One but not the same - Integration at the Beeb

[Dan O'Brien]

Great talk by Pete Clifton, really interesting stuff. Thinking about it afterwards though, I wasn't quite sure how one bit was going to work:

Online, TV, and Radio will all be equally important in the Beeb’s shiny new ‘integrated’ newsroom. They’re going to reduce duplication, increase cooperation, and give audiences their news in whatever medium they want it. And all of that, whilst losing staff. Right….

Cuts are always rubbish, but I can understand the funding problems and I can see how they’ll maintain ‘editorial standards’ and the traditional ‘values’ of their news coverage with less people. That’s fine. But for all this talk of integration, reduction of duplication, and customisation, I can’t help but think there’s a risk of this all backfiring.

Duplication is obviously inefficient, but duplication is not the same as having several reporters reporting the same event. ‘My News Now’ isn’t just about choosing by whatever topic and medium the story’s in, its also about the tone, language, angle and style. No amount of Bluetooth-enabled bionic limbs or integrated news hubs can help with this – you still need a reporter to write each version for each audience regardless of technology. If Online, Newsbeat and Newsnight all shared the one reporter for a particular story, the coverage may well be efficiently multi-platformed but the actual content would be a confused generic mess. It would be like sending an FT reporter to also do a piece for the Daily Sport. An extreme example maybe, but you get the point.

[Dan O'Brien]

exactly why ning has decided to resize the second half of that, I don't know... one of its many mysteries we'll never solve