You can call me Al

Some US reviews of Al Jazeera America's opening day...

.....it seemed to deliver on what it promised — serious, straightforward news. The first hour had a lengthy promotional video that said, among other things, “We will connect the world to America, and Americans to the world.” Then, at 4 p.m., the news began, led by the former CNN anchor Tony Harris, who updated viewers on the unrest in Egypt and a shooting at a school in Georgia.

Brian Stelter in the New York Times

...the opening hours of Al Jazeera America had, for all its high ambitions and expensive expansion, a muted color scheme, unexciting camera work and sophomoric graphics. This may be part and parcel of a more "old-fashioned" approach — let the news be the news — and certainly there can be an over-reliance on bright and shiny graphic elements at the expense of content. But this is television, and even those of us genuinely interested in the topics don't want to spend half an hour staring at three people quoting studies [discussion on climate change in Inside Story]

 Mary McNamara in the Los Angeles Times

Despite its laudable goal of avoiding the polarizing aspects of cable news, AJA might be testing the proposition that the straight-up presentation of the news — sans some of the smoke and sizzle — can succeed in a crowded media landscape. It’s also testing whether Americans will embrace anything called Al Jazeera.

Paul Farhi in the Washington Post