BBC editors' blog

Last edition of Working Lunch

Today is the last edition of Working Lunch, a programme which has done invaluable service for viewers over the years in providing information on a range of topics on business and personal finance.

But the world has moved on in the past 16 years and whilst the programme was ground-breaking when it first went on air, there has since been an explosive growth of broadcast media and the launch of the internet.

It means that audiences now have a range of ways of accessing this sort of information.

Many people have written to us saying they have been saddened and in some cases infuriated by this decision. But the BBC, like other organisations, has to make tough decisions about how and where we spend our resources to ensure they provide maximum benefit to licence-fee payers.

The cancellation of Working Lunch will deliver cost-saving for BBC News, much of which will be recycled back into programme making.

It's always sad when a programme reaches the end of its life-cycle, but our business coverage has never been about one programme.

In the slot we will be bringing the news, current affairs and business programme, GMT with George Alagiah to BBC Two. The international edition is already a cornerstone of the BBC's international output. The programme showcases the best of BBC journalism from around the world and has a strong business focus.

In addition, the BBC will also be commissioning a new agenda setting business programme on the News Channel at the weekend and a new money and business programme on Radio 5 live.

We believe our new programme line up will serve BBC Two, Radio 5 live and News Channel audiences well.

Fran Unsworth is the head of Newsgathering.

BBC News's content production system

The Content Production System (CPS) manages content production for BBC News, BBC Sport and over 100 other websites across the BBC. It also produces the content for multi-platform journalism, such as the BBC mobile services and interactive TV/red button services; even content for the mighty old-skool Ceefax is born in the CPS.

If the BBC website is one of the largest and oldest on the internet, then the CPS has been around nearly as long. As a rule of thumb, if you remember Bagpuss, you are older than the CPS. If you grew up watching Teletubbies, you probably are not.

There have been a number of requests from people asking to see more of the CPS but as there is a lot of detail to go into, I'll just focus on a few headline points for now. We will be doing a more in-depth post on it soon.

Read in full and comment at the BBC Internet Blog.

John O'Donovan is Chief Technical Architect, Journalism and Knowledge, BBC Future Media & Technology.

BBC News iPhone app

Some good news for anyone who has been waiting for a BBC News iPhone app: the BBC Trust has just announced that the BBC's plans to launch dedicated smartphone applications for BBC News, Sport and iPlayer "do not require further scrutiny through a Public Value Test". This means the News app should be available from later today.

At the About The BBC blog, the director of BBC Future Media and Technology, Erik Huggers, announces the launch and at the BBC Internet Blog the executive product manager for BBC Mobile, David Madden, describes the features - so read on and comment at Erik's or David's post.

Update 1231: There's now a News website story about the app and you can watch a demo with David Madden at the BBC YouTube channel.

Steve Herrmann is editor of the BBC News website.

BBC News website redesign (5)

Thank you for all your feedback on the BBC News website redesign. There has been a lot of it, and we'll continue to sort through the comments and e-mails we've been receiving, identifying specific issues we can address and adding answers to the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) page.

Most of you commenting here on the Editors blog have been critical, with many urging us to change the design back to the way it was. Given the strength of feeling expressed in some of the comments, I'd like to explain again, as clearly as I can, what our thinking is.

• Reverting to the old design is not something we're considering, but building and continuing to improve on the changes we've made certainly is.
• We are looking closely at the comments and feedback we are getting on all aspects of the new design, and we'll also be carefully watching usage, traffic and conducting further audience research, as we would after any such change.
• There will be a review process and if changes need to be made, they will be considered as part of that.
• There are a few things not yet working exactly the way they should be - our developers and designers are tackling those now, and we are addressing them in the FAQs.
• The changes we have made are based on careful research and thinking about how the site can work at its best now, and how we can make sure it is adaptable enough to continue to evolve, not stand still.

Along with everyone else on the design, technical and editorial teams here who have worked together to try to improve the site and the systems which produce it, I hope you will grow to like it, if you don't already (and thanks to those of you who have let us know you do!)

Here's what we've already said about the reasons for the new design, why we didn't run a public beta and the thinking behind the design itself.

Many of the specific issues you've raised are tackled in our FAQs page and we've added some further updates there, which are also summarised below.

Thanks again to all who have commented here - I'm sorry I haven't been able to reply to everyone individually. The intention of these blog posts over the past couple of weeks has been to let you know what we are doing, and why. I hope that even if you are one of those who doesn't agree with what we've done, you at least understand a bit more about it.

We'll continue to follow the feedback, and to address specific issues where we can in the FAQs page.

  • Where has Europe and other world regional weather gone?
We are currently working on better ways to present weather in our world regional sections, and hope to re-introduce it soon.

  • Why don't you have a single list of the main News blogs linked from the front page?
We do not currently have a single destination page aggregating all our News blogs, but we link to blogs individually on relevant section indexes around the site, also on related stories and on the front page, depending on the news agenda. All the blogs are also linked to from the right hand navigation within any individual blog post. There is now a new section on many of the main indexes called "Expert Views" which does provide a home for blogs in the respective subject areas. For these reasons we do not currently have a permanent link to all of them on the front page.

  • Can I turn off the Facebook option?
Some of you have contacted us to say that your work computer blocks access to Facebook which is causing you problems looking at our pages that embed the Facebook "Recommend" button. We're working to see if there is an automatic solution to this, but in the mean time, if you would like to remove these Facebook buttons, then you can do so by clicking here to set a cookie. This will tell us not to show you the Facebook buttons. If you would like the Facebook buttons back at any point, simply clear your cookies. If you clear your cookies you will need to visit the link above again to re-hide the Facebook buttons.

  • Why does video slow down my story page download?
Some of you have reported that the video player in our stories is sometimes slowing down your experience of using our site. This will be particularly true if you are using a slower connection, but we are aware that it is an issue and are working to resolve it as soon as possible.

  • Is the site designed just for large screens?
We tested the site extensively on all modern browsers and screen resolutions, however, we have received a number of comments from some of you with small screens saying that the text on our pages is too close to the left hand side of your screens - we are still investigating this

Steve Herrmann is editor of the BBC News website.