Caught this Newswatch programme with Snoddy for the first time tonight....basically one of their pieces had a guy in the studio (the average viewer) complaining that News 24 repeated too many stories, devoted too much time to minor news stories and didn't cover enough stories from their correspondents across the globe.
Well in true PoV style, the editor-in-chief of News24 was in the studio responding- the comment of relevance was that he agreed that perhaps the channel could make more use of its correspondents across the UK and the globe.
He revealed that they would shortly be trialing a new format for some of the evening hours, when the anticipated breaking news levels are lower- rather than covering the usual 12 stories/hour (i.e. with reports/interviews), the new evening hour would be more pacy- covering about 25 stories/hour with less in depth coverage after the half hour. This would utilise more correspondents from outside London and the UK.
Sounds like an interesting plan, and something to look out for trials of soon.
He described it as a 'best of the BBC' hour with international stuff and material from the nations and regions as well as the 1/6/10.
A good idea; certainly the ITV News Channel has had the upper hand for some time when it comes to exploiting regional material, and with its added international resources an hour-long BBC equivalent of the ITV NC's ITV News Network programme should be a very good watch indeed.
He described it as a 'best of the BBC' hour with international stuff and material from the nations and regions as well as the 1/6/10.
A good idea; certainly the ITV News Channel has had the upper hand for some time when it comes to exploiting regional material, and with its added international resources an hour-long BBC equivalent of the ITV NC's ITV News Network programme should be a very good watch indeed.
Yes, although I hope he got the message about more use of international correspondants....I don't want an hour of the best of local news, because frankly the best of local news generally isn't worthy of News 24 news in brief. No stories of sheep being stolen, "farmer interest stories" etc. Proper news from around the globe.
The other piece in last night's Newswatch about Look East and the QUOTA of reports from Bedford sums it up- regardless of what's actually happening in your region, you'll see a fixed quota of stories from each part of it. It's pathetic....time to end local news or marginalise it to the depths of the red button.
I don't know - I would like to hear about sheep being stolen, anyway I think it will be a good idea, I always thought that BBC News 24 should have a regional news slot!
Caught this Newswatch programme with Snoddy for the first time tonight....basically one of their pieces had a guy in the studio (the average viewer) complaining that News 24 repeated too many stories, devoted too much time to minor news stories and didn't cover enough stories from their correspondents across the globe.
Well in true PoV style, the editor-in-chief of News24 was in the studio responding- the comment of relevance was that he agreed that perhaps the channel could make more use of its correspondents across the UK and the globe.
He revealed that they would shortly be trialing a new format for some of the evening hours, when the anticipated breaking news levels are lower- rather than covering the usual 12 stories/hour (i.e. with reports/interviews), the new evening hour would be more pacy- covering about 25 stories/hour with less in depth coverage after the half hour. This would utilise more correspondents from outside London and the UK.
Sounds like an interesting plan, and something to look out for trials of soon.
Is that not a completely obscure way of looking at things?
When the 'anticipated levels of breaking news' are lower, this surely gives them more time to look in depth at particular stories, not give 3 minutes to each one because nothing exciting is happening.
I thought the new News 24 was supposed to be MORE in-depth... not less.
Caught this Newswatch programme with Snoddy for the first time tonight....basically one of their pieces had a guy in the studio (the average viewer) complaining that News 24 repeated too many stories, devoted too much time to minor news stories and didn't cover enough stories from their correspondents across the globe.
Well in true PoV style, the editor-in-chief of News24 was in the studio responding- the comment of relevance was that he agreed that perhaps the channel could make more use of its correspondents across the UK and the globe.
He revealed that they would shortly be trialing a new format for some of the evening hours, when the anticipated breaking news levels are lower- rather than covering the usual 12 stories/hour (i.e. with reports/interviews), the new evening hour would be more pacy- covering about 25 stories/hour with less in depth coverage after the half hour. This would utilise more correspondents from outside London and the UK.
Sounds like an interesting plan, and something to look out for trials of soon.
Is that not a completely obscure way of looking at things?
When the 'anticipated levels of breaking news' are lower, this surely gives them more time to look in depth at particular stories, not give 3 minutes to each one because nothing exciting is happening.
I thought the new News 24 was supposed to be MORE in-depth... not less.
He wasn't talking about the whole evening just a certain time in the evening, he said that News 24 needed to go into stories in-depth but I think this idea would be for one hour where they would have the best reports from the whole of the BBC.
Is that not a completely obscure way of looking at things?
When the 'anticipated levels of breaking news' are lower, this surely gives them more time to look in depth at particular stories, not give 3 minutes to each one because nothing exciting is happening.
I thought the new News 24 was supposed to be MORE in-depth... not less.
Well there's always a fine balance between keeping things 'exciting' and taking time out to go in depth. As with ITV and Sky, N24 faces the age old problem of trying to please everybody, with the conflicting agendas of constantly breaking news, stronger international focus, using resources from the Regions and Nations, in-depth analysis, social coverage, 'yoof' interest stories and plenty more besides.
It's a fine balance, and a difficult one to perfect obviously. As stated on the NewsWatch programme, the back half-hours usually offer the in-depth analysis that many audience members seek, while a look at the top stories is covered from the top of the hour. Those audiences seeking to simply dip in can, as we all know, get headlines every 15 minutes or so. I don't see any problem at all to taking an hour out - perhaps at 2100 each weekday (thus avoiding conflicts with the light approach of the 7 on BBC THREE, and the heavy analysis of The World on BBC FOUR) - to move away from the usual formula, and take a look at lots of stories from around the UK, and the world, that wouldn't otherwise make the usual half-hour round-up.
It's not a case of ditching in-depth analysis; it's simply offering something new, taking advantage of existing resources that aren't being fully capitalised on. It would be easy to transpose a whole report on an interesting issue from Reporting Scotland or North West Tonight; regional packages do tend to be quite short and sweet anyway, and would therefore suit this kind of programme on N24. Reports could also be plucked from WORLD, and it is judged that there would be sufficient 'general' interest, packages could also be sourced from the likes of Asia Today and Middle East Business Report.
The difference of global coverage between N24 and WORLD is very obvious; WORLD manages to look at a vastly greater variety of stories to N24, even if only in brief. The problem is of course that N24 has a domestic agenda to represent as well. The competing agendas of domestic and international news - with much to be reported on both fronts - means that N24 usually only focuses on those stories that are deemed 'big' which consequently comes at the cost of variety. If you spend fifteen minutes doing justice to the big UK stories (2-3 mins per story), and another fifteen giving adequate coverage to international news, there's no time left to look at everything else that's going on in the world before the in-depth analysis of the biggest stories begins at the bottom of the hour. The problem remains that if you take time out of every hour to cover more stories, then you eat into the time of the big stories that 'matter most', and then people complain; but if you give more in-depth analysis, the channel can become stale, the pace slows, and sooner or later you've just one huge discussion, topped by a quick summary of the headlines. The obvious solution is to take a whole hour out of the schedule to do something completely different. The format of the programme - with up to 25 different stories being covered in an hour - would also pick up the pace at a time when there is usually less breaking news. I don't see this period where breaking news is traditionally thin on the ground as an excuse for the channel to fall asleep. Of course there should continue to be plenty of analysis throughout the day, but I see no reason not to try to keep things 'alive' with a more pacy approach, packing an hour with a very varied selection of stories from the UK and abroad.
Such a programme would also offer a welcome break to the daily grind of half-hour round-up/half-hour analysis (of course giving way to breaking news as appropriate), while trying to make the best use of the BBC's resources around the country and globally, which we hear so much about on those irritating trailers, but which in practice are often marginalised in favour of using the same packages about the same stories headed by the same 'big name' correspondents over and over again.
Is that not a completely obscure way of looking at things?
When the 'anticipated levels of breaking news' are lower, this surely gives them more time to look in depth at particular stories, not give 3 minutes to each one because nothing exciting is happening.
I thought the new News 24 was supposed to be MORE in-depth... not less.
Well there's always a fine balance between keeping things 'exciting' and taking time out to go in depth. As with ITV and Sky, N24 faces the age old problem of trying to please everybody, with the conflicting agendas of constantly breaking news, stronger international focus, using resources from the Regions and Nations, in-depth analysis, social coverage, 'yoof' interest stories and plenty more besides.
It's a fine balance, and a difficult one to perfect obviously. As stated on the NewsWatch programme, the back half-hours usually offer the in-depth analysis that many audience members seek, while a look at the top stories is covered from the top of the hour. Those audiences seeking to simply dip in can, as we all know, get headlines every 15 minutes or so. I don't see any problem at all to taking an hour out - perhaps at 2100 each weekday (thus avoiding conflicts with the light approach of the 7 on BBC THREE, and the heavy analysis of The World on BBC FOUR) - to move away from the usual formula, and take a look at lots of stories from around the UK, and the world, that wouldn't otherwise make the usual half-hour round-up.
It's not a case of ditching in-depth analysis; it's simply offering something new, taking advantage of existing resources that aren't being fully capitalised on. It would be easy to transpose a whole report on an interesting issue from Reporting Scotland or North West Tonight; regional packages do tend to be quite short and sweet anyway, and would therefore suit this kind of programme on N24. Reports could also be plucked from WORLD, and it is judged that there would be sufficient 'general' interest, packages could also be sourced from the likes of Asia Today and Middle East Business Report.
The difference of global coverage between N24 and WORLD is very obvious; WORLD manages to look at a vastly greater variety of stories to N24, even if only in brief. The problem is of course that N24 has a domestic agenda to represent as well. The competing agendas of domestic and international news - with much to be reported on both fronts - means that N24 usually only focuses on those stories that are deemed 'big' which consequently comes at the cost of variety. If you spend fifteen minutes doing justice to the big UK stories (2-3 mins per story), and another fifteen giving adequate coverage to international news, there's no time left to look at everything else that's going on in the world before the in-depth analysis of the biggest stories begins at the bottom of the hour. The problem remains that if you take time out of every hour to cover more stories, then you eat into the time of the big stories that 'matter most', and then people complain; but if you give more in-depth analysis, the channel can become stale, the pace slows, and sooner or later you've just one huge discussion, topped by a quick summary of the headlines. The obvious solution is to take a whole hour out of the schedule to do something completely different. The format of the programme - with up to 25 different stories being covered in an hour - would also pick up the pace at a time when there is usually less breaking news. I don't see this period where breaking news is traditionally thin on the ground as an excuse for the channel to fall asleep. Of course there should continue to be plenty of analysis throughout the day, but I see no reason not to try to keep things 'alive' with a more pacy approach, packing an hour with a very varied selection of stories from the UK and abroad.
Such a programme would also offer a welcome break to the daily grind of half-hour round-up/half-hour analysis (of course giving way to breaking news as appropriate), while trying to make the best use of the BBC's resources around the country and globally, which we hear so much about on those irritating trailers, but which in practice are often marginalised in favour of using the same packages about the same stories headed by the same 'big name' correspondents over and over again.
I so want to read all of that, but there is something saying 'just don't bother'.
I so want to read all of that, but there is something saying 'just don't bother'.
Attention span, or something.
Perhaps a ball of wool or a toy mouse would be more your level of intellectual engagement?
Not sure where to put this, but here seemed as good a place as any with talk of regional resources. Was just watching N24, and heard a report signed off as "[Correspondent name], BBC Midlands Today". Is this a one-off?
To be honest, I think that by keeping the regional reports with the ending intact makes it look to the viewer that News 24 is making full use of BBC's regional teams in the UK, so IMHO, they should stick to this in future.
And a similar scenario on another report: the correspondent didn't sign off, but Peter Dobbie clarified that it was "[correspondent name] from BBC Scotland there".