The ITN Nostalgia Thread

ITN World News had left NBC Europe long before 30th June 1998, with news coming from CNBC, MSNBC and NBC News.

As a result, for the last year or so the evening line-up was

CET
1900 - Europe Tonight (from CNBC)
1930 - VIP
2000 - National Geographic Doc
2100 - Dateline NBC / Other factual
2200 - Tonight with Jay Leno
2300 - Late Night with Conan O'Brien
0000 - Later
0030 - NBC Nightly News


Here's a promo for NBC Europe from 1997 mentioning the shifting of late night shows to 10pm - the former ITN World News slot

It was on air until the end of 2001. The deal was with WNET, which lost their transmitter on 9/11.
The main sponsor of the programme was Virgin Atlantic, which pulled the funding after 9/11.

Also, ITN were making formal complaints to the OFT/BBC Governors around that time about BBC Worldwide. One being that they were undercutting (giving away for free) BBC World bulletins to PBS stations. Don’t think anything came of that though.

The ITN News Channel could have been so much more, in terms of presentation it looked smart and professional. It’s easy to forget that NTL was a partner in the service, whilst you saw what both companies were hoping for, it was so under invested by both. That’s no fault of ITN’s, but when then they started to use the same reports from ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 News, it felt ridiculously cheap in comparison to the BBC and Sky. But it wasn’t something that worked the other way, meaning that they weren’t allowed to cross promote it on the main ITN programmes on ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5. I also believe that having such a low EPG position on Sky did themselves no favours either.

NTL did have an interactive service where ITN supplied a few News pages for NTL’s digital TV service, but it didn’t go beyond that. There was no red button, nor video option. Again it felt cheap, this was the same time Sky launched Sky News Active.

I renewed faith in the service when ITV took over it and rebranded it, especially in 2004. But when you saw that they were solely keeping it as a commercial service, then you knew the writing was on the wall. Sky News has never turned a profit, but the powers that be are happy to invest in the service and keep it running, such a shame ITV never did the same.

The ITN News Channel was a rather grand folly, I'm afraid. Perhaps if it had been launched in the early 1980s (I believe ITN piloted a 24-hour news channel at that time, but never went ahead with the idea) they might have got ahead of the game and made a success of it. But by the time it launched, I'm afraid that ship had already sailed.

ITN had always had a reputation for punching above its weight. A nimble, fleet-of-foot, operator that provided a very respectable news operation for ITV and later Channels 4 and 5. But 24 hour news is not a cheap business and ITN just didn’t have the deep pockets to make it work. I think it spoke of a certain arrogance really, ITN thought it could provide a decent product simply because it was ITN. But producing a 25 minute bulletin that can compete with the BBC's resources is a very different task than producing a rolling news channel.

In the end, the ITN News Channel couldn’t compete. It had a small budget and it showed. If they'd spent more, they would have bankrupted the company. There just isn’t that much money in 24 hour news; as others have pointed out, Sky News was run as a loss leader for years, never making a profit. Sky were happy to indulge it, as it boosted their prestige. ITV never had the same attitude, so were never going to indulge in any similar largesse.

People still occasionally say, ‘I don't know why ITV don't launch a news channel; I'm sure it would work.’ It wouldn’t and ITV (or ITN for that matter) will never do it.

Yes the news channel was just part of a multimedia approach. There was an ITN News Radio station too (on DAB) and online and mobile (WAP) sites. There was a version of those arrow titles with the words TV, WAP, Radio, Web etc whizzing past.


The branding and content also appeared on News Direct 97.3 which became ITN News Direct. That got into trouble with the Radio Authority for using too much TV content as some of which didn’t make much sense on TV and it wasn't a London focused station any more.

That's the forerunner of the current LBC News station (although ITN didn't launch it)



No as the BBC had a BBC World then too, that was 24 hours a day, not just a couple of bulletins.

The BBC had a lot more radio news, ITN just had IRN, LBC and News Direct

Ah, which became D1 Ten. Beeeeep. Memories.

I agree. A very worthy effort that was never going to be profitable and that’s what it’s all about in the end despite best intentions.

The rebrand from ITN to ITV was perhaps the beginning of the end, in that they suddenly needed a lot more content from the ITV News brand to fill a 24 hour service rather than using the (often longer form) Channel 4 News content as well.

When C4 News launched were reports signed off as ITN or Channel 4 News?

Channel 4 News.

This won't make sense to some the the younger forum members here, but for me and many others on this forum will agree with - the scrapping of the ITN brand was indeed the beginning of the end for what was, and clearly still is (judging from the input and knowledge on this thread) a very respected and authoritative news outlet.

ITN suffered from an almost automatic 'dumbing down' when rebranded ITV News. The whole move to virtual studios knocked a few more nails in the coffin for me. That glorious atrium and the newsroom studios that showed it off really added to the drama of it all. For what it's worth, I loathed BBC News when it moved to its virtual era.

Anyway, if it's threads like these we need to refer to for some nostalgia of better days, then I for one am happy they exist.

I agree. The ITV brand has been driven into the ground and is incredibly low rent, almost a shadow of its former self. Former ITV/ITN employees (especially the founders and management of A-R) must be turning in their graves.