Today (sometimes referred to as "the Today programme" to avoid ambiguity) is BBC Radio 4's long-running early morning news and current affairs programme, now broadcast from 6.00 am to 9.00 am Monday to Friday, and 7.00 am to 9.00 am on Saturdays. It is also the most popular programme on Radio 4 and one of the BBC's most popular programmes across its radio networks. It consists of regular news bulletins, serious and often confrontational political interviews and in-depth reports, and an often criticised religious slot of 3m 15s. It has been voted the most influential news programme in Britain in setting the political agenda. The programme has 7.18 million listeners. It was voted the Best Breakfast Show of the Year at the 2010 Sony Radio Academy Awards.

Today was launched on the BBC's Home Service on 28 October 1957 as a programme of 'topical talks' to give listeners a morning alternative to light music. It was initially broadcast as two 20-minute editions slotted in around the existing news bulletins and religious and musical items. In 1963 it became part of the BBC's Current Affairs department, and it started to become more news-orientated. The two editions also became longer, and by the end of the 1960s it had become a single two-hour long programme that enveloped the news bulletins and the religious talk that had become Thought for the Day. Radio 4 controller Ian McIntyre cut it back to two parts in 1976-1978 (creating a gap which was filled by Up to the Hour), but it was swiftly returned to its former position.

James "Jim" Naughtie (surname pronounced /ˈnɔːxti/; born 9 August 1951) is a British radio presenter and radio news presenter for the BBC. Since 1994 he has been one of the main presenters of Radio 4's Today programme.

James Naughtie was born and brought up in Milltown of Rothiemay, near Huntly, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. He was educated at Keith Grammar School, the University of Aberdeen and then Syracuse University in New York. He is a Fellow of the British-American Project.

Naughtie began his career as a journalist in 1975 at the Aberdeen Press & Journal, moving to the London offices of The Scotsman in 1977. The following year he joined the paper's Westminster staff, and became its Chief Political Correspondent. In 1981, he worked for The Washington Post as the Laurence Stern fellow on its national staff. Naughtie joined The Guardian in 1984, and became its Chief Political Correspondent in 1985.

In 1986, Naughtie moved into radio presenting, presenting The Week In Westminster moving to The World At One in 1988. He has also made several radio documentaries and series and has written three books, Playing the Palace: A Westminster Collection, The Rivals: The Intimate Story of a Political Marriage, and The Accidental American: Tony Blair and the Presidency.

Desmond John Humphrys (born 17 August 1943 in Splott, Cardiff), is a British author, journalist and presenter of radio and television, who has won many national broadcasting awards. From 1981 to 1987 he was the main presenter for the Nine O'Clock News, the flagship BBC news television programme, and since 1987 he has been a presenter on the award-winning BBC Radio 4 programme, Today. He is also currently the host of the popular BBC Two television quiz show Mastermind.

Humphrys has a reputation of being a tenacious and forthright interviewer; occasionally politicians have been very critical of his style after being subjected to a tough interview on live radio.

Humphrys was born in Splott, son of Winifred Mary (Matthews), a hairdresser, and Edward George Humphrys, a self employed French polisher. He was one of five children. His parents encouraged him to do his homework and he passed the eleven plus exam. He became a pupil at Cardiff High School (then a grammar school), but he did not fit in to the middle class environment there. He was an average pupil and left school at the age of 15 years to become a teenage reporter on the Penarth Times. He later joined the Western Mail.

Sarah Montague (born 8 February 1966)^{[citation needed]} is a British Journalist, best known for her work on BBC Radio 4 as one of the regular presenters of the Today programme.

Montague was born to John Montague and Mary (née O'Malley) on Guernsey, a British Crown Dependency and one of the Channel Islands. She attended Blanchelande College, a local independent school for girls, and she went on to study biology at the University of Bristol and gained a BSc.

Montague's first job was as a stock broker for County NatWest, and then a Eurobond dealer with NatWest Capital Markets in London. She then went into business in London with the owner of Charles Tyrwhitt Shirts.

Montague began her journalistic career with Channel Television in 1991. She joined Reuters in January 1995, and then became business correspondent for Sky News in January 1996.

She joined the BBC during October 1997, and presented Newsnight and BBC News, before joining the Today news programme on BBC Radio 4. She has also presented HARDtalk on BBC News. In December, 2008 she hosted BBC World's Nobel Minds in the library of the Royal Palace, Stockholm. The 2008 Nobel Prize winners in Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Economics and Literature had a round table discussion on issues of global concern and their own contributions to the world of knowledge.

Glenn Greenwald (born March 6, 1967) is an American lawyer, columnist, blogger, and author. Greenwald worked as a constitutional and civil rights litigator before becoming a contributor (columnist and blogger) to Salon.com, where he focuses on political and legal topics. He has also contributed to other newspapers and political news magazines, including The New York Times,The Los Angeles Times,The Guardian,The American Conservative,The National Interest, and In These Times.

Greenwald has written four books, three of which have been New York Times bestsellers: How Would a Patriot Act? (2006); A Tragic Legacy (2007), and With Liberty and Justice for Some: How the Law Is Used to Destroy Equality and Protect the Powerful, released in October 2011. He also wrote Great American Hypocrites (2008).

In March 2009, he was selected, along with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, as the recipient of the first annual Izzy Award by the Park Center for Independent Media, an award named after independent journalist I.F. "Izzy" Stone and devoted to rewarding excellence in independent journalism. The selection panel cited Greenwald's "pathbreaking journalistic courage and persistence in confronting conventional wisdom, official deception and controversial issues."