Sky have confirmed that their news channel is to relaunch on October 24th, in an over-sized studio with flashy screens and a spinning desk. Following on from previous practices, rumours suggest that the studio is to be referred to as Skybase, and all presenters will be required to wear coloured jump suits whilst presenting, and interacting with a computer-generated 3D world of flying news-related objects. A corner of the studio will be reserved in case of a formal declaration of war, and at such a moment the desk will spin at high speed to give the appropriate backdrop, whilst pyrotechnics around the desk give the appearance of a giant news-based catherine wheel.

Weather will be presented from the upper floors of the mammoth studio, on the basis that they will be closer to the real weather action happening above our heads. This will be facilitated by an opening roof hatch, which will double-up as a way for Kay ‘Meet the People’ Burley to dramatically board the SkyCopter when opinions are sought on a given issue. A giant tower is also to be erected on top of the studio building, from where comment can be passed on the state of traffic on all Britain’s roads.

It’s going to be great.

Last Saturday was the best-ever daily sale for The Grauny:

Last Saturday’s sales are said to have beaten the previous record, for the Saturday after September 11, 2001, by 29,000. The redesigned paper was helped by a DVD giveaway of The Madness of King George.

Having sunk to its lowest ABC circulation for 27 years this August, next week’s ABC figures for September are expected to show that the Berliner has brought an increase in sales of 60,000 a day.

That’s pretty darn impressive – to go from losing 15,000 readers a month to gaining 60,000 is no mean feat. It’s very nearly a 20% increase. But, of course, the real question is whether it can be sustained over the coming weeks and months. The Guardian have always been very open about their sales figures (even when they were in rapid decline), though, so I suspect they’ll tell us honestly whether or not it’s sustained.

It’s certainly a very promising start, even if not quite so big a relative bump as received by the Independent when they compacted themselves. It’ll be good to see how it pans out.

Ronnie Barker, one of my favourite comedians, has died aged 76. There’s full obituaries over at the BBC site, but I thought a much more fitting tribute would be to share one of my favourite Barker monologues… Pismronunciation.

“Good evening. I am the president of the Loyal Society for the Relief of Suffers from Pismronunciation, for the relief of people who can’t say their worms correctly, or who use the wrong worms entirely, so that other people cannot underhand a bird they are spraying. It’s just that you open your mouse, and the worms come turbling out in wuck a say that you dick not what you’re thugging to be, and it’s very distressing.

“I’m always looing it, and it makes one feel umbumftorcacle, especially when one is going about one’s diddly tasks. Slopping at the Sloopermarket, for instance. Only last wonk, I approached the chuckout point, and I shooed the ghoul behind the crash desk the contents of my trilly, and she said ‘All right, granddad, shout ’em out.’ Well, of course, that’s fine for the ordinary man in the stoat who has no dribble with his wolds. For someone like myself, it’s worse than a kick in the jackstrop.

“Sometimes, you get stuck on one letter, such as wubbleyou. And I said, ‘Well, I’ve got a tin of woup, a woucumber, two packets of wheese and a walliflower’. She tried to make fun of me and said, ‘That will be woo pounds, wifty-wee pence.’ So I just said ‘Wobblers!’ and walked out.

“So you see how dickyfelt it is. But help is at hand. A new society has been formed by our mumblers to help each other in times of excream ices. It is balled Pismronouncers Unanimous, and anyone can ball them up on the smellyphone any time of the day or note, twenty-four flowers a spray, seven stays a creek, and they will come ’round and get drunk with you.

“For foreigners, there will be inperpetwitters, who will all speak many sandwiches, such as Swedish, Turkish, Burkish, Jewish, Gibberish and Rubbish. Membranes will be able to attend tight stool, for heaving classes, to learn how to grope with the many complinkities of the daily loaf.

“Which brings me to the drain reason for squeaking to you tonight. The society’s first function as a body was a grand garden freight, and we hope for many more bodily functions in the future. The garden plate was held in the grounds of Blennham Paleyass, Woodstick, and the guest of horror was the great American pip singer, Manny Barrellow. The fete was opened by the bleeder of the opposition, Mister Dale Pinnock … Pillock, who gave us a few well-frozen worms in praise of the society’s jerk. He said that ‘In the creeks and stunts that lie ahead, we must do out nut roast to ensure that it sucks weeds.’ “And everyone visited the various stores and abrusements, the rudeabouts, thing boats and the dodgers, and of course, all the old favorites such as Srty your Length, guessing the weight of the cook and tinning the pale on the wonky. The occasion was great fun, and I think it can safely be said that all the men present and thoroughly good women were had all the time.

“So, please join out society. Write to me, Doctor Small Pith, The Spanner, Poke Moses, and I will send you some brieflets to browse through and a brass badge to wear in your loophole.”

Thanks to MediaGuardian for the transcript.

Ronnie will be sadly missed.

According to today’s Sunday Times, Mr Lynam has been selected as the new presenter of Countdown. I think he’s a pretty good choice – someone who will still be popular with the target audience, whilst being different enough in style to avoid the appearance of copying Mr Whiteley. I can really see him making the show his own, as Richard did.

Carol will, of course, be continuing. And the article says she’s very enthusiastic about Des as a replacement, though I think this possibly says more about the main competitor – Paul Merton – than it does about Des. Merton just would not have suited the show at all, as far as I can see.

So, all-in-all, this seems a good thing. Although, of course, no-one can ever truly replace Richard Whiteley.

If any proof were needed that the Guardian is the same as ever, Decca Aitkenhead’s profile of teenage mum Hannah White provides in the new ‘Family’ supplement. It’s a very inspiration insight, and well worth a read.

You can browse the new Guardian here for free. I have a hard copy (as I usually do), and I have to say that I really quite like it. Possibly more than Andrew Brown did. But I do miss Doonesbury…

…and it’s 12th September. The Guardian will, quite literally, never be the same again.

Nick Witchell’s got himself in the news again today (the last time was back in March), for a pretty hilarious argument he had during a rehearsal for a radio news two-way. Unfortunately for him, the mp3 of the incident has found it’s way into the metaphorical hands of the Grauniad, and then onto their website… and from there, onto this website:

In all honesty, though, I tend to sympathise with Mr Witchell in this case – the questions the presenter was rehearsing were generally pointless, as indeed was the whole two-way. And it probably eventually went better for having had the argument. Granted, it would probably have gone on even better if the presenter or the production crew actually had any idea about the story that was being reported, but perhaps that’s too much to ask nowadays.

But however much I think Nicolas was in the right, this will undoubtedly form another chink in his far from flawless armour – and his position is already looking increasingly dodgy, as the Beeb and others oust informed, connected, and mature correspondents in favour of inexperienced attractive young ‘faces’.

When it comes to presenting the news, I’ll take informed presenters like Jon Snow and Jeremy Paxman over autocue reading, lip-gloss wearing, automatons like Natasha Kaplinsky and Kay Burley any day. How can someone who doesn’t even know what’s been going on in the world ever possibly conduct a decent interview about it?

Updated 29th July 2006 to include audio file (replacing dead link)

Ian Mayes has given more tantilising details of the new format, revealing that it is once again ahead of schedule, and now likely to launch in ‘the autumn’ – which, by my reckoning, is about a year ahead of schedule.

I like the Guardian’s policy of being very up-front with its readers about the difficulties it’s been facing of late:

The decision not to change to a conventional tabloid shape meant a delay that gave the paper’s rivals an advantage and that has been reflected in the circulation figures.

It takes a big paper (no pun intended) to stand up and say that yes, their circulation is falling rapidly, and yes, changes need to be made to stop this. Reading the other broadsheets, you’d think that circulation was going down quickly in every paper but the one that happens to be reporting the news.

The paper is being totally redesigned for its new format, marking a complete departure from the successful and influential David Hillman design of 1988 that was refreshed by Simon Esterson a decade later

That’s a big decision, and will probably be at first greeted (possibly even by me) exactly as the David Hillman design was – as a huge mistake. But it’s worth noticing that the Hillman design is still the most modern, fresh-looking of all the newspaper designs, and if the new Guardian can pull this off, then I will be most impressed.

It will feature throughout, in headlines and text, an entirely new typeface, unique to the Guardian.

That’s a much bigger decision that many people will realise – the backlash against The Times when it introduced the Times Millennium font as opposed to Times New Roman was such that they ended up dedicating two whole pages to explaining the differences and advantages of the new font. But I guess it fits in with the redesign of the paper as a whole – and maybe even signals a completely new masthead.
One noteable change:

They are technically more advanced (for the time being at least) than any newspaper presses operating in Britain. They will, for instance, be the first to give a daily national newspaper in the UK the option to run full colour on every page.

Previously, Carolyn McCall had said that the paper was going full colour. Now Ian Mayes is saying they have the option of priting full colour, when they want to. Perhaps this is just a semantic slip, but it does seem to signal a fairly major change of policy.

There is at least one good sign though, courtesy of Amanda Platell:

Impartial observers may have been confused when they saw Andrew Pierce’s normally scintillating People column replaced in the Times of 26 July with something that looked about as interesting as the instructions on my home waxing kit.

The clue was in the copy, which contained the word “guardian” in most items. I am reliably informed that the Times had seen a dummy for the much-heralded Berliner-style redesigned Guardian, to be launched some time this year. If this sleep-inducing display of journalism is anything to go by I hope, for the Guardian’s sake, that it was a one-off spoof based on a very old dummy.

If Amanda ‘Daily Mail’ Platell finds it ‘sleep-inducing’, and Andrew Pierce of the increasingly Daily-Mailesque Times wants to mock it, then we can happily say that it’s acheived its editor’s goal:

The editor wants the new paper, in tone and presentation, to separate itself clearly from the middle market in which he sees its closest rivals converging. He believes its new format and appearance will signal that intention.

It’s certainly a big decision to take, so let’s just hope that this radical change is as good as I’ve come to expect from the Guardian – and doesn’t signal the beginning of the end for an excellent paper. But they needn’t worry – so long as The Guardian’s journalism continues in its presently excellent form, I’ll be sticking with it, and I’m sure many others feel the same way.

‘We’re, um, not as bad as the Mail, ‘ he says, ‘We’re the Mail on Sunday, um, we’d take, um, a different tack…’

Impressive, even for a Mail hack. It’s part of this story, in which a woman who survived the King’s Cross explosion explains how she dealt with an MoS journalist hoping to persuade her to have a baby after the bombs, or at the very least a birthday. It is well worth reading, not only for the humour, but also to see the true nature of the Mail group (via).