Stay classy, TV newsland

I remember, distinctly, the scene, 32 years ago, in the Sky TV press office in Osterley. It was late afternoon and Sky’s five channels were due to go on air at 6pm. We kept reminding ourselves that no-one had ever launched as many TV channels at the same time (this was February 1989 - until Channel 4’s arrival in 1982 the UK only had had only three terrestrial offerings). Sky News would be the first “live” channel on Sky with in-vision presenters. Everyone was nervous. Sky’s HQ - three converted industrial units on what was still a muddy site, underneath the Heathrow flight path - was still being constructed around us, which meant that the inaugural news bulletin, presented by Penny Smith and Alastair Yates, had to be fed through an outside broadcast link in the car park connected to a facility in central London. Anything could have gone wrong. Thankfully, it didn’t.

The parallels were there this last Sunday when upstart GB News launched at 8pm with a monologue from Andrew Neil (who was Sky’s executive chairman in 1989), promising “to do news differently”. As the newcomer’s chairman, Neil - who still has the huge-shouldered, hunched gate he had when I encountered him in the Osterley boardroom - promised: “We are committed to covering the people’s agenda, not the media’s agenda.” This, as has been well documented, is GB News’s PR schtick: to draw in the anti-woke brigade and satiate their belief that the BBC and, indeed, Sky News, are now portals for left-wing liberal thinking, and give them a voice (the fact that we’ve had a right-of-centre Conservative government for over ten years, which has delivered Brexit, doesn’t seem to have sunk in amongst those breathlessly endorsing GB News in comments beneath the Mail’s various puff pieces on the channel).

Like Sky, though, the build-up to GB News launching was coloured by a media narrative similar to that we endured in the latter half of 1988 as we worked towards launch day. Being a then-Rupert Murdoch-owned channel, the tone had been somewhere between cynical and hostile, such was the proprietorial tribalism amongst the UK’s various media corporations. As a cousin of News International - home, then, to The Sun, News Of The World, Today, The Times and Sunday Times - Sky News was envisaged as “The Sun on TV”, somewhere between the tabloid’s cor-blimey popularism and a Thatcherist political bent. We were even known as “Tits at Teatime” in rival newsrooms (when Channel 4’s Drop The Dead Donkey appeared, there were eerie similarities - even the desk phones and vending machine in the fictional GlobeLink newsroom were identical, which suggested some well-placed research).

So, despite the political colour that was part of the chatter before GB News’a launch on Sunday, we should, I suppose, give it a chance. It’s opening night technical hitches (Neil’s monologue looking like it had been lit by candle, Scottish academic Neil Oliver’s microphone not working, and so on), may have given it the air of satirical pisstakes, but these were teething problems that could have happened to anyone. As Hugo Rifkind writes in The Times today, the media should give their new competitor some slack, given the rate of attrition that the journalism profession has experienced in the online age: “Any journalists resenting the expansion of their own industry probably ought to be in a different one,” he commented. 

There is a notion, in the old days of printed newspapers, that when you launch a new product - be it a brand new paper or a redesigned one - you do so with a scoop. To some extent, it’s a marketing hook to put you on the map. After a while, everyone - broadsheet or tabloid - soon levels out, covering more or less the same stories in their own particular style. It is, actually, quite a skill to write for a tabloid: trying to cram into 250 words for The Sun what you’d have more than a thousand to make use of in a broadsheet. I can speak from experience, it’s more challenging than you’d think. I’ve also worked with journalists of all creeds, and regardless of their publications’ political orientation, all work to the same objectives. It would, though be horrendously naive to think that all journalism is objective and without nuance. Which is why GB News is, to me at least, a curious experiment. Its debut-edition scoop is to declare a culture war and somewhat cynically tap into the same opposition to political correctness that has Piers Morgan railing about Harry and Meghan’s apparent snowflakery, and ends with footballers being booed for taking the knee at Wembley. There was just a little dog whistle about Neil’s opening: “We are proud to be British. The clue is in the name,” he intoned (and from someone who spends much of his time living on the Côte d'Azur…).

GB News knows full well what it’s doing (and the number of endorsements from people with “defund the BBC” in their social media profiles speaks volumes). Certainly, opening night excitement - even with the Euros on - buoyed the channel’s numbers, with 336,000 viewers tuning in to watch Neil’s opening statement, according to TV industry magazine Broadcast. Sky, by comparison, had just 46,000 viewers, but 8pm on a Sunday night was never going to be a big battleground for eyeballs amongst channels not predisposed for mass viewing. Time will tell whether GB News will genuinely prove the challenger it pretends to be. There’s no doubt that it has attracted a strong calibre of presenters to its line-up, poaching the likes of Simon McCoy from the BBC News channel and former ITN anchor Alastair Stewart to a roster of experienced journalists, including several from Sky News itself. What this says about them, politically, is a matter for debate, and the channel’s editorial content so far hasn’t shown any great surprises, with Nigel Farage and Priti Patel amongst its early interviewees.

It certainly is trying to do things differently. Television news in America, for example, is a largely homogeneous experience: drop into any TV ‘market’ (i.e. a city or large town), and you will see an identical format: a male and female anchoring partnership, a chipper sports presenter and a mildly amusing weather presenter. Yes, Anchorman. Unlike America, however, television news here does vary, thankfully, and GB News takes its place in a landscape where, say, the BBC’s 10 O’Clock News and ITV’s News At Ten do have distinct stylistic differences. Whether they have any editorial differences is a matter of personal opinion. One thing, though, is that I’ve never had any quarrel with the political orientation of any of the mainstream channels’s news output. That, I know, might inflame those who cast the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, ITV’s Robert Peston or Sky’s Beth Rigby as lefty activists - all three regularly get pelted from both sides, leading to the maxim that they must be doing something right if that is the case.

GB News has opted for something else, editorially, and subtly alternative with its look and feel. It’s breakfast show looks like ITV’s GMB but in a studio painted on a limited budget; it’s mid-morning show could be coming from the comfy sofas in the office canteen. And, two full days in, it was still suffering from sound problems - this morning, I had to have the TV volume turned up to 70 just hear anything Colin Brazier, as he sat on the couch wearing an open-necked blue shirt as if we’d caught him during his coffee break, rather than a news bulletin. I’d ask whether this consciously casual approach is what the occasional viewer actually wants, given that rolling news channels are mostly watched by people dipping in to see what’s going on in the world. 

GB News believes that it is resetting the way news is presented, arguing - not too discreetly - that existing platforms talk down to viewers. I’m not so sure that’s the case, but again, GB has found its schtick. If you believe that the BBC, ITV and Sky talk down to you, then you’ll find news presented by someone hanging out in the canteen works for you, although no one ever complained about John Craven’s jumpers on Newsround lacking gravitas (though in fairness, his demographic was somewhat different to Kenneth Kendall’s on the Nine O’Clock News).

Anchorman: staying classy in San Diego

Rolling news channels have always found their strength during times of crisis. Only saddos like me have them on constantly in the background while they work during normal times. For the most part, as the description provides, they are repetitive, especially on mundane news days. But it’s when the news hots up, and situations become dynamic, that a news operation is fully tested. Before Sky had even launched, it covered the Lockerbie disaster as part of its trial operation, making the industry sit up and notice as word got around the media village that the channel wasn’t, after all, going to be a televisual version of its print cousin. Live reporting from ‘hot’ news stories - be they wars, disasters or political eruptions - are the mark of a news broadcaster, and its reporting (and production) talent. It’s why the publicity biographies of many news anchors are such colourful affairs, proudly claiming to have been on air during moments of global notoriety. I once had to deal with the fallout of two Sky presenters having a punch-up in the Osterley corridor following an ego spat that began with both claiming to be on air at the moment Nelson Mandela walked free from Robben Island Prison. I swear to this day that someone involved in Anchorman must have heard about it, given that it escalated into a war of attrition that ended with the pair “rolling” down a corridor, not unlike Alan Bates and Oliver Reed in Women In Love (though, thankfully, fully clothed). 

GB News will want to avoid any such chicanery, as it seriously dents a channel’s reputation and detracts from the core mission of delivering news as authoritatively as possible. That is when it will truly be worth considering. For now, we can chatter about the gimmicks, the Wokewatch on-air clickbait, and controversialists like Dan Wootton or Michele Dewberry mixing it up for kicks (Sky’s early days had a confrontational debate show featuring Norman Tebbit and Labour MP Austin Mitchell), However, it is when sharp, analytic journalism is required that any news organisation comes into its own. Anyone can read wire copy of what has happened, but it’s a whole different matter being able to objectively explain why it has happened.

In its charter (no doubt, an Ofcom-mandated requirement), there is no mention of GB News’s headline-grabbing intentions. Actually, it’s a pretty standard declaration, pledging to stand for journalistic independence, a fact-based approach but also respect for opinions and freedom of expression. It’s focus is, notably, the UK (the clue is in the name, as Neil stated) and what is “good and bad – it’s about covering what is going on, not just what is going wrong.” That might be a pointed statement about pepping up our lives with feel goodery, but sadly, news doesn’t arbitrate that way. It’ll be interesting how long GB News can remain so differentiated.

The night football came home...and no one was in

"The ambient noise is hideous. The overall spectacle melancholic. Maybe I will get used to it. But I have not enjoyed the game, and not just because it is same old Arsenal." So tweeted Robert Peston, ITV's verbosity-prone political editor. Normally Pesto is to be found asking excruciatingly long questions to whichever stooge has been put up to front the daily No.10 press conference. But here, in the succinct confines of Twitter, he nailed it: my worst fears confirmed - football returned to stadia bereft of fans, noise or atmosphere.

As I watched with low expectation the lifeless spectacle that was the evening's first serving, Aston Villa against Sheffield United, I couldn't help feeling it was all just an experiment: some sort of exhibition by a chemicals company to test out a new type of ball, a new form of artificial grass or that it was an Under-17 practice match behind closed doors. It certainly didn't feel like a team trying to fight its way out of relegation (Villa) or one trying to clamber into fifth place (United). The sterility of a Villa Park shorn of all but essential personnel, and the awkward moment of managers Dean Smith and Chris Wilder not knowing whether to shake hands or elbow-bump at the start (sensibly, they opted for the latter), gave the fixture a surrealism. I've seen televised games before played in front of an empty stadium, but they've usually been European matches operating under crowd bans. This enforced absence was different, and not even the Sky Sports option of a crowd sound effect audio channel could make a difference.

Players taking a ten-second knee before kick-off, followed by a minute's silence for victims of COVID-19, provided two moments of theatre. But for the 90 minutes of play that followed, the only drama was referee Michael Oliver's smart watch proving to be not so smart, and failing to signal a goal when the Villa keeper Orjan Nyland fumbled Oliver Norwood's free kick over the line. Cruel for Sheffield United, but even more cruel for the football-starved viewer hoping for something more than an anodyne encounter to herald the return of competitive football after a three month absence in which we focused on other priorities. Not dying, mainly. If the failure of Oliver's watch was a major talking point in the otherwise so-so 0-0 draw then so, too, was the lack of intervention from VAR on what - regardless of the game itself - was supposed to be a prestige moment in this weird season. "We were waiting for somebody at Stockley Park to show a bit of courage and say they will make that decision," Wilder said afterwards, "but if they've not seen it and seven cameras haven't seen it I suppose they will say that it was not their decision to make." Fair point. For once, you could hardly say the crowd saw what the referee didn't.

If the Villa game was meant to be the warm-up act, the main event - Manchester City-Arsenal - hardly delivered the goods, either. Like the preceding fixture, there was plenty of effort but suspect quality. I know it's going to sound mean-spirited for me, a Chelsea fan, to pass comment on Arsenal, and do so objectively, but it's fair to say that the Gunners barely turned up to their opening engagement of Project Restart. David Luiz's brain didn't turn up at all. The Brazilian, always a subject of mixed opinion while in Chelsea blue, is yet to win over anyone in N1. After last night's performance, it's unlikely he will now. Coming on for the injured Mari after 24 minutes, it didn't take him long to let Kevin de Bruyne gift Raheem Sterling for City's opening goal. Worse was to come when he ridiculously brought down Mahrez to give away a penalty. The subsequent red card received from referee Anthony Taylor might well be the last red thing Luiz sees as an Arsenal player: his contract runs out later this month.

Luiz has inevitably provided the lightning rod for Arsenal fans' wrath, but at the end of the day, this was a clinical Pep Guardiola result for City over an team Mikel Arteta clearly has an uphill challenge to improve. That, though, is to look at the game through the myopia of normal football engagement. Widen the focals, and we had a match, like the 6pm kick-off, that resembled a pre-season friendly with less-than friendly intent. Across the park, fitness looked predictably suspect, and this actually underpins the arguments of indifference to the Premier League resuming. Playing before soulless, empty stadia is one thing, but if the season's remaining, contractually-obliged fixtures are in any way similar to these first toes dipped in the cold sea of revival, then even the most starved fans are going to go wanting.

Players often talk of crowds as being the "12th teammate", and the absence of supporters is clearly a factor. Sure, football can be played as a mechanical exercise, but last night's attempts at blowing puffs of breath into a dying season demonstrated just what a pointless exercise it really is. I've said before that the season's stumps should have just been pulled up, and we restart in September or whenever it's safe to do so, and my view hasn't been changed by last night's morsels of live 'elite' football. It might be back, warts and all, but elite quality - on this first evidence alone - is a long way away. Many will no doubt be relieved: we're all craving normality - holidays, going to the pub, not having to wear face masks to post a letter, and no one will disagree that 'normal' will come at a price, for the time being. I'm not, however, convinced that football so vacant of atmosphere is the normal we want.

You're on mute!

It was during yesterday's 10 Downing Street coronavirus press conference that I was suddenly restored to the corporate life I left behind a few months ago. If you've been watching these 'pressers', as they're known in the trade, you'll have seen them alter in a matter of days. At first there would be a No.10 stateroom packed with the nation's political editors (Kuenssberg, Peston, Rigby, et al) throwing questions at the prime minister, the UK's chief medical officer and its chief science officer, each standing side-by-side like The Three Amigos. Now, it's a sparse chamber, with the spokespeople du jour spaced the requisite two metres apart, fielding questions via video from journalists bunkered in their home offices and no doubt hoping that an errant child doesn't suddenly burst in.

Yesterday's update from Chancellor Rishi Sunak and deputy CMO Jennie Harries took me back to almost every corporate conference call I've ever been on: the Daily Telegraph's political correspondent commenced her question without unmuting her microphone, prompting Sunak to utter the immortal words of every virtual meeting host: "I think you're on mute." ITV's ever-languid Robert Peston went further by not fully hearing Sunak's invitation to speak, responding with "Oh shit! Er...hello...". We've all done it. Watch any amount of television now and news programming has now become a replica of corporate life. News studios are now virtually empty as anchors conduct interviews via FaceTime or Skype. No wonder those working in the TV industry are fearing for their long term futures as viewers grow used to the sight and sound of talking heads coming through laptop, tablet and smartphone cameras, just as simply as they did when sat across the studio set. Broadcasters have too much professional pride to consider this to be the future, however. TV in the HD era relies on sharp images and that can only be achieved in a studio with state-of-the-art imaging technology and participants appearing on camera properly lit and made up for the medium.

The rapid conversion to video conferencing to keep a nation in lockdown informed and entertained has, though, been interesting. Sky News even went as far the other day as running a Q&A segment on coronavirus maternity health in which all three participants - presenter Sarah-Jane Mee, who is 26 weeks pregnant, Dr. Zoe Williams and Sharon Gamon of Private Midwives - appeared from home via laptops. As crude and as sometimes unpredictable as it can be when home bandwidth wobbles, it was remarkably effective. I just know how trepidatious it must be for producers normally used to rock-solid studio connections who don't have to deal with the vagaries of network coverage.

This week, for the first time, millions of people in Britain will be trying out video conferencing for the first time. For some, it will be an amusing novelty as the family gathers virtually on a Houseparty screen or socially distanced by Zoom's 'gallery mode', which turns the session into The Brady Bunch title sequence. For those of us used to corporate meetings over Webex, Skype or Microsoft Teams, it'll be second nature. In my last company, where the HQ team was often spread over substantial distances of the San Francisco Bay Area by flexible working arrangements, it was simply the norm for some to be in the office with others in their kitchens or wherever they did their work from home.

But, whether for carrying on with work or simply having a family gathering, virtual meetings do require etiquette. The biggest bugbear I've experienced on business calls is people forgetting that they're not in the same room. Even with galleried platforms like Zoom it's important for everyone to remain in vision so that you know when a current speaker has stopped, and you can interject without crashing the latency that sometimes makes these systems cacophonous. That also requires everyone to remember that you're dealing with home broadband connections and, usually, WiFi, which can be compromised by a fellow dweller zapping a jacket potato in the microwave, or a child killing the boredom by playing Fortnite online. I have been on conference calls where reception quality for some participants has meant everyone saying "over" after they've said their piece. I'm not kidding.

There are simple rules for making video conferencing both effective and not the weird experience it might seem at first. The first is to make sure your equipment is properly set-up. With many business users now finding that their working day, which would otherwise be a mixture of formal and informal meetings and encounters, is now one conference call after another, time efficiency is vital. Nothing truncates an hour-long slot more than connections dropping or speakers cutting out because they weren't tested to begin with. This is especially important with video conferencing, so check that your camera and microphones are working properly. Next, have a planned agenda. Even if you're just 'huddling' with your team to feel the love, you're not in the coffee area hanging out. Time - especially now - is money. As nice as it will be to share experiences of your own life at home under lockdown, keep the social chit-chat to a minimum, so that you can focus, in the limited window you have available, on the priorities to update everyone on. Save the cat news for Facebook.

The other key point of etiquette is to stay in the call. Unless you're in a listen-only 'virtual town hall meeting', there should be no sneaking out to the kitchen to make a cup of tea, or even worse, to the toilet for a pee. This is especially important if you're wearing Airpods and remain connected throughout. Be reassured, I do not speak from personal experience here, but we recently saw Dale Ross, the mayor of Georgetown in Texas, briefly leave a city council meeting for a 'bathroom break' with his microphone still switched on. This doesn't just happen to Frank Drebin. That said, wherever you do your video calls, choose somewhere quiet. Even with laptop or smartphone microphones these days being highly sophisticated, unless you're in a home studio, with sound baffles and a broadcast-grade microphone, background noise will still disrupt the audio. That means not opening the window if you live under a Heathrow flightpath, as I do, or on a busy road...when roads are busier again, of course. The best way to ensure a video conference call runs smoothly is for studious use of the mute button, so that bandwidth is optimised, but as the Telegraph reporter found yesterday, you've got to stay on top of things so that when it's your turn to speak, your fellow conferencers aren't resorting to lip reading.

For the corporate world, ever conscious of social responsibility (as well as dividend-minded shareholders), the COVID-19 lockdown will be disruptive, for sure, but the absence of business travel will be exactly the sort of thing chief financial officers will lap up. Discretionary travel is normally the first casualty of financial cutbacks, and when you add CSR commitments, companies have been imposing travel bans long before the current crisis reared its ugly head. According to the Global Business Travel Association, the coronavirus is expected to impact the business travel sector by $820 billion as corporate travel is pared right back, especially in Asia where at least three out of every four companies have cancelled or suspended all or most travel to China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and other countries in the continent. Environmentalists will no doubt be rejoicing, too. I spent most of my time in my last company travelling, and I can attest that it really isn't the glamourous life it might seem. Yes, it's nice to have a meeting over lunch in Paris, but not much fun being sealed into an air-conditioned conference room in Dubai for a meeting you could have just as efficiently conducted via Zoom and without a tedious seven-hour flight and all the time zone carnage it causes. When we all return to normal, I wonder whether business travel will ever be the same again.