"Fair and balanced." -- FOX News

TV Well, that's it. I can't stand this any longer. Could we leave the current BBC as it is please, at least for now? If John 'usually lucid' Humphreys isn't calling for the closure of BBC Four despite it being the one place on television which broadcasts something worth watching for up to ten hours a day, it's the ironically named BBC Vision wanting News 24 to shut up shop too because:

"There are many providers of 24-hour rolling news in the market place, why do we need the BBC to do it? Why are we doing something that Sky is doing already?"

Which sounds like the kind of bizarre comment only someone who doesn't watch much television could make -- both may be rolling news stations but they're certainly not doing the same thing. It's like saying that that BBC One should be shut down because it's also a general entertainment channel like ITV!

Apart from the two services being journalistically dissimilar -- Sky News will in general report anything that looks like a breaking news story whereas the BBC will get confirmation from sources first and if not will preface with something saying that they can't confirm anything yet -- News 24 also carries a range of news analysis programmes such as Dateline London and magazine shows such as Click which certainly aren't reproduced anywhere else simply because market forces wouldn't allow it.

In addition, there's the rumour that rules related to television channels impartiality being modified to allow them a left/centre/right wing bias which would certainly effect Sky who would almost certainly shift one way or another, Fox News-style, as a way of garnering new viewers. If BBC News 24 were to go that would mean there wouldn't be a rolling news channel available, based in the UK, and showing on Freeview for that matter, that didn't show some kind of political allegiance which would certainly be a disaster for choice.