The social media spat between ITV and Huw Edwards is just one manifestation of the pressure BBC news is under during a highly politicised charter renewalYou can go crazy obsessing over TV audience statistics. Has Tom Bradby’s novel News at Ten hacked a chunk out of Huw Edwards’s BBC 10 o’clock figures as the ITV competitor soars towards 2 million a night? Or is the Broadcasting House version holding firm and doing “trade as normal” – one claim from a chippy Huw tweet? ITV groans over BBC “arrogance”. Reach for a broad brush and a stiff whisky.
The retort – possibly – is that Bradby’s recent arrival has added 240000 viewers in his first few weeks,and skimmed maybe 200000 of them from Huw. But these are smallish shifts in a permanently shifting landscape (much conditioned by whats on for the hour before 10pm). It’s best to conclude merely that the Bradby makeover has made a decent start, with many missing millions yet to go and Robert Peston yet to advance. Forget instant successes or failures. Consider, and rather,what the Bradby arrival means.
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Source: theguardian.com