broadcast was enjoyable, interesting and exciting. Guest's like David Starkey added context while Joan Collins, Catherine Jenkins and Barbara Windsor gave a 'showbiz' feel to the coverage, something which added to great feeling surrounding the coverage.

Alastair and James's commentary were focused and clear while the interviews outside St. Pauls gave us a sense of what it felt like to be inside. The various interviews as well from Mary, and Romilly were interesting, particularly from the young St. Johns ambulance volunteers who read at the service. Geraint's segments were also interesting, I can honestly say that I have learnt a lot more about Red Arrows today! ITV defiantly showed a view from all perspectives.

The event also created a great deal of humour, a key element in ITV's coverage. Natasha's interview with one of the guards was enjoyable while Mark Austin in the crowds was hilarious. Getting caught out by scout guards twice in just over a year seemed to catch him out, and of course the live links from across the country meant that we got a feel for celebrations right around Britain adding to warmth of the coverage.

It was also nice to see a friendly side to Nina who for me can sometimes come across as quite cold but she came across today as very natural while interviewing those celebrating down at Trafalgar Square.

There were some issues that could of have been handled a bit better, there were several occasions where sound dropped as nobody was speaking, I am not sure if this was because of a delay in communication but nevertheless the coverage was outstanding.

Then the regional coverage mirrored the national effort. Meridian even went as far as changing the lights in the studio to a red, white and blue mix while the team at London Tonight continued to entertain and inform with live reporters, interviews and one extremely dedicated royal supporter.

It just shows that even if you do have a plethora of resources that a much smaller team of professional, journalistic presenters can deliver coverage on the same if not better level. ITV captured the atmosphere of the hearts and minds of a nation that came out to celebrate, and by simply showing this on there coverage from what I gather they showed the BBC how it is done.

You do get the point of an 'international news station' don't you? They broadcast to every country and the proportion of those who are interested in an anniversary taking place in the UK are very small


Yes, but in the UK it's a 4 day weekend. The rest of the world however are getting on with life as normal

http://tv-live.org.uk/wp/media/jubilee/jubilee96.jpg

The argument about whether the BBC got the Jubilee coverage wrong made it to the Today programme this morning:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9726000/9726239.stm

Some interesting arguments, many of which have already been mentioned here.

ITN played out the message via BT Tower at around 1725 yesterday, embargoed until 1800. There was also a radio version (approx 60s) with just the message and no music. It also went out on the EBU News Exchange.

I guess BBC One and ITV1 ran it bang on 18.00.00, while Channel 4 didn't feel they needed to be so accurate with their timekeeping. They do normally show the Christmas message, don't they?

Don't think they've done that for years.

Typical BBC reaction to criticism there. Ignore most of the points that everyone agrees on and bury your head in the sand. Loved the last few seconds - the critic said (rightly) that too many of the presenters during the river pageant coverage were inexperienced and had not enough background knowledge, to which Mark Damazer replied that most of the presenters were knowledgeable and notably failed to mention the likes of Fearne Cotton, Chris Hollins and others who were inappropriate for the occasion.

He says the BBC tried to 'jazz it up' and be 'inclusive' - I don't necessarily have a problem with that. However, couldn't they have jazzed it up by including even more impressive camera work, actually being there for the key moments, and informing viewers with interesting trivia and anecdotes about the vessels and people sailing them? I think that would have gone down with most of the viewers - I can't see many of the young people who they were obviously trying to impress sitting down to watch a 4-hour pageant of old boats on a Sunday afternoon. Most of the audience were probably older and young folk like me who are actually interested in the monarchy and with a bit of a quirky interest in history etc.

The BBC seemed to treat the pageant as a backdrop for its celebrity-driven features, which was to misjudge what I suspect most of the viewers wanted - some good shots of the river with informed discussion. The critic on Radio 4 made a good point when she said that too often these days commentators and presenters spend too much time describing what the viewer can see; they almost forget that they are broadcasting to a TV audience rather than radio. For TV, the presenters should be informing viewers with information they can't get from the pictures.

And it went out bang on 18.00.00 on the BBC News Channel as well....

indeed - N6 picked up a clean feed of BBC One on this occasion.

It seems a little bit like they are in thrall to the One Show format at the moment. Lots of items of topical interest, celebrity guests talking about them, pre-edited VTs about quirky things. Might work at 7pm on a weeknight but totally inappropriate for this weekend's events. So many times I switched over from ITV1 to see BBC1's take on whatever was happening and they were in the middle of an inconsequential film about something or other, and Paloma Faith plugging her album as Fearne Cotton was showing off jelly moulds as the crowds were surging forward in the Mall was just something else.

I guess DQF might actually help with this sort of thing as it may ultimately mean they have to reduce their scope. But as I said earlier, who would have thought it would be ITV sticking largely to journalists and the Beeb stuffing the show full of celebs? Total turnaround from my childhood. It's not inconceivable that a different ITV would have had Ant and Dec on the Mall, Holly Willloughby at a street party, Christine Bleakley out in the regions etc etc, all in the name of "jazzing up the coverage and reaching out to viewers who might not otherwise have been interested", which was exactly the BBC's excuse.

And it does appear once again that they're burying their heads in the sand over the reaction rather than taking a step back and addressing the issues. Ignore the Mail - they will criticise the BBC whatever they do (remember Sissons and his tie?) - it's the likes of us on a geeky forum that should be defending them, but I can't do that after the last few days.

For these sorts of occasions the BBC should strive to "disappear" from the event itself. If people talk more about how it was presented than what is presented then there's a problem. Keep it simple.