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I wonder if Old Oak Common is going to be a white elephant like Stratford, Ebbsfleet, and Ashford and just be used by local trains.

Answer:
Southwark - ceiling of passage from platform to lower circulating area in July 2012


Bonus question: Why was this location chosen for today?
Bonus answer: today is the station's 25th anniversary

It will good if the first CLIP train has now achieved a performance that doesn't need tech on anymore - this should probably mean it can run more hours (and in the peak) to support the customer service

I would guess that is related to the ATO "coast" mode also being retained to try & ease stresses on motors (unless there are track issues requiring a speed restriction?)

It seems that the "Internal and External specialist Engineers" haven't resulted in much difference in the overall situation 8 months on? CLIP hasn't resulted in even one more train entering service, now a year since the original was launched into public service! Is there any encouraging news?

Its also still running in slow mode westbound Leyton - Stratford. but its not all bad news as the gentle swaying of the slow-moving train can be very soporific - ideal for a short nap!

Trains also continue to accelerate (a little) as the front portion enters the platform area at Stratford.

Indeed it is

Stations beginning with B is part of it, but not all of it.

From the linked press release:

Go Ahead have (jointly) operated multiple NR franchises, most recently Southeastern. Tokyo Metro obviously have experience in Tokyo but also in Hanoi, Vietnam. Sumitomo Corporation I've not heard of before, but from their Wikipedia article they seem likely to have experience with railway maintenance on the Manila Metro.
Whether this is an upgrade from, the same as or worse than MTR I'm not qualified to say. Obviously TfL think they will be at least equally good or they wouldn't have signed the contract, but from the limited commentary I've seen from those more knowledgeable than me I would caution against expecting dramatic improvements.

Not that I know of, and I'm struggling to think of what the benefits of doing so would be.

As a couple of examples of what they can do that I've directly experienced, a couple of years back there was a gas leak between Crossharbour and South Quay. With very little fuss they were able to operate services between Lewisham and Crossharbour and between Canary Wharf and Bank, with a one-train single-line shuttle between South Quay and Canary Wharf without impacting the Stratford-Canary Wharf service. At Canary Wharf the Bank service reversed in platforms 5 and 6, the Stratford service in 3 and 4 as normal and the South Quay service in 1 and 2. (Each track serves two platforms).

Some years back now I was at Canning Town late at night when there was an extended gap between services to Beckton. A unit was found (I don't know where from) and arrived wrong road into the eastbound high level platform, before boarding passengers and departing eastbound.

One I've heard about but not directly experienced is when a train in one of the platforms at Bank has an issue preventing movement, the trains are diverted to run on the other track and reverse in the platform. Obviously this is much lower capacity than normal but it does allow a service to be run, and it is very quick to recover from when the problem is resolved.

Similar to that posted in this thread on 15 February

The Mayor has been at some sort of launch event for the new Overground line names - and has been slammed by opponents because the re-namings are costing £6.3m which opponents say should have been spent in other ways, such as helping homeless people.

This has also been called a vanity project to create a lasting legacy for his term as Mayor of London.

I plan to Tweet a TfL poster showing what the line names mean (why they were chosen) and after than I can add the image to this page.

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re: the DLR, yes I can see how fixed and advertised route names could cause confusion, but it would be no worse than the (at times significant) confusion caused by S stock trains having two different route maps, or some of the service patterns on the SubSurface network where Circle Line and Hammersmith & City line trains sometimes serve non-standard destinations, eg: to Upminster. Also, some DLR route maps actually show fixed routes using different shades of turquoise.

(I hope my comments here are seen as just reporting facts without political bias)

In 2015 a consultation found that two new Overground stations at Old Oak Common, to serve both branches, would provide connections to north and south, linking the area with Willesden Junction, and serving construction and other workers in the area. Since the new HS2 station is now to open in 2030, have there been any recent moves to get on with these plans?

That IS a remarkable degree of flexibility.

Any plans to rationalise it out?