BBC1 to revamp weekday schedule?

It's a good show for guests, they're certainly getting the big names into that studio.

There aren't really the outlets for interviews on 'prime time' TV these days - there's no Wogan or Des o Connor any more, it's either edgy late night offerings like Ross of Norton... or The One Show.

It's the same with music - with the traditional shows gone there are very few outlets for bands to perform

Inside Out doesn't run all year round, they have a few weeks of national versions and then other current affairs programmes in that slot.

Part of the original idea behind Inside Out was to cover stories from across the country, it's lost that focus a bit but it's still a part of the programme. There's little point in The One Show going regional - it would be far better to incorporate Inside Out style stories within TOS but shown to the whole country

All very "daytime" and sterile wasn't it! Glad the format has settled on what it is today - a relaxed show with good presenters and (generally) interesting reports. And just on the subject of presenters I think it was great that Christine, who with all respect was largely an unknown to most, got the gig for a primetime BBC One show. It just shows that we don't always need to rely on the same pool of talent.

I guess the temporary extension is to see whether they can actually hold onto the audience for the full hour.

I think the show does cover the UK pretty well - both in terms of the stories covered and the teams making them. The actual inserts are made by BBC teams in Bristol, Manchester, Cardiff, Belfast and Glasgow, as well as London. There are also independents producing inserts for the show from across the UK as well (none of the independents are based in London)

It may not shout about it - and put a place name in every link, or start every piece to camera with a hackneyed "I'm here in xxx" - but the show is pretty pan-UK in the way it is produced, and the items it covers.

It certainly covers more of the UK than the Birmingham pilot shows did - though probably in a less shouty way than then (where there were UK maps a go go)

Yeah, it does better than most programmes, but it does seem to be getting a more London based reports now. Not ones about London itself but filmed in or around London. Maybe it's because the reporters are required to appear in the studio after them

Seeing that intro from the pilot series there did seem to be a bit more variety, I don't think it's just because they were being more blatent about it but I think they'd find it hard to use a similar map treatment nowadays.

I always thought Inside Out was there as a replacement for the old Thursday night Regional programmes that were shown on BBC Two, we used to have Close Up North, now we have Inside Out, which are pretty much similar in style.

The main difference between the old shows and the new shows is that the old documentary format was single-issue. You got a 29'00" show covering one story in depth, usually in documentary style, and each region branded the show differently. Inside Out has a presenter-led 3 x story format in most (all?) regions - so you get 3 films and presenter links in between, with one of the films often presented by the main presenter. It is also branded the same across the UK. (This was tried on a "things to do" series that ran before Inside Out called "Out and About" I think)

I don't think that is the reason - most of the films are shot weeks or months before they are broadcast - some recently were obviously shot last summer (nice blue skys, fluffy clouds and everyone in t-shirts!)



Yep - I think the map treatment makes you a slave to creating a running order where you cover the whole of the country every day - whereas you want contrasting and interesting stories each day that work with the guest and keep the show surprising. That might mean two stories from the South East one day, but then two from the North West the next.