Bbc news through a Virtual Reality headset . Audiences take to experiencing news events this way. And what questions do the new technologies pose for journalists . First, though, safi roussos, one of 22 People Killed at a pop concert in manchester on may 22, her ninth birthday would have been on tuesday. To mark the occasion, we spoke to safi rousoss parents. We did not want to let her birthday pass. We did not want to let her birthday pass. She loved the limelight. Ijust wanted to celebrate safis birthday through doing this. What has your family lost . 0h. We have lost everything. We have lost everything, we have. Life will never be the same. Stephanie and trevor firth were among a number of viewers to pick up on one aspect of the interview, writing versions of the report Ran On Bbc News all day, leading the news at six. It provided powerful and moving television, but some people had concerns about the prominence given to the item. Heres mark eaton linda dell also contacted us about the coverage, leaving us this telephone message. I find this mawkish in the extreme. Like rubbing salt in peoples wounds, to show the video clips again of the people panicking outside the concert hall. Surely the bbc can find better news than this, than bringing up old hurts and deliberately finding people in anguish to put on our screens. Im fed up with it. Now the bbcs director general lord hall announced the corporations annual plan this week and he addressed what he called The Huge Competition Presented Online by companies such as amazon and netflix. One of the responses he proposed was the development of Virtual Reality content, including in news and current affairs. There had already been some work in this area, including we wait, a Short Vr Film which dramatises a syrian familys journey to europe on smuggler boats. Hes tired. We are all tired. The film, based on real accounts, gathered by bbc news and animated by the makers of wallace and gromit, won an Industry Award this week. It may not be news as we know it, but could it be the future . Virtual reality footage like that is only properly experience by wearing a headset. But a simpler version, 360 degrees video, can be viewed online or on mobiles. The first such report was filmed following the Terrorist Attacks in paris on november, 2015. This is what its like in paris today. This is the place de la republique. The correspondent, matthew price, is holding the camera on a selfie stick, the intention to provide an immersive type of reporting, which puts the viewer at the heart of the story. But what questions do these technologies raise for the bbc and could they revolutionise the way viewers consume news . To discuss this i am joined by the head of the bbcs new Virtual Reality hub. Can you explain first the difference between vr and 360 . Well, 360 video allows you to look all the way around. So you can either watch it on your phone like this and move it all the way around. But when you watch on a Virtual Reality headset like this, you feel like you are there, you are much more immersive. But true vr is actually made from Computer Graphics and it really does trick your head into thinking that you are somewhere else. So if a giant pit for example opens up for you your heart might start beating faster and you really would get that fear of being in a real situation where you are scared. And we should say that the audiences seeing some 360 degrees footage of the large hadron collider, you get a sense of your scale, you can project graphics over it, its more than just getting a sense of some news footage. But vr is different. You have a film that has been made for bbc news on it. Whats the benefit . Iam in i am in someones room and you are watching how the fire starts. The fire officer is talking to me from his station and explaining the background to this incident that they had to tackle. But it is just they had to tackle. But it is just the scale of it. You feel like they are life size and it is different to watching something on a flat screen. If it works well on a flat screen, it is not Virtual Reality. You have to make choices about what kind of stories might get that treatment. How do you decide what makes a story and what is the benefit . The benefit is allowing the audience to step into the story. They are seeing it as you would be if you are a reporter. For a foreign reporter for example to stand in a place and allow your audience to look around and almost smell and feel the sights and sounds of the place youre standing in. So thats why it offers such amazing opportunities. Or as you saw in the firefighter one it enables you to be there with someone seeing how they do theirjob and feeling as if you are there with them, so it is be there or be them. Is it aimed at a different audience, perhaps one that dont use regular bulletins orjust Reading Stories or watching videos on the website . Tv news took a long time to take off in the Early Television service, and we are at that stage right now where we have not even really worked out how you would deliver this regularly to an audience, it is still highly experimental. We are starting to understand the stories that really benefit from it, it is early days. The bbc has obviously developed content for new technologies before, and there is stuff with Mobile Phones when they were a new way to deliver news, only 2 Million People have vr headsets, and the bbc presumably is spending a lot of money developing stuff for them. Is that really a smart investment at this stage . Were not spending a lot of money and were investigating it and trying to see what audience benefits we can achieve through it. There would be no point in the bbc spending an enormous amount of money until there is an audience, but it is a chicken and egg thing. If we can start to find really extraordinary ways to tell stories using Virtual Reality that do allow people to step in and understand the world in completely new ways, thats completely justifiable. Because things like that film about the refugee experience, which has won awards, i wonder how many people have actually seen it, ordinary people . They wont yet. But eventually more people will be able to. And that was a very early prototype, really, to see whether you could, through Virtual Reality, put people in a place where they would see what it was like to be refugees trying to travel across the mediterranean in the boat with them, feeling the splashes as the waves pass by the boat, and feeling the terror as they try and cross the sea. Thats what it was trying to achieve. That was a reconstruction based on reports, but if youre filming in 360, you get issues about privacy and whether distressing images might be caught up in that wider sweep of things. You have less control over what you are filming, dont you . Absolutely and there would be lots of things we have to address as this technology develops further. But theyre not really any different from a reporterfilming something on a mobile phone. Its just that its all the way around, and you might be Filming Things that you dont even see and only spot later. But in the rush to give an immediate experience, which is what a lot of social media does, things like periscope, is the bbc in danger of throwing away the editorial thinking and Decision Making that distinguished bbc news . I think most foreign reporters get really excited about Virtual Reality, because in the end one of the bbcs missions is to help people to understand whats going on in the world. And so if you go back to those principles of what we are all about and work out how Virtual Reality or 360 could enable you to achieve those, i dont think those issues will be so difficult. Thank you so much. Finally, while we are looking towards the future, Professor Stephen Hawking was taking the long view on sunday, when he met us ahead of a conference to mark his 75th birthday. In an exclusive interview with bbc news, Professor Hawking told me that he was worried about the future of our species. What are your views on president trumps decision to withdraw from the paris climate agreement, and what impact do you think that will have on the future of the planet . We are close to the Tipping Point, where Global Warming becomes irreversible. Trumps actions will push the earth over the ridge, where it becomes like a planet that rains sulfuric acid. That decision ran at the end of the sunday night bulletin. Stephen hawking, one of the greatest physicists of all time, gave an interview to the bbc where he basically said the end of the world is nigh because we are close to the Tipping Point at which Global Warming. We wont be able to stop it. And earth will end up becoming another venus. And you put it as a minor item at the end of the news. Things are grim, and youre treating it as a minor item on the news. Thank you for all your comments this week. If you want to share your opinions on bbc news and current affairs, or even appear on the programme, you can call us 0r e mail us you can find us on twitter and do have a look at our website. There you can catch up with previous discussions we have recorded. And if you ever miss an edition of the programme you can catch up on the bbc iplayer or via our website. Thats all from us. Well be back to hear thoughts about bbc new coverage next week. Goodbye. If you put in an order for some fine, weekend weather, then so far, so fine, weekend weather, then so far, so good. This picture comes from a Weather Watcher in the isle of white. We have a Weather System just fringing the very far north of scotland, so it was not good for everyone. For part two of the weekend during sunday that is edging a bit further south across scotland and it takes the rain into northern ireland, which had a lovely saturday. Not quite so spectacular for sunday as it was for saturday. A chance of a few showers in Eastern England into the afternoon in the evening. 0utbreaks england into the afternoon in the evening. Outbreaks of Rain Pushing South across scotland and the central belt and into northern ireland. That will hold the temperature down to the mid teens. But maybe as high as 29 celsius and humid as well in parts of south east england, but it is the last day of heat like that. This Weather System is moving east on monday and there is moving east on monday and there is fresher air to follow. There will be some showers around, nothing more than that. Rain on sunday night in Northern England and showers developing elsewhere. Sunshine and showers and it will be a little bit cooler, temperatures into the teens and cooler compared to the weekend as well in south east england. Still pleasa nt as well in south east england. Still pleasant when you are in the sunshine. Then we watch this Weather System as it targets the southern half of the uk later on tuesday and tuesday night. There will be some rain, but because it has been so dry, you may appreciate that rain on the garden. It goes through parts of england and wales and it could be potentially quite heavy in south east england. As we go into wednesday it heads off into continental europe. For wednesday we are ina continental europe. For wednesday we are in a gap between Weather Systems and wednesday is one of the better days with fine weather. There will bea mix days with fine weather. There will be a mix of cloud, sunshine and the Odd Light Shower breaking out and temperatures fairly close to average, maybe a bit cooler in some spots. The gap between Weather Systems is very brief. Notice how far north of the uk the area of low pressure is, but these Weather Fronts dump most of their moisture in the north and the west and they will not reach southern and eastern parts of the uk until thursday night. Another gap between Weather Systems and another ridge of High Pressure on friday. We have rain to move through as we go into the start of the weekend and the breeze will be picking up as well. It is all pa rt be picking up as well. It is all part and parcel of what is a changeable weekend. 0ccasionally you get some sunshine and occasionally you get some wet weather moving through courtesy of low pressure. It looks like a breezy weekend next weekend and although relatively warm in the south east, for much of the uk it is looking on the cool side. That is your latest. Donald trump claims victories on trade and climate change, as the g20 summit ends. But while World Leaders accept americas commitment to coal and some tariffs, they keep their own pledges on Global Warming and free trade. Mr trump also offers theresa may, what he says will be a very good trade deal after brexit. So whove been the winners and losers at the g20 summit . Also tonight iraqi forces claim what they say is a decisive victory over so called islamic state, in mosul. The London Fire Brigade changes policy on deploying high ladders, after it took half an hour to send one to the Grenfell Tower disaster. And the lions with the all blacks share the spoils as they draw