Sky News

I can't forgive sky for what they've done to thier newswall. They've taken all the essence of having one away. Surely it is supposed to make a bold statement about the stories, surely it is their to provide a dig picture and a new dimension.

Who does a shot - albeit a very good one - of the newsroom even come close to providing that.

I've got a gun and some pills if you want them Mr Ryley


I caught it on sky sports news.

You know it's a big story when Sky bring Keith Graves out of retirement.

I've got to agree with everything you've said, its such a shame Sky hardly use the newswall anymore. That set was built for purpose - to be used! and it's not used, of course with each 'appointment to view' programme there was a place for each programme, Sunrise using the newswall pod and the upstairs area, Sky News Today using the newswall pod and the elbow, along with the stairs (did any of the presenters on SNT AM use the stairs?, I know Ginny did on the afternoon?) but since the schedule has been put back-to-basics, we've lost everything. I knew everything was going down the pan when they stopped using the logo's for Sky News Today. It lost all its identity. Now the desk and the elbow are used mostly, with only the Sky.Com News using the upstairs area. I think Sunrise should use the shoebox for sports/business/showbiz and then the upstairs area for everything else. The news updates could be done at the stairs (were Kay open's Afternoon Live) Sky News could just click their fingers and could use everything again, sadly I doubt it though!

Sorry, just read my post earlier and realised that It doesn't make any sense at all. I was trying to eat my korma, post on here and keep up with the score from the Lane - and, as you can see I didn't quite pull it off. Apologies.

BTW I agree with you 100%. For what it's worth I personally think it's a shame that Mr Murdoch is retiring, and although I'm not keen on FOX News' bias or anything like that, you can see why they're number one. It's because of that atv element. They understand the audience they understand that news needs to be done differently at particular times of the day. They understand the power of style and identity, of personality, and of competition.

STYLE
Watch Fox and Friends - now the inter presenter banter may not be everybodies taste, but it obviously works as a lot of people like it. It makes you feel warm and welcome. Oh yeah, and they dare to present it from a sofa (or the 'curvy couch' as it's called) GOSH HOW ADVENTUROUS!!!

This however goes beyond recognising what people ant at times of the day, because that invariably leaves a large section of the day where people want the same thing. So what do they do? They make it up. 'The Live Desk' comes from the gallery and has bar breaking news, exactly the same content as any other hour it's just that they changed the style to bring more impetus to that hour.

Now gimicky that may be, would it suite a UK audience? May be not. But if it's gimicky to use a studio that you spent £20m on to its full potential the bugger me we're in a sad state of affairs aren't we?

AND THE EXAMPLES GO ON. For those readers who think its very tabloid to have your program branded to the hilt look to AlJaz and their Newshour brand - now that's what I call branding, especially the opening.

But don't just do that otherwise that's effort wasted. Advertise it for God's sake. AlJaz have done some quite frankly mind blowing ads for their newshour stuff.

PERSONALITY
I'm now a recent convert to CNN - yeah I took your advice ginnyfan, and it's great. I love it. The presenters seem human and actually kinda chat away to you in the lighter segments which seems nice and get this there is actually banter. Oh I nearly went into orgasm last night when I saw Finnoualla and Femi Oke (weather) laughing at a joke about a CNN cameraman.

Ask yourself people - how long is it since you've seen something so natural like THAT on sky.

Don't think that's important? think I'm being too tabloid for little old you and your silver spoon? Remember Bob Friend, pooper-scooper, Anna Botting etc? Yeah, well didn't they make you wanna tune in for more?

Sky think they're being all clever by having the 'sky celebs' all one thier own. But they are missing the point completely. We don't just like these presetners becuase of their journalistic skill but because of the way they interact with others, their colleagues and us - lowly viewers.

COMPETITION
Sky have go a news studio that kicks Snooze 24's ass. I know if I was in charge the whole friggin hour would be pans, crabs, zooms, tracks. The full caboodle. Becuase it makes sense. If you've got something the comp. hasn't you should damn well make a big thing about it.

May be it would be a good idea to define an area for each show. let them personalise it a bit make it their own. I dunno.

'Back to basics' my arse. Where they're at now is further from where they started back in 1989 than I ever thought possible. If somebody could point out to me when in 1989 they had personality driven programming I'd gladly eat my hat, and alot else too, but they didn't. Simple as. So what sort of back to basics is that? I say the sort that isn't really back to basics.

I also find the whole thing about the hierachy where you have one King Pin and the other a lowly peasant on screen. I can see the logic, it just rubs me up the wrong way.

I would personally look to give the 2nd presetner a bigger role. Actually have them next to the main presenter, or atleast near them, and when your coming up to going to a break I as a director would make sure there was a little time free for the two of them to have a chinwag. None of this forced 'on our website...' crap, just a casual mention maybe that, say if a European story has just be covered, casually mention that Greg has a blog at sky.com/news, and then turn it into a conversation between the two of them. A little bit of banter. Just an incy wincy bit.

I'd also give them a bigger role so may be they would traffic and entertainment news. Or maybe you could simply spread the interviews that they do with reporters out throughout the hour.

The weekends stink as well. Why oh why is ANDREW WILSON presenting HIS OWN SHOW!!! AAAARRRRGGGGHHH. What about Allan King and Paula or Helen who have such great chemisstry between them rather than that man.

*Pauses to think*

Y'all - for the past 5 minutes I've been thinking about news every 15 minutes. And what to say about it.

Words can not describe my feelingas towards this piece of sh!t. Because on the face of it, many people would no doubt find it a very useful and admirable service. And you know what I can't argue with sky's logic on principal alone because they have listened and taken on board what I wrote earlier on. They have obviously accepted the idea of competition and since News twenty-bore do more analysis in this segment.

BUT - their constant plugging and obvious investment in their own website cancels out this logic because surely the website provides exactly the same possibility but in a much more user friendly manner. As their is that element of control and on-demand style.

I don't know what to suggest to a channel that pitches it's own tv programming in direct competition to another two of it's own strands (active and online). Especially a commercial one whose purpose is to at the very least try to make money. It is quite simply bizarre.

EDIT: Thank you for your patience in having to read through all of that.

SN2005, I'm happy to hear you watch CNN, the best news channel. They have the best presenters, real people with knowledge and experience. The only thing missing are the old newsroom sets.
Sky has lost everything good about it, even their set looks bad right now.

Most channels have that though BBC News 24/World, Al Jazeera .. maybe a bit of Sky News!

Yes but at CNN they have a good schedule ( the same one for over 5 years now) with regular presenters, not like Sky who can't keep up one schedule for 2 months,not to mention constant changes ofpresenters.
Also I feel like CNN is one big happy family,their presenters know each other and they also have great presenting teams.

here here to that, CNNi have quality news presenters, and stick so the same schedule most times, and they have glamour like, Monita Rajpal, Becky Anderson, Kristie Lu Stout and Hala Gorani, who have sky got.....Skeleton faced hard nosed Kay Burley!

MEMO TO JOHN RYLEY

Re: Breaking News coverage of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto

Doesn't it work well with two main anchors handling the story.....something to think about for 2008!

Very clever, personal insults

And I think you will find Kay Burley is pretty popular on Sky News.

Agreed.

The only thing wrong with Sky News at the moment is that they have lost the 2 header chemistry.

The only other thing that still bugs me is the yellow and black Breaking News ticker. Just change it to red and white to match the normal lower third 'Breaking News' strap.

#

Or, better still, change the Red/White breaking news strap to yellow/black perhaps - so that it stands out from all the other straps.