LIVE 8 COVERAGE: FIRST HOUR

Well, Nokia's Live 8 is underway, sort of, not quite; or at least, BBC TWO has cranked up its coverage. Chaired by Jonathan Ross (we'd have hoped for Ellen - Kershaw - Skinner ourselves), with Fearne Cotton running around backstage ("look - Madonna might be over there") and Jo Wylie sitting on the couch asking Dido soft questions - when Dido says she wants to send her message, why didn't you ask her what her message is.

Ricky Gervais is doing his amusing, undercutting the event drop-in films that he's done for Children In Need and Comic Relief as well - no reason why not, everyone else is doing their greatest hits. And Andrew Marr has done a little film to explain what's going on - apparently the G8 is "the sofa of the world", which might be why they could get someone to dig around down the back to find some extra cash, we suppose.

Elsewhere, Fox News is excited by the Pink Floyd reunion, but manages to discuss if Bono uses soap instead of Africa; but it's Euronews which does the best coverage - frequently cutting to its No Comment live footage of the protest marches in Edinburgh.

Everyone seems to have the same two seconds of the "first Live 8 concert, in Tokyo, Japan" of a Japanese rock act going "cling"; the Berlin event is being represented by some scary metal act doing Hang On Sloopy and - to prove how daft it is to pretend the African artists are being excluded - there's two seconds from an unnamed African band rushed by on BBC TWO, as well.

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