Introduction
Above: Richard Baker (1954) delivering the first BBC news broadcast. The first British Radio News broadcast was delivered by the BBC in 1922. (BBC.co.uk, 2013) (For your own personal reading and for more detail on the BBC, please follow the link and look at the BBC Time Line:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/historyofthebbc//, 2013 and
http://www.infoplease.com/ipea/A0151956.html, 2013)
The first BBC news broadcast was delivered in 1954. It was a 20 minute broadcast, and was introduced as an ‘illustrated summary of the news’. (news.bbc.co.uk, 2013) The bulletin was heavily constructed, and the news items were often several days old. This is obviously a far cry from the news audiences now experience and the news cycle’s speed had to adapt to the modern audience’s vast paced lives and demands. (The adaptation of the news cycle to match everyday lives is called the Feiler Faster Thesis and this theory was first referred to in March 2000.) The news is now also delivered in real time, it is of course, as with all media items, quite heavily constructed, but there is a sense of immediacy and immediate relevance to it. You can read more about the BBC News by following the link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/aboutbbcnews/ (2013) The first radio broadcast in the USA was delivered on 31st August 1920, by The Detroit News. (wired.com 2013) However, in the United States the News Broadcast entered American homes more regularly in the 1940s, but America’s first TV station went live in 1928. (wired.com, 2013) In February 1948, the NBC Television Newsreel was launched, which was simply a film with voiceover and narration. News items were between 10 – 15 minutes long. In the mid- 1950s weekly news shows by Edward R. Murrow was seen as the most important and influential work done regarding news broadcasts. The 1955 show See It Now had live reports from journalists on the East and West Coast of the USA. The programme focused on controversial issues, and the one that it will be remembered for most is A Report on Senator Joseph McCarthy. This report in the end contributed to the eventual downfall of the senator. (http://www.museum.tv, 2013) There was soon a need for News Broadcasts to become longer and more detailed. It moved from a 10 – 15 minute programme to a 30 minute slot, which allowed for more detailed reporting on news items and a wider range of items to be covered. These changes were seen in the late 1950s and 1960s. The shape of the news started to change too, as mentioned in the above section looking at See it Now, programmes could be anchored by a news anchor, and live transmissions could be made from various parts of the country. (http://www.museum.tv, 2013) In 1953 ABC Evening News started to air and in 1978 the ABC Evening News was succeeded by ABC World News Tonight. There was a clear shift from just reporting locally or within one country to a more global approach, with 3 news anchors and reporters reporting back to the studio on a range of event. It is clear from looking at the history of the news room that it has seen many changes in its approach, and above all, it has seen many changes in the approaches to the news. (nyu.edu, 2013) What is interesting to look at is the way in which reporting is tackled. At first we can see it was heavily constructed, and a restricted process due to the limitations technology presents. Information had to be filmed, and brought back to the studio for editing and vetting. However, as the technological methods of filming and broadcasting evolved, the more natural the news room could present and deliver the news as it happens. It is interesting to know that if news is fed live to for example the Sky Studios, it takes 2 seconds for the normal transmission to reach our screens and 3 seconds if you are watching in high definition. (Sky.com, 2013) This is a clear example of how fast the news cycle is becoming, and that news is delivered in almost real time. However, in the studio, the shape of the news is very different too. The studio is used as an anchor base to which the all the news reporters / journalists feed the information and reports back to. The News Anchors read some of the news, but also act as facilitators and ‘interpreters’ of the events as it unfolds. We therefore now have some scripted elements and the rest comprises of a blend of live and edited reports. A range of platforms and mediums are also used to engage the news audience. However, the first step towards what we now know as 24 Hour News was the development of satellite links. This development opened up a range of possibilities for the news room to report more accurately and in real time to its audiences.