Eyeballs

The Newsnight team have invested a lot in promoting the 7pm Friday slot, including a three minute sizzle reel at the end of last night's show.  But phrases like "Prime time" and "Peak time" are dangerous hostages to fortune, and people will be chasing the overnight figures for a quick judgement. 

Channel 4 News has been the Royal Television Society's news programme of the year for the past three years.  Yet it's coy about viewing figures.  In the networks annual report, it talks about "an 8% linear growth in 2025", without hinting at a baseline.   The same report baffles this reader with very big numbers for social media, without giving real confidence that the figures are better or worse than other similar size operations - make sense of this, if you can...  

"In 2025, annual digital views reached 2.1 billion, up 12% year on year, supported by a global following of 16 million across platforms. 

"Social platforms delivered over 700,000 UK views a day from 13-34-year-olds, alongside 3 million TikTok followers and 6 million on Meta. Original vodcasts averaged 100,000 views, with TrumpWorld topping Spotify’s UK podcast charts. 

"Channel 4 News is powered by an always-on, fully integrated digital newsroom, designed to reach younger audiences on the platforms they use most, while remaining fully Ofcomcompliant. The result is nearly 900 million minutes watched annually. 

"New editorial products – including FourNow, FourSight, and Substack – deepened engagement with loyal audiences, while YouTube continued to scale, attracting 4 million subscribers and averaging 20 million monthly views."

Newsnight is already in similar digital lime-washing; expect more soon.

Linear readings

Digital triumphs aside, Mr Jackson, BBC1's coverage of this year's Last Night of the Proms drew in 2.2m (25.2% share), peaking with 2.8m. That's down on 2025's 2.9m (28.7%) and 3.5m peak. 

BBC2's coverage of the first half of the concert averaged 930k viewers (10.2%). That's a tad down on 2025's 1m (9.7%)

Alice off

BBC Corporate Affairs supremo Alice Macandrew is leaving, almost exactly on her four-year anniversary in post, with no news on her destination.  

Alice, 54 (Mary Erskine School and MA History at Cambridge University, probably Downing College) is a member of the PR Hall of Fame. She had spells at Broadcast magazine, the FT Newsletter and Euromoney, before partnering at Finsbury PR. There she worked with James Murdoch, and eventually joined Newscorp. She departed in the aftermath of phone-hacking charges (Nick Davies said she had a half-hour shouting match with Rebekah Brooks), to re-emerge at Sky in 2012. Three years on, and she moved to Thomas Cook, only to leave after an 'horrific' time as the company failed.  She came to the BBC from Primark. 

Soon after joining, she was a player in the resolution of Gary Lineker's suspension for social media activities. She's tried to smooth paths to the UK Jewish and Palestinian-supporting communities. 

In a Thomas Cook house mag of 2018 she shared a 'fun fact': "I am 100% Celt - 50% Scottish 50% Irish, no English blood in me, but I don't sound it until I drink. The more gin I drink, the more Scottish I become."

America for the Americans

All those in BBC News facing an unwonted exit might brighten at the job ad for a Supervising Editor, Digital - Breaking News and Live, based in either Washington or Los Angeles. 

But wait: "This is a local hire position and eligible candidates must be able to live and work in the US (US citizenship, Green Card or work authorisation). Previous applicants need not apply."

"At least 10 years experience in a daily digital news operation, with significant news editing experience and an in-depth knowledge of US and Canadian affairs"

"PROPOSED SALARY RANGE: $140,000 – $160,000" 

Size matters

Might one be mildly surprised that the BBC has suddenly found enough space in its yet-to-be-occupied Tea Factory in Digbeth for Birmingham City University to lease space to run courses in media, journalism, content creation, production and broadcast technology ?

The design was set with planning permission granted in March 2023, way after Covid. Occupancy was then expected in 2026.  In December 2023, opening date was moved to 2027.  Now this:

"Subject to final planning and landlord’s approvals, BCU will lease space within the Tea Factory and create state-of-the-art training facilities built to BBC specifications. These will include sector leading hi-tech studios, workshops, teaching rooms and breakout areas."

Is there something genetic in the ambition of the BBC's Nations & Regions, to build too big ?  Large areas of Pacific Quay are empty; the Cardiff bus station-site for BBC Wales/Cymru is less penetrable. The BBC in Northern Ireland has had its transformation ambitions curtailed to a refurb, with the recent announcement of a studio/event space in the new Belfast Stories development, to come on stream in 2030.

Trend ?

All Perspectives, sole tv product GB News,  reached 3,275,000 viewers in August, according to BARB. That's down from 3,597,000 in July,  and down from 3,979,000 in August 2025. 

TV News

The modern BBC is ... relentless.  Do we really need another 'big' Saturday night quiz show ?

This is what's coming our way. The Spanish picked up the format, marketed by BBC Studios, a year ago, and have recorded but not shown a full series.  "The Wisdom Of The Crowd", was renamed 'Los 200: Uno contra la masa'.  The host is Carlos Sobera, actor, producer, presenter and former law lecturer. 

The show is for Telecinco, deemed by most Spanish critics to be struggling in third place in the country's channel rankings. 

The BBC have gone with John Bishop. 

Meanwhile furrows are being ploughed ever deeper at BBC News Online. Try, if you dare, the searing insights of "Why I'm doing a September reset and how you can create a new routine", or the focused reportage of "Some dentists say more young people are grinding their teeth - are you one of them?"  Modern 'health' journalism at the BBC. 

Manhunt

I suppose most newsrooms in the UK, except perhaps BBC Verify, are using OSINT to identify where Harry and Meghan are staying, from their latest Instagram post. Or perhaps it didn't occur to Harry, a Sandurst-trained Captain in the Army, that he might be giving away his position.... 

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A post shared by Meghan, Duchess of Sussex (@meghan)

News will eat itself

Next Friday's Newsnight has been allotted 7.00-7.28pm on BBC2.  Six UK channels will be offering 'news' at the same time - ITV, C4, BBC Scotland, BBC Alba and BBC2. Oh, and The World Today with Maryam Moshiri on BBC News.

The 10.30 slot it has vacated on BBC2 is straddled by The Devil’s Confession: The Lost Eichmann Tapes, part one of a two part documentary made by Sipur Studios, an Israeli production company. Sipur means story in Hebrew. 

Why now, Emma ?

Is there a link between Emma Barnett's 14 minute interview with Opposition Leader Kemi Badenoch on Thursday morning, and the strong rumour that the interrogator is about the leave the Today programme after two years ?

The interview became unduly and unnecessarily unheated - a sort of prizefight and test of will when the immediate political climate demanded more of a canter round low obstacles. Waiting alongside Emma, her co-presenter Nick Robinson, with thirty years of experience as a political correspondent and interviewer, rather heavy handedly claimed he had the "Interview of the Day", with Gruffalo author Julia Donaldson.

Three weeks ago, Emma revealed that she'd been largely off-air since June, recuperating from a five-hour operation which included a hysterectomy and gall-bladder removal. She returned to the Today studio just in time to co-present with Amol Rajan for his last programme. She may, too, have decided that there are easier ways to earn £300k a year without requiring 4.30am alarm calls.