The poll title speaks for itself - do you think the national evening news programmes have been "dumbed down"?

Don't know - don't watch any of them.

Don't watch - get all the news on-line......

My telly sits very quietly in the corner most of the time. I only have it on if there's something I really want to watch on. I get most news online or via newspaper.

I wanted to become a more informed person so I've tried to listen to them but all I hear is "Latest figures show that the government has done this thing that sounds vaguely intresting until you hear the rest which is really boring and a member of the opposition has commented on this but what he said was predictable and boring but implied it could really affect your life but it should be alright unless everyone goes mad and agress with him" etc

I think they are - and much more subjective too.

I don't like the banners telling you the news they're talking about but in simpler terms; and I don't like when, instead of getting on with the next story, they ask ordinary people in the street their opinion on the current story. If I wanted to know people's views on the news, I would ask them - right now I'd just like to hear the rest of the news, thanks. Oh, and I don't like the fact that Andrew Marr left as political editor, but that's just me.

Yep that's what I mean about them being subjective. Rather than reporting, for example, the fact that "the courts are debating whether or not to deport a man convicted of murder", they discuss "whether this man should be allowed to stay in the same country of the family of the woman he murdered brutally and viciously" and then have ten ordinary people saying "send him back, we don't want murderers in England!" and "why should the poor family have to live with him here". I won't point out the logical fallacies in the arguments, as that was just one example, which could easily have been twisted the other way.

If I watch the news, I'll tend to go for the BBC or Sky.

And there's nothing wrong with a bit of Sky Sports News from time to time!

May be my perception, but ITV/C4 news doesn't seem to be as well put together as the BBC or Sky, though it remains to be seen what'll happen at the BBC with the uncertainty there at the moment...

I don't watch the news that much - only if I'm eating breakfast in the kitchen for some strange reason. And then it bugs me, at least the BBC, because of the way they report it (or not). Give me a paper any day!

Can't comment on tv programmes, we don't have a telly.

However, I love both the Today programme and PM at 5pm on Radio 4, listen to them most days.

I hate the way they presume we can't take in the news without having some sort of visual aid in the background.

I'm perfectly capable of processing what 50% of something is without someone pointing to a giant computerised pie chart

I think thay have been dumbed down. I hate the flashy way they have 2 presenters who talk to each other. They should have a newsreader. Just one. That would save the BBC some money
Get rid of the background noises and music.
Get rid of the speculation and just give the facts.
That's it
Bev.

[quote name='ad_libitum' date='Oct 20 2007, 09:34 PM' post='614932']
I hate the way they presume we can't take in the news without having some sort of visual aid in the background.


That's what's so good about radio, well Radio 4, anyway. You don't get the visuals, you have to use a bit of brain.


Edit: When I try to do a quote, why don't I get a nice box like everyone else? What am I doing wrong?

You're deleting the box with /quote in it. You need to keep that in.

Yes- I miss AM too, and I feel the same about getting other people's views - (the so-called experts are sometimes bad enough, let alone the bloke in the street !) it wouldn't just be padding, would it ?

I used to watch the news almost every evening - I don't bother now, I get news online at various times.

I used to watch the news but it often doesn't seem like news any more. It seems to be more commentary and opinions, and often uninformed opinion at that from "the man in the street". Nothing wrong with that in itself, except that it would be more suited to "Points of View" rather than a so-called "news" programme. I hadn't watched the news for a long time, and when I saw it again for the first time recently (BBC), I was struck by the different style of presentation. Instead of telling us the news "straight", the presenters seemed to be trying to be chatty and conversational about it, putting unnecessary expression into what they were saying, presumably for so-called "dramatic effect". Hey ho, looks like it will be another long time before I watch it again....

I must admit i only watch the news for 10 mins in the morning while the kids are having breakfast. Most news I get from websites - national and international, and forums.

The good thing about international sites is that you hear the 'other side' to stories and learn about more important things than the price of peas in Tesco.

Like most people I get terribly frustrated at the way news is reported, with so many questions left unanswered, and also the actual items themselves. Particularly with Sky news, when they sometimes spend ages reporting on some news item in the USA that can't possibly be interesting to europeans.

I find the BBC very biased and was disgusted after the Tsunami when they didn't report on the huge and immediate relief effort by the USA, giving the impression that the americans weren't helping - no doubt appreciated by the EU commission who reacted to the disaster by immediately setting up committees to assess the feasability of forming working groups to coordinate damage assessment surveys!

I haven't seen Question Time or Panorama for years, but I remember that the brilliant Robin Day almost never let a politician get away with waffle and hot air. In these days of spin and political correctness, I doubt that the presenter is nearly as strict!

Steve