ITV News

From Media Week
Is ITV’s back against the wall?
ITV uses giant £1m video wall in a bid to attract viewers to news at 10.30pm


Unfortunately some of the text is rather mangled (as often seems to be the case since Media Week relaunched their site) but it's interesting nonetheless.

Like some other commentators, this guy has misunderstood David Mannion's comments about the News Channel moving away from rolling news to doing more breaking news and live stuff, thinking they applied to the ITV1 News.

Who was presenting between 1 and 3 on the news channel?

I don't know (wasn't in) but i'd hazard a guess at Chris Rogers, Nicholas Owen and Steve Scott.

I wonder if the NC will use the same surplus as yesterday in terms of the fact that they used only 2 presenters from 3-10.30 I believe.

Well at least they managed to clear the main set in time for Leyla at 7pm.

DTT says Chris Rogers from 8

It would be much better if Chris and Leyla co-presented 7-9 at least

Yes but that would mean they would be on for 2.5hrs rather than the 1/1.5 hours each they're getting paid for.
But there really is no need for such a mess even though news channels are designed for people to dip in and out in one single hour.

Well I still find it hard to believe that the new-look News Channel schedule/presenter lineup is in its final post-relaunch state yet.

I think it's fairly likely that Katie Derham will feature somewhere on the channel, and I wonder if Mark and Mary will present on the channel again? Apart from John Suchet's one hour a week, Nick Owen is the only ITV1 news presenter to have a regular slot on the NC.

The 4pm-5pm slot often used to be presented by Mark, Mary or Katie, and as one of the NC's selling points is/was that it features the main ITV1 team, I would have thought ITN would be keen to get them to do at least a semi-regular slot on the channel.

Also, when there were press reports a few weeks ago of Alastair Stewart and Angela Rippon joining the channel, an ITV News spokeman was quoted as saying that more big signings would be announced soon. Apart from Alastair - whose arrival was known some time ago - and Lucy, there's no-one else new on the NC, so I presume there are more changes to come.

Edit - found it

Whatever new signings the NC makes, i do hope they are publicised on ITV1 at least, along with the various features the NC carries, such as the Media Review, The Shopping Segment etc, etc.
The channel has potential and can outgrow it's poor relation status if treated with the same attention as the ITV1 bulletins.

They replied to an e-mail I sent them weeks ago saying that although they have ambitious plans, the emphasis remains on keeping the channel cost effective.

If they can clear the studio in time for 7pm, then I don't see why they can't have a double-header between 7 and 9.30.

What I'd really like to see is a bit of discipline - ie only taking the studio out of use for 30mins prior to the ITV1 programmes. Then Alastair Stewart could do his show until 12, and there could be decent double-headers from 4-6 and 7-10. Instead of CSO bulletins at 12, 6 and 10, they could run half-hour feature/specialist programmes - not just fillers, but actually something to set the channel apart. How about a sports news programme from the CSO at 6pm - it would be the only 30-min sports bulletin in a peak slot on any of the news channels. And maybe a discussion programme/business round-up at 10pm?

I know it would probably be a tall order, but then again the News Channel will never do well if it's always effectively treated as the poor relation to the ITV1 news. If ITV treat the news channel as sufficiently unimportant to be kicked out of the studio whenever the ITV1 guys need to practice/faff around, then I don't see why viewers should take it any more seriously.

What is going on with the ITV websites. The Border website won't open, and when I could get it to open it has had the same news stories since Feb 3rd!!!

It struck me today that ITV News still does have a pretty big team of correspondents and reporters, but yet only a few of them make it on to the ITV1 bulletins each day.

Whereas you get the impression that Sky News work their correspondents quite hard and get their money's worth from them, I don't think the strength of ITV News's correspondents and journalists shows through on screen.

It would be nice to see some of the specialists and foreign correspondents have regular feature slots on the news channel.

For example, Juliet Bremner could do a weekly roundup of European stories, Lawrence McGinty could chat through the science stories, Neil Connery could do an update from Johannesburg, Tim Ewart could do a sports feature, etc etc.

How about a roundup of the week in Westminster with Nick Robinson or one of the Millbank team?

ITV News has a huge resource of journalistic talent, and comparatively little of their work can be seen on the three main daily ITV1 programmes.

It would be nice to see more of the established team on the News Channel, which presumably wouldn't cost too much for them to do, with the will and a bit of imagination.

Chris Rogers seems to be in the CSO already from 9

I ditto what James said in the above post.

The NC has potential but as long as it keeps sticking presenters in broom cupboards at important times of the day, it will not build substantially on it's audience. It has some of the best presenters and reporters around and their talent should be taken advantage of, so to speak.