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Nelson Mandela


Gardian
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Good report on Fox news channel about the man who was "signing" for the deaf at Mandela's memorial service, seemed he'd acted out this scenario before, and although nothing to do with the "signing"  had been arrested several times. The storey obviously asked questions about South Africa's security arrangements as this guy had been standing next to several world leaders. Lot's of questions to be answered I think as it seems that already reports and papers involved in the mans history have disappeared.

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[quote user="NickP"]

Good report on Fox news channel about the man who was "signing" for the deaf at Mandela's memorial service, seemed he'd acted out this scenario before, and although nothing to do with the "signing"  had been arrested several times. The storey obviously asked questions about South Africa's security arrangements as this guy had been standing next to several world leaders. Lot's of questions to be answered I think as it seems that already reports and papers involved in the mans history have disappeared.

[/quote]

I imagine it will not be long before he turns out to have disappeared as well

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[quote user="Russethouse"]So as you say we had extended news coverage and lots of other coverage of which we had warning...that isn't what happened on Dec 5 th....programmes were just stopped with no idea for the viewer whether we would go back to normal programming or not.....which proved to be the case.[/quote]

errr....what do you mean "we had warning?" No, we didn't. Have a look at the Digital Spy forum for the day in question. The programme schedules were changing and being disrupted by the minute. It wasn't as if anyone knew either Thatcher or Mandela were going to die and the programme schedules could be announced!! I didn't say anywhere that we had warning, I'm telling you what happened in April. We know now, of course, because we can look back and check, but on the day we were subjected to just as much (if not more) continuous, unscheduled coverage of events. Your comment was that you couldn't recall there being any disruption, when in fact BBC1's only scheduled programmes to go out as normal on that day, more or less, were "Pointless" (quite apt) and Eastenders...And possibly The One Show, which no doubt comprised an hour-long eulogy by Gyles Brandreth...[6]

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IIRC ( I happen to have had the TV on) we were told at the end of the first extended news that they would be back at x and x etc. ..that didn't happen on the 5 th, the viewer was just left to assume. The time for other programmes came and went with never a mention...... Nor were programmes shifted to BBC 2 as has sometimes happened in the past.

Are you really saying that you think it's a good use of license payers money to send all these staff to SA when other commercial broadcasters didn't see the necessity ? Does it really need 'George', David Dimbleby and John Simpson to pronounce on it.....I suppose if anything had happened in Britain we'd have been left to Huw's tender mercies .....

Apart from anything else what is the point of having a rolling news channel if the moment anything happens BBC 1 is devoted to the same stuff? Is that still valid with Freeview so easily available ?

Please don't complain if a senior Royal dies and we have blanket coverage...you never know they might broadcast QT from the Guildhall in Windsor :-) or for a real touch of reality, Slough ;-)
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Perhaps coverage of Thatcher, whatever your view, was more appropriate as she was a British PM. Mandela had no direct influence and perhaps no indirect influence on the UK so effectively just another leader of a country.

A total and utter jolly and feeling of self importance for the BBC staff - still, the BBC will just show a few more repeats to save the expense of new programmes to pay for the beano.
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Trust me, RH, I won't complain if a senior royal dies. We had it with the QM, and Question Time's already been to Slough. Anyway, with a following wind, and if they can hang on through 2014, I won't be here for it to bother me. And, to be honest, the worst disruption ever caused in this area during the time I've lived here was the State Visit of Sarkozy. Seriously.

It's "Alagiah", BTW, former BBC Southern Africa correspondent, and Africa specialist. And no, of course, I think the BBC should have had one bloke on a bicycle covering the whole thing.

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Oh yes, I know George's second name...but they so often say, ."it's over to George" or "we"ll be coming back to "George"

As reporters go I was was interested in John Simpsons report yesterday. I used to like Fergal Keane (sp) too.

It will be interesting to see what happens in SA in the next year or so.

As for the BBC my feeling is they need a policy review about handling these events and using the channels they have more wisely when there are "major" news stories.

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I don’t think this is just about Mandela or Thatcher. The BBC have a track record for going completely overboard. on big stories; they did something very similar with the tornado in the Philippines. The result is that news which is initially interesting becomes repititious and boring and leads to the sort of stupidity where someone on the BBC (Evan Davies ?) suggesting that Mandela was a saint.

I suppose that none of this would matter if nothing else was happening, but I was not the only one on this forum who woke up that morning wanting to know how people on the east coast of England had fared in the light of the very bad weather overnight.

For a long time now I have been concerned that I know less about the regions of the UK than I do about the USA. One can look up the regions on the BBC website, but there is little more than a catalogue of murders and road accidents, there is little information about what things are important beyond unemployment and house prices. They also fall into the trap of sending reporters out unnecessarily. When there had been a spate of walk outs at our local prison I remember seeing a reporter in driving wind and rain standing outside its gates in the dark. There are no street lights there so the space around him was completely black and his presence added nothing to the story.

I think the BBC needs to have a complete overhaul of its whole approach to news.

Hoddy
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For me the question is, why does the BBC have to saturate it's main channel and disrupt normal programs with these stories, I thought the 24hr news channel could do that adequately. Obviously they didn't spend enough money moving the news channel to Manchester. Plus the perks for Mr Pompous Bumblebee are not as great as a trip to SA.
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What I find interesting is that the BBC can spend so much money on this yet they still have not completed the Savile enquiry and that the bits they have done ignore evidence.  Now we are up to 32 hospitals being investigated where Savile had full access to children and alleged abuse took place. I think we (the public in general), and the BBC, should pay more attention to the living (Saviles victims) than that of a dead man. Mind you this thread has about as many posts as BBC staff attending SA for the funeral.
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Yes Hoddy, I wanted to see the news about the storms and the reaction to the autumn statement...I have two children in their thirties, so that and it's consequences, matter to me.

Of course the BBC cover these things comprehensively but perhaps they should think of doing it on a slimmer budget and utilising the other channels they have.....

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