As the battle to decide which is the greatest news programme of them all hots up, ITV is upping the stakes by banishing the ad break from its relaunched 10pm news programme. Having lost the ‘opening night’ ratings war to the BBC it appears ITV execs are fighting back. While they claim it is a commercial decision – and an expensive one at that - it does seem to be a bit of a coincidence that they choose to announce this the day after the programme relaunches – surely it would make sense to have launched it in ad free format.
Both programmes have been accused of being ‘light’ on news for their head-to-head debut but that’s perhaps a bit cynical. We have to remember that with 24 hour news on the net and tv, these flagship programmes are as much about entertainment as they are about delivering anything substantially new. That having been said, they do offer an opportunity to move their journalism from soundbites to background and insight pieces offering more or a wrap-up of news events and analysis. Hopefully this is the direction they’ll take, using their access to interview ‘exclusives’, technical capabilities (ITV’s live link from under a glacier was impressive even if not cutting edge news), graphics capabilities to enhance coverage rather than substitute for substance.
Read all about it:
First night defeat HERE
News hasn't moved on HERE
Clash of the ten o'clock titans HERE
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