Re: [Swprograms] OT: Fox News competes for international viewers

[Mike Barraclough <softbulletin1@xxxxxxxxx>]

I must admit, particularly since I got broadband, I am
tending to use the internet more for news together
with The Times I take as a daily paper. For television
news I tend to watch Channel 4 News 7 p.m. nightly. So
bearing in mind I am not that keen on the 24 hours
news channel format:

By the BBC I take it you mean BBC News 24. I find them
dull, they actually redesigned their presentation last
year to look more like Sky's. Too often they just fill
in time with studio "experts" giving you their
opinion, whereas I prefer to from my own, or going
over to on the spot reporters to find out what is
happening which is usually nothing. Indeed there is a
regular column in Private Eye now where readers
contribute the worst examples of this. 

Sky News is a real mixture, they tend to concentrate
on a smaller number of stories and if there are three
sensationalist domestic stories those are the ones
they cover. They don't have the BBC's budget so tend
more to repeat the same reports during the day.
However if there is a serious domestic or
international story at the top of the news agenda or a
news story breaking their coverage is on a par with or
soemtimes better than the BBC, the day Baghdad fell I
watched Sky News as they had a reporter, whose name
escapes me, on the ground interviewing residents and
troops whereas the BBC had distant camera shots and a
pompous glamour boy reporter with a book deal. Sky
News has quite a few experienced staff who previously
worked for Independent Television News whom they hired
on large salaries when they started the channel. I
don't detect any particular political bias on Sky
News, their political editor Adam Boulton is well
respected and during Hutton they had Rod Liddle on as
a commentator. On the other hand they have a daily
poll running making money from viewers ringing up
premium lines to vote. As someone with a statistics
degree these polls irritate me as they prove
absolutely nothing.

We also have the ITV News channel over here as well as
CNN Europe, all these are on my basic cable package. I
am not a great fan of the 24 hour news channel format
as they end up just filling time with talking heads or
going over to on the spot reporters who report that
nothing is happening. Thats partly why, despite my
suspicions of Murdoch, I sometimes will check Sky News
as it is a tighter format. 

The Fox News US format will not work over here if they
are looking at serving more than expatriate Americans.
They already have an Ofcom judgement against them 

Fox News censured for rant at BBC

Ofcom says Murdoch station broke programme code

Matt Wells, media correspondent
Tuesday June 15, 2004
The Guardian

Fox News, the US news network owned by Rupert Murdoch,
has been found in breach of British broadcasting rules
for an on-air tirade that accused the BBC of
"frothing-at-the-mouth anti-Americanism".

Television regulators said the broadcaster failed to
show "respect for truth" in a strongly worded opinion
item, broadcast on the day the Hutton report was
published, which also accused BBC executives of giving
reporters a "right to lie". 

http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,14173,1239094,00.html?=rss

Mike

--- jfiglio1@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

> Well, trying to put the best spin on this as is
> possible, I note that 
> (at least IMHO) CNN International is a far superior
> and more 
> informative service than its domestic US version. 
> Murdoch is a pretty 
> savvy businessman.  He probably will think twice
> before trying to 
> proffer the same kind of content Fox offers to
> domestic US (and now 
> Canadian) consumers to a likely less docile and
> receptive 
> international audience.
> 
> Maybe someone on the list familiar with Sky News
> would be kind enough 
> to offer an evaluation of Sky and a comparison, for
> example, between 
> Sky and the BBC.
> 
>



		
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