The BBC Shouldn’t Need to Ask
Posted on May 15, 2006
Filed Under For Argument's Sake |
What is it about big media organisations that they can’t do democracy? A recent conference in London called We Media (it was pretentously styled a Global Forum) in part organised by the BBC was designed to allow big media companies to understand better how democratised media works.
The next day the BBC held an internal seminar with Citizen Media advocate Dan Gillmor attending:
Then he asked the panel: what is it about participatory media that really changes the relationship between the BBC, say, and its audience?Gillmor: It’s a shift from lecture mode to a conversation/seminar. The BBC can bring former audience/participants into the journalism itself, engaging them in your conversation. It’s necessary, but not easy.
Well, actually the emphasis should be the other way round. An orgnisation funded by a special tax on every household should not find conversation difficult. It has several million obligations to deliver on.
The emphasis is important. Organisations like the BBC don’t exactly face an un certain future. They have revenues of over £2 billion a year but they are still in the old IBM phase, rigid with conformity.
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