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The new Five News with…
Is fine. The thing that gave it most character, ironically, was not Natasha Kaplinsky but the promo for its long-running Your News segment, which was more impressive than the thin segment that actually aired. The style is a familiar mix of glossy professionalism up top, and poppy amateurism down bulletin. Will viewers abandon Emmerdale or…
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John Simpson: wrong and right about TV news
From John Simpson: All the signs are that British people are simply becoming less interested in the world around them. Once upon a time, we used to think that this kind of isolationism was something particularly American, like high levels of crime, the possession of guns and wide-scale drug addiction. Americans weren’t interested much in…
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The Campbell diaries
I’ve never been run over by a pedestrian, but Alastair Campbell did the next best thing striding down the narrow atrium walk towards the studios of Channel 4 News. He was about to berate Jon Snow. Personally, I think he made Tony Blair a lousy press secretary, but a very good counsellor. I don’t know…
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BBC World News Today
I have a piece at the Guardian today reviewing the Beeb’s revamp of its international newscast, The World – now World News Today (World News Tonight already belonging to ABC). Basically, the UK scheduling puts this up against Britain’s equivalent of NewsHour, and that’s got people asking why the BBC is duplicating something already offered…