I find it very hard to believe that they (RTE) would locate a daily live news programme of at least 2-3 hours several hundred miles from their....newsroom.
And they will have to fill 2-3 hours of LIVE programming....I presume they will want to bring in some big name people to interview in person on a daily basis (e.g. senior politcians, business people, special interest groups, and dare I say it..'celebrities') most if not all of whom are based in....Dublin.
TV breakfast news programme a la the old BBC Breakfast News sounds good...basing it in Cork sounds like an absolute cock of an idea.
And it should not be beyond RTE's capability to set up their own 24 hour news service and simulcast all their live news and current affairs servings on it (Breakfast news, Lunctime news, 6.01, Nine News, Prime Time, News Two), especially now that Ireland will be finally getting DTT. Afterall, they are a 'public service broadcaster' - well resourced news and hard hitting current affairs should be the corner stone of a PSB who gets over €158 from each licence fee payer each year.
And they are negotiating "with the unions". What is this 1988? Suppose we know were some of the licence fee is going....
On a side note it was reported earlier in the year Nuacht RTE is to completely relocated to Baile Na habhann in Galway by the end of this year from Dublin.
I imagine this will mean an end to the seperate Nuacht RTÉ and Nuacht TG4 looks, I mean, they're hardly likely to recreate the Dublin RTÉ News set in County Galway.
On a side note, RTÉ Sport launched new presentation yesterday with the new season of The Sunday Game, a rather slicker 3D-ised version of the previous graphics (which of course, In No Way Whatsoever Copy the BBC Sport Graphics, especially not the idea of having every sport programme have a logo in the same font, with the RTÉ Sport logo underneath) Rather overshadowed by THAT theme tune returning though.
RTE is to use this week’s referendum to launch its new online streaming news service, RTE News Now. The service, which will function as an internet-based news channel, will be available on RTE.ie when it launches on Thursday, with a rollout on mobile phone networks also under discussion.
The channel will broadcast online 24 hours a day and will be shown in addition to news content already available on the broadcaster’s website. The service will consist of existing RTE news bulletins and current affairs programming, which will be simulcast live and repeated throughout the day, as well as breaking news stories and special events that might not get coverage on television.
The news service will forma central part of the planned RTE media player, which is currently in development. This new platform is expected to be similar to the recently launched BBC iPlayer, which allows viewers to re-watch and download previously aired programmes online.
‘‘RTE News Now will live stream all breaking news coverage from RT€1 and RT€2,” said a spokesman for RTE Publishing.’ ‘However, it will stream special events such as Oireachtas debates, which are not being broadcast on television.
‘‘All content will be produced by RTE and users will continue to be able to access all RTE news and current affairs programming on an on-demand basis on RTE.ie.”
According to the RTE spokesman, there will also be brief business, entertainment and sports updates produced exclusively for the News Now service by the end of June. The text-based news content already available on RTE.ie will also be factored into the new service as a ticker tape-style feed.
The broadcaster hopes to raise revenue from the venture through short advertisements, which will be shown before the main content begins. This approach is already used on RTE programmes that can be watched on demand on the website.
In addition to being online, RTE hopes to make the News Now service available on mobile networks at - or shortly after - launch, and is in discussion with carriers to facilitate this.
3 Mobile already offers its customers access to live and looped RTE news broadcasts at a cost of €2 per week, however neither O2 nor Vodafone offers such a facility.
At the moment, the service will be focused on RTE.ie and mobile networks, but the spokesman for RTE Publishing said there were plans to roll it out onto other digital platforms in the future.
It is likely that digital television will be one of the platforms under consideration, perhaps as part of the broadcaster’s overall plans for Digital Terrestrial Television ( DTT).
According to RTE’s internal statistics, the news section of RTE.ie is now the most popular part of the website, accounting for more than 11 million page impressions, or 23 per cent of overall site traffic, in April.
Some 34 per cent of those who accessed RTE.ie/news during the same month were based outside Ireland.
Well, it is a good idea for sure but the permanent left-side panel and the enormously big newsbar are a bit overdesigned - I understand it is to make the text more readable but people with a decent internet connection (and a decent one must be had talking about streaming video in general) will have no problem with seeing the bar in a standard size. The content of the left panel is so poor, that it should be removed in favour of a more advanced ticker on the bottom and for the original 16:9.
I've also expected more autonomous programming - for example "no comment" sections or news headlines in Irish during the commercial breaks... fresh world news headlines during the night and early morning would be very nice too, and it would make the channel more unusual.
I'm not sure it ever had any branding of any kind in the first place, both RTÉ International and Diaspora TV were/are working titles. I would hate, though, to be the branding agency given a brief to create an identity for a channel called "Diaspora TV"!!! The Diaspora TV thing, as I understand it, arose out of Eamon Ryan's want to "announce" the channel to tie in with St Patrick's Day before any concrete details had been agreed with RTÉ. I'm not sure there is even an agreement between RTÉ and DCMNR beyond the basics, RTÉ is rather annoyed at having to fund the channel out of the licence fee.
My money anyway, is on the channel being simply known as "RTÉ" when it launches.