The reality of running a TV station in the UK is it’s fraught with difficulty. It’s not going to be easy, and that’s just for starters.
The setup is meant to support televisual glory, but the reality is hard graft. The ratings slide, presenters misbehave, and advertisers wobble.
At least, it’s the experience of those not in the mainstream of media. It’s a larger, broader mission to achieve, and it takes effort to do.
The advent (or innovation) of GB News is a project to be admired simply because it exists.
There was a time when it seemed no one could stop complaining about BBC News and a dearth of ‘alternative’ news channels that didn’t fit the “mainstream” mould of both the BBC and Sky’s attempts at twenty-four hour news streaming.
These days are not yet behind us, as GB News and also Talk TV lag behind not just in viewers but in significance in the UK news media market.
It’s not just a question of a make-or-break interview, but it’s also a matter of working out how a news channel makes itself significant anymore.
Is anyone really taking note, and is it worth watching at all?
These are questions for a political culture, and not for news journalists, but analysis of both sides of the spectrum amount to dire news for these agencies.
It looks as though they all lag behind in some respects, and GB News isn’t on honeymoon anymore.
According to analysis by Redfield & Wilton Strategies, published at the end of April, it appears as though GB News is doing ok in respects of the demographics of its audience base. They’re Tory voting, mostly beer drinking football fans, who enjoy the banter and gossip on the rolling news channel.
Gone are the days of conservative politics just being about… exactly the same thing. It means they’ve managed to reach the over 55 age range, which you would imagine makes up much of today’s television viewing habits (or at, least those still willing to see it out in long form).
It’s instead of the younger folks, like the University generation of graduates, and those wanting to still see themselves in on the act of following politics, and don’t fit a particular mould.
In my view, this is still a niche considering the complaints about the BBC and Sky, but it’s one that is not easy to fill pockets with, if you get my drift.