BBC – Page 10

BBC news uses 5DmkII for Burma story « DSLR News Shooter

5 April, 2010 by Einar Thorsen Leave a Comment

BBC news uses 5DmkII for Burma story « DSLR News Shooter

"This is a big deal: I am reliably informed the BBC has aired its first hard news piece shot mostly on a Canon 5DmkII. It’s a nicely filmed report on Burma’s Kachin army by correspondent Alastair Leithead and shot by a BBC cameraman. Much of the footage has the DSLR look but I’m told they also used a small Sony A1 HDV camcorder for the interview sections. The piece is a great use of the camera as they were travelling to a remote location – the 5DmkII makes it much easier to keep a low profile."

Del.ici.us tags: bbc dslr journalism practice

BBC Online redesign, civic engagement and joined up internet

9 October, 2009 by Einar Thorsen Leave a Comment

Seetha Kumar, Controller BBC Online, on redesign of website and audience participation / civic engagement:

Our continuing concern is to make BBC Online better for our users. This includes looking at how we can genuinely make BBC Online part of the web and meet our users growing expectations that they can contribute in different ways to our site. A number of ideas are in train; including allowing users to add comments to news stories as they can at many sites, including The Times and The Guardian. However, those ideas are aimed at allowing us to keep pace with what users have come to expect – they do not add up to a radical” social” overhaul!

I agree that this is long overdue and hardly revolutionary. Indeed one of the conclusions from my PhD was that debates taking place on news stories appeared to have a better focus and greater sense of dialogic interaction than those in Have your say debates. Bear in mind though that this was based on the 2005 UK General Election, when the BBC still used a manual system for updating content to these debates. Anyway, Kumar went on:

The BBC has always sought a close relationship with the people who provide its income. Interacting with audiences is intrinsic to our heritage even if the means of doing so constantly evolve. I remember debates with viewers via letter, arguing in response to complaints and closely monitoring daily call logs during my programme making days. These kinds of feedback helped – and still help – programme makers to shape and sharpen the output for which they are responsible.

Newer forms of audience participation are audible or visible across our output, whether in Nicky Campbell’s compelling morning show on R 5 or in texts to BBC Breakfast. And, of course, feedback is the u.s.p of shows such as the appropriately namedFeedback on Radio 4 and Points of View on BBC ONE. In these programmes, value for the whole audience is provided by the contributions of a few – and this is a pattern we want to be part of BBC Online in future.

… and:

Our aim is to be part of the much more joined up internet that is emerging; not compete with other service providers. Indeed, in order to become more part of the web we need to interact successfully with other sites and services – and that means effective collaboration. From being a digital repository for the BBC’s digital content, BBC Online aims to co-exist more fruitfully with other services and significantly improve the way it signposts and embraces content and services that exist outside the BBC.

More ambitious, but also more complex perhaps, are emerging plans to work with partners in the sharing of technology and other service elements like metadata. This is the thinking behind many of our partnership proposals – such as open iPlayer and Project Canvas. The same principles and intentions are informing our thinking on social media.

From BBC Online and social media, over on the BBC Internet Blog.

Have your say: BBC’s new editorial guidelines

9 October, 2009 by Einar Thorsen Leave a Comment

The BBC Trust has announced that it will allow licence fee payers to have their say on its new editorial guidelines – proclaiming on the consultation website:

Have you got views on the BBC Editorial Guidelines? If the answer is yes, then the BBC Trust wants to hear from you.

The guidelines are reviewed every five years, but have not previously been subject to public consultation. Closing date for feedback is 24 December 2009. The online survey apparently contains ten questions and comment boxes – I’ll be completing mine over the weekend so will post back about what they are.

Interestingly the draft document contains a tightening of the editorial control over online news content. As noted by the Editors Weblog:

The importance of respecting the guidelines in online news as much as in broadcast is stressed in the impartiality section, adding to the existing guidelines. It requires that “news in whatever form must be presented with due impartiality” and “our audiences should not be able to tell from BBC programmes or other BBC output the personal prejudices of our journalists and presenters on such matters.” It continues by emphasising “this applies as much to online content as it does to news bulletins: nothing should be written by journalists and presenters that would not be said on air.”

Which may have an impact on journalists’ blogging, as James Robinson wrote in the Guardian:

Some industry observers are already referring to that as the “Jeremy Bowen clause”. The BBC’s highly-regarded Middle East editor, was censured by the Trust in April for loose phrasing in a potted history of post-war Israel, which appeared on the BBC News website.