Entertainment For Lively Minds
The Big British Castle News At Ten
The Big British Castle News At Ten.
I haven't had the misfortune to see the news for a couple of weeks. Now I remember why I rarely watch it. Auntie BBC seems to think that she is broadcasting to an audience with the attention span of a goldfish that has been in a skateboarding accident.
The lead report (I'm sure some of you fine people watched it) was on the good old collapsing economy. So far so predictable. What made my peepers pop and my tiny brain boggle was when Mervyn King's face appeared in the badge of a crashed car & then zoomed toward me on the screen. (This was during a particularly tortuous extended metaphor to the effect that - are you ahead of me? - the country's finances are akin to a car-wreck in need of repair.)
Appalling. Appalling idea & execution. Mervyn's disembodied face bouncing around the screen made the graphics from 'Pong' look like a PS3. Do the Beeb think we are idiots? Yes they do. Do they think we need special help to understand the news? Most certainly. But this is the News At Ten - for grown-ups. Surely between all the other channels the current-affairs phobic could be catered for. I want proper TV news for adults - is it still possible to find it anywhere?
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Don't get me started on this...
I'll get high blood pressure. I am in complete agreement with you.
You know what? One of the reasons I spend so much time on this site (apart from being a sad, lonely old git) is that I can converse with intelligent people who have genuinely interesting things to say. I honestly get a lot more from spending time here than I would do from watching some TV programme that treats me like I've been trepanned.
Excellent use of the word trepanned
You wouldn't get that on the BBC news...
Chris Morris and Armando Iannucci
have a lot to answer for. The Day Today and Brasseye were meant to be satire, not an instruction manual for literal minded news editors.
The lack of imagination and the contempt for the intelligence of the audience is quite saddening really. Still, at least BBC News isn't quite as bad as the televised Daily Star, otherwise known as ITV News. News at Ten is just fucking embarrassing: I cringe at it and can't watch any longer.
I was watching C4 news last night
and they were illustrating the economy with a badly animated picture of Alistair Darling's head in a balloon basket - I said to the FPO that it looked *exactly* like something from The Day Today
the dickension effect
regional news is even worse
up here in the north west they think pensioners kissing and sick kids is news
i don't think they would dare to venture into the inner cities to find out what a sick society we live in
Newsnight ?
Channel 4 news ? I'm not there anymore so I'm out of touch.
You are probably right about those
Before I had kids Ch4 was my news of choice - now it's just at the wrong time of day for me. Likewise Newsnight, generally I'm too tired to watch. Perhaps I should record the Ch4 news & watch it at 10 - now there's a thought...
Edit...
*Looks up at stimpy's post* Oh gawd!
Every time they talked about an inflationary pressure
they turned the flame up a bit, and deflationary pressures were sandbags hanging off the endge of the basket.
Stunningly badly animated as well...
My first ever job interview...
... after University was for BBC Production Training (Factual). After a perfectly reasonable interview, as part of the wind-down, they asked if I thought anything could improve the BBC's news presentation, and I told them I thought it was simplistic and patronising, and that it was wrong to manipulate images to suit a story (this was 1986 and still the beginning of computer graphics.)
They looked at me as if I was insane. I didn't get the job, BTW.
That's my long way of saying they've been on this path for a while, so nothing about this surprises me.
In all fairness
you are a piss poor robot from a shitty kids tv series from long time ago, no wonder you didn't get the job. Oh, and weren't you Dusty Bin?
Damn
I knew it was a mistake to take advantage of Fraser's real account name amnesty.
And Dusty Bin's my cousin - he's in Hollywood now, had plastic surgery, got a gig as a Cylon in Battlestar Galactica, but now it's finished he's been typecast and can't get any work. It's a shit business...
my cousin
was R2D2's body double. He caught rust, got lockjaw and was scrapped.
Do you run or batteries these days or solar or hybrid?
Graphics
I've mentioned this before, but it still makes me shake my head and sigh. On the BBC breakfast news, in order to illustrate a point about Britain attempting to claim a £3 billion rebate from £6 billion paid to the EU, they actually went to a viewer's house, cooked 6 sausages and took 3 away.
On the 6 o'clock news, they did a feature about rising house prices, super-imposing the reporter into a computer-generated lift that, yes, started to rise. In order to demonstrate what would happen when prices started to fall, the lift then started to go down. Another feature, on liquidity, would probably have been misunderstood by everyone, had there not been a huge graphic of a glass with water being poured into it.
My favourite was a BBC report on men visiting websites with extreme sex content; they had a seedy looking actor typing in a web address that was something like "www.illegalextremesex..." It was probably funnier than most BBC comedies.
It is only in Britain
everywhere else in the world they just show the news, tell you what's happened and get on with it. Why does Britain have to be so different?
I think British TV broadcasters generally
are pretty contemptuous of the 'audience' - as if we were a different species to them. You can see that in some of the scams they have pulled in recent years. They take a swipe at our elected officials for living in ivory towers, but they are just as bad. TV that treats you like a grown up? Can't think of a recent British example. In the US, however...
I submit
both Charlie Brooker's Newswipe (and incidentally Screenwipe) and the two Adam Curtis series on TV in recent years (I forget the titles but remember the tone and content very well).
both of these talks about news and current affairs and certainly take the audience seriously, assuming a level of intelligence that the News programmes would do well to match.
PS: I know I've mentioned them elsewhere, so this might seem a bit like harping on, but I don't care becasue I think they are pretty bloody good.
Good shout
I read Charlie Brooker when I can - never seem to catch his shows. Must try harder!
The Power Of Nightmares...
...and The Trap were the Curtis documentaries. Both very good, and in no way condescending to the viewer.
I saw the BBC news article last night. Usually I would be mildly amused with something like this, but last night I was bloody fuming because of the level of disdain shown to the viewer.
Thanks
The Power of Nightmares was in there somewhere but The Trap had evaded my memory. They were fabuluos. There was talk of the recent (kind of) installation piece he'd done going on tour. I'd love to catch that one.
I'm glad I missed it, I reckon the TV might have gone out of the window...
I'm going to have to interrupt this blog to read some emails.
For goodness sake I watch the news to get informed opinion about the hot topics of the day, not to hear the views of the some ignoramus from (insert your own town here) in some attempt to appear open and democratic.
Bottom line: I guess it saves money
And while I'm on could someone please give the person who does the News 24 ticker some spelling/ typing tests.
Standards
A codgerly comment I'm sure, but what has happened to standards at the Beeb? Are there no proof readers any longer?
This from the sports gossip column this morning:
LA Galaxy and England midfielder David Beckham was pictured drying himself down with a stars and stripes towel after a swim in Malibu. Also sporting a New York Yankees baseball cap and oversized shades, all he needs is a hot do an a Budweiser to perfect the all-American look.
Now, I'm not sure why Beckham would wish to carry a hot do around with him "an" surely he would be drinking Becks, not Budweiser?
Petty perhaps, pedantic certainly, and in this case not wildly important. But last night, reading the coverage of that all too predictable punch up at Upton Park, one poor victim was reported as being in a table condition. Had he been varnished within an inch of his life?
Piece after piece on the BBC is littered with typos. Lord Reith must be gurning in his grave...
"Are there no proof readers any longer?"
On the web, almost certainly not.
For the bulk of the web
I wouldn't expect it Fraser. But shouldn't we expect more at the BBC, given its standing in the world?
As somebody who has to proof around 15,000 of his own words every week, I know what an impossible and perilous job that is - surely the BBC realise that too and give a sub the chance to go through articles before posting?
Beeb
I wouldn't expect it anywhere where content is produced specifically for the web, to be honest. In an ideal world everything would be checked before going live, but there are too many articles, not enough subs, not enough money, and any mistakes can be fixed post-publishing anyway.
Get your news from the radio.
The World Tonight is far superior to News At Ten.
I haven't watched news at ten since I saw Stephanie Flanders doing some strange split screen conversation with herself about the economy. Now I love Stephanie Flanders, but this was too much.
Like all programme makers
The News people hate their captive audience and love the audience they've yet to entice. Because these potential viewers are seen to be (a) young and (b) not the brightest, things are dumbed down accordingly; it hasn't seemed to dawn on the News producers that this massive unreached group of of people who never watch the news will never, ever watch the news.
Precisely
who needs news when you can watch Piers Morgan interview Katie Price/Jordan/whatever? Lovely, an over-exposed twat being interviewed by, well, another overexposed twat. How lovely.
And Big Brother doesn't watch itself, does it?
Actually, this series it pretty much does, doesn't it?
man swatting flies
a couple of weeks back the local news did a report of a village having a problem with flies. they went into this guys house and interviewed him whilst he was swatting flies-it was the funniest thing i had seen in along time, whilst the reporter carried on doing the report to camera, the guy was still in the background swatting every fly he could
also, when there is a report on train or bus strikes they show a picture of a train or a bus-i know what a bloody train or a bus looks like
Going Live
It's the live links to correspondents that get me - not only patronising to the viewer but also a total waste of time and money. E.g. to find out more about David Cameron's hold on tory party discpline, let's go live to our man standing outside Conservative Paty HQ, on a Sunday night, when there won't be any staff in until the following morning! Are we supposed to think that the correspondent is close to the action and can give us the latest update - we all know that they haven't actually spoken to anyone in the building. The worst thing is that in fending off the questions from the studio the location correspondent imparts no new information whatsoever!
And when
the story actually involves the Beeb they go straight to outside broadcasting house!
The most stupid going live
was during a postal dispute they went to a reporter who was standing next to a pillar box in some suburban street. I've moaned about this one before, but it really annoyed me, moreso than standing outside an empty building late at night.
Does anyone remember 'Breaking News'?
Did it get pulled because it was hard to see the join?
Bargepole wonders
why on numerous bulletins they now have the newsreader standing or even wandering around the set - what's wrong with sitting behind a desk like they used to and just imparting the facts to us!
and on radio news shows, aren't phone ins the most irritating format - people with half arsed opinions on topics they know next to nothing about, and with too much time on their hands to boot. they invariably have bargepole's hand reaching for the off switch.
The standing/wandering thing
was designed to make newsreaders look 'accessible' and 'friendly'to the audience, because sitting at a desk was just far too intimidating. That's the thing I always think about desks: how intimidating they are. i can't look at a desk without physically doing a cack in my pants. If I'm in any way representative, it's no wonder they got them out from behind the things.
As it is, having all these newsreaders wandering around the studio just makes it looks like an Alzheimer's ward with all the confused patients lolloping around in a state of advanced confusion trying to remember who they are and what they're doing there.
Even when they find it difficult to stand they have to
The BBC's security correspondent uses a wheelchair and on some news programmes this is quite clearly visible while he is at a desk. So all credit to the BBC on this for not disguising something which is pretty everyday in the rest of life. But on other programmes, where the convention is for the correspondent to stand, because, well who knows, he stands resting on a frame. Showing that no matter what your physical condition, you must go along with the showbiz.
Agree with most of what has been said here.
Have lived out of UK for over 20 years now and only recently have got a dish and access to BBC etc.
A couple of other things that have changed in this time:
When did they start asking members of the public for their opinion, and how can this constitute news ?
Why is it necessary, at the beginning of almost every programme, to show a preview of what I am going to see in the next 30 minutes, and why is it necessary to repeat most of the preview 15 minutes later ?
And by the way, what has happened to the decent documentaries like Horizon or Panorama ?
Euro News
is a cableTV channel, it may also be on sky. It has a number of strong points, namely that it tries to be factual at all times, without any apparent bias, and also features a much wider range of news stories (since you can find out what's current in Germany, France etc).
But on the negative side it doesn't have a presenter, just a voiceover (because the same pictures can be viewed with English, German, French or Italian), who sounds like one of those earnest 1970s schools programmes. As a result, it becomes pretty tedious to watch after 10-15 minutes.
has anyone ever watched Al-Jazeera? (That's a serious question btw)
Yep
I watch Al Jazeera all the time. It can get a bit CNN-ish in terms of look and feel - and they tend to carry the same kinds of ads - but the coverage is generally pretty good (their motto is something like "the view, and the other view"), so you usually get both sides of most stories. And it does a much better job of covering World news than most UK channels. I've no idea how much the English language version differs from the Arabic version.
Words and pictures
As this is a blog frequented by people that like to read things, I am not at all surprised that television's adoption of visual aids to explain things does not quite hit the mark.
For my part, I think it is useful to have a little cartoon machine with levers on it to show me why I should care about interest rates or currency exchange rates. I need reminding because most of the time I couldn't care less.
For those who are interested...
...in why we suffer from this malaise in both broadcast and print journalism, I would like to point you in the direction of Nick Davies' excellent "Flat Earth News" as mentioned on CB's Newswipe a few months ago. If you don't want to end up feeling angry, dispirited and cheated however, steer well clear!
Birtian legacy
Apparently we have John Birt to thank for the fact that most 'news' programmes contain about 10% news and 90% 'comment' (i.e. conjecture) on the news. News and comment were strictly separated until he came along. Source: a very interesting book called 'Can we trust the BBC?' by Robin Aitken, which despite its title isn't a Daily Mail-style rant (unless it is and I have become One Of Them).
amusing ourselves to death
is a very good book about the whole thing is neil postman - written in 1985 but still very relevant
Fiona Bruce in stockings and suspenders..
A pound to a pinch of shite that you all twitched a bit at that as an idea.
Fiona. Perched on the edge of the desk. Winking a bit.
The occasional crossing of legs.
Now tell me you wouldn't watch the Six. Or at least record it for later.
I hope it doesn't happen.
But at the same time..
Trailers masquerading as news....
.....another trend I've noticed recently; as in "And you can see more on that item in Thursday's Panorama/Crimewatch/etc."
One recent example was the case of an attempt to retry a man for a rape using new evidence, after he got off on a technicality in the original trial. It may have been an interesting program, but it wasn't news - so why was it featured on the six o'clock BBC news?
And, if I may be allowed one more gripe, the item also used that most pointless of contrivances - 'the fearless TV presenter challenging the suspect in the street'. What has that ever proved, other than people get aggressive when a camera is shoved up their nose?
Jeremy Sodding Vine
Have him dragged through the streets by his heels for starters.
Titrash.
A man symptomatic of all which is wrong with BBC news at the moment.
And tie Robert Fucking Peston to him as well. Might as well do two birds with one stone.
For my sins
I once had a post on the BBC's Have Your Say rolling nutter service rejected, probably because I said that Northern Rock had Peston capering around, creaming his pants and rubbing his hands with apocalyptic glee. Robert Peston did pretty bloody well out of the recession, didn't he? His career is now firmly established as a result of his constant mewling that, I think, actually served to make things even worse than they actually were.
As I have said elsewhere, I wish Vine (a fellow Durham graduate, to my horror) would move out and be replaced by his altogether more interesting brother.
Mention of the dreadful Peston.....
....catapulted me out of my lethargy to register after years of passivity and become a "first-time caller". I recall an edition of Newsnight where Paxo with his trademark sneer demanded of a representative from the rightly-beleaguered financial community "Surely you're not suggesting Robert Peston is exaggerating his reporting in order to further his career?". As I remember the answer was "Well...Yes I am". Paxman let it go but I've always wondered whether he wasn't of the same mind.
And while I'm on: the ridiculous puffing of the BBC itself within its news broadcasts is transparent and odious. Mention already of news items (ahem) trailing documentary programmes but possibly worse is the "The BBC has discovered...." e.g. the elections in Afghanistan are subject to corrupt practices - well whodathoughtit!
Jeez and I'm a fan of the Beeb, what must its detractors feel like?
Ramprakash
Eric said "The worst thing is that in fending off the questions from the studio the location correspondent imparts no new information whatsoever!"
Well I was listening to 5Live the other day and Mark Ramprakash, speaking as the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing Expert, was asked "So how tall is Richard Dunwoody?"
His answer: "He's probably quite small given he was a jockey".
Very informative!
(In his defence, I think he knew it was a stupid question and his answer was better than "How the **** should I know?").