Newsworld subscribers and those prone to epileptic seizures may want to mark January 9th on their calendars. That’s the launch date for the on-air rebranding of Newsworld.
Preliminary critiques call the new graphics “CNN-ish,” with a wealth of bombastic transitions, spinning doohickeys, dramatic flourishes, import-signifying curlicues, pulsating gewgaws, and information-bearing whirling dervishes, enough to consistently crash our brand-new Chyron-replacing Inscriber system. Such is the price of value-added.
Just as important to those in the trenches is the absence of coordination between those who set the Jan 9th deadline, those who drew up the graphics, and those who are charged with putting the dream factory on-air. It’s not that it’s being managed badly, but rather, not managed at all.
Included is a new Newsworld set, to be built from the ground up this week and next, an incredibly short timeline. Worst-case scenarios put a single camera on a newscaster on the 9th, while jackhammers drone on in the background.
Stay tuned.
10 Comments
wow…
Happy New Year, Ouimet. And hi Aigle de Nuit… long time no see.
Don’t forget Jan. 9 is also the “relaunch” date for the local newscasts, moving back to 6 p.m. Oh, it’ll be great. No promotion, no plan, no extra resources.
Oh and for the locals in the west, it’s the same day as one of the election debates so it’ll be “hey we’re back at 6 pm — but not today.”
Happy New Year, Ouimet, I’ve very much appreciated your blog and hope you will continue to post in 2006.
Aigle:
I’m hearing and not hearing the same things as you, it seems.
Tod:
I agree – the set, as it appears in the plans, looks good. It’s the graphics that are supposed to be CNN-inspired
“Shelagh”:
I admit I was wondering what she might have written and then retracted. “Fuck you Ouimet,” perhaps?
Offended:
In my defence the line is an oblique reference to a story from a few years back and not meant to offend.
But thinking about it a little more, you are right: it was derogatory and cheap and provided me with a catchy opening at the expense of others.
I apologize.
There are brain disorders worse than epilepsy. One of them is ignorance. I am offended by your reference to epileptic seizures as though people who suffer from them are some kind of sub-standards we should laugh at. If Ouimet truly is a CBC manager she is not fit to be one. She would probably discriminate against such people. I am equally offended that none of the others who commented even mentioned this rude and discriminatory attempt to write a catchy opening.
I just want to clarify that the “Shelagh” post above was, in fact, from me accidentally. During the CBC lockout, I briefly had Shelagh Rogers’ blogger account when I set it up, and Blogger.com seems to have kept my info in a cookie somewhere. :)
Shelagh did NOT post anything on this blog. :)
We’ve been using Star Trek analogies in here (wanna bet the plants come back fast?).
Currently there is only the beginnings of the “lights of Democles”-cabling for Drop 3 has also begun.
I’m getting a lot less info than in the old days…not sure why yet.
…They’ve been warned that, given my info..overtime will happen.
Aigle-one of the “movers”
I’ve seen the artwork of the new sets (as I’m sure you have, they’re in the newsroom on the 3rd floor). I find they look much more like the BBC’s world service set than CNN. In fact, I’m rather partial to them. :)
Can’t wait! Sounds so exciting! If there is one thing any news organization needs it’s to be more like CNN, or Fox maybe, National Inquirer? World Weekly News? Where do we pick up the 3-D glasses?