This is (still) London...pip, pip, pip

"It is 3am GMT and here is the news..."

By BBC News Online's Jenny Matthews

"...And if you've just joined us, here are the main points of the news again."

It's a long while since Joseph Goebbels said the BBC World Service had won the "intellectual invasion" of Europe in WWII.

But in the age of global villages and internet surfing, more people than ever are listening to the BBC World Service and its familiar refrains.

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Latest figures show 151 million people are tuning into the service, and 40 million of these listen to its traditional English language service.

So what is the enduring appeal of what was once called the "bowler hat and umbrella" station?

Ex-pats and those without a free press alike say they most value the news coverage, which tries to be as objective as possible.

The service is funded by the Foreign Office, but BBC staff retain total editorial control and are fiercely jealous of their independence.

But listeners also cite other reasons for continuing to twiddle the wireless knobs to crackly short wave, despite the notorious gunfire static and wandering wavebands.

Many Britons working abroad, especially in trouble-spots, say they like the dispassionate, sedate delivery which reassures them that everything is under control.

Others like it for the sheer, comforting familiarity - a bit like the soporific "Sole, Dogger and Finisterre" of Radio 4's Shipping Forecast.

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Even modern young travellers say it provides them with a familiar blast of home.

Culture-shocked backpackers who are not crammed into internet cafes tune in for cricket scores, the Queen's Speech at Christmas and - nowadays - live Premiership football.

Some older listerners say it conjures up mental images of what they see as a romantic golden age, when working abroad was all about gin-and-tonics and bridge fours.

They fondly hark back to its first broadcasts, made almost 70 years ago in 1932, when it was called The Empire Service and Britain was still a colonial power.

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But anyone crouched in the African bush with a wind-up radio is unlikely to find the service so familiar nowadays.

They will still hear "This is the World Service broadcasting from London...pip, pip, pip" and that famous Lilliburlero theme tune.

But they may also be startled by the sounds of the Smashing Pumpkins pop group, or surprised by a soft Scouse voice reading the news.

A couple of years ago, the service underwent a modernisation programme after focus groups found it comforting, but increasingly irrelevant.

Nowadays jingles are lively, news bulletins are read with regional accents and Oasis and Pulp are played alongside the Proms.

There are regular Top 20 rundowns, and indie DJ Steve Lamacq plays newly released UK records three times a week.

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There is even a World Service soap opera, Westway, set in a busy health centre in an inner-city area near Notting Hill and aimed at giving a true picture of life in contemporary London.

Even the content and style of the news, led by flagship programme The World Today, has been given a modern polish.

Chief executive Mark Byford says that nowadays it is as likely to appeal to "influential opinion-formers and decision-makers" as to lonely embassy staff, displaced victims of war or isolated missionaries.

So the World Service may still be delivering the BBC's old motto "Nation Shall Speak Peace Unto Nation".

But it is just as likely to be doing it by discussing dotcoms and the digerati, as by talking about tea and tennis.