1 post tagged “iplayer”
As a prefix to this I should make clear I worked on this project in a previous employment, and as a reader I'd be aware of the inevitable spin that this article may have.
BBC Jam faced a difficult birth, from the moment the plans for the "Digital Curriculum" were announced, the commercial sector cried foul about the impact the BBC launching such a service would have on their business and that it wasn't something the BBC should be involved in.
Battles were had in European courts, negotiations took place and eventually a number of years later the project was resumed. I joined the project during this point, and was involved in the process of selecting suppliers and the early phases of the implementation. Like most people on the project I have my war stories (if you ever want to talk about the implementations of SOAP and W3C-XMLSec in open source when interfacing to .Net...).
The suspension obviously saddens me, as the project has a very infectious zeal to it - because it was seen as so important to the future of the BBC's role in education. Interactive Factual & Learning, as they were known had produced countless educational websites, including Bitesize which stood alongside TV programmes. This was the first commission the other way around - where the Internet was the commission. Not being an educationalist I'm not really in a position to judge the quality of the resources fully, but it did feel well made - with videos made to a standard closer to the TV than to the Web. I had friends who were teachers saying it was a really good resource - and for someone now involved in more shameless commercial activity, it was a project I felt proud to be involved in.
Damned if they do, damned if they don't
So as of tomorrow, the 20th of March 2007 the service will be suspended totally, this follows from a freezing of the service where no new subjects will be added. A further series of tests will be undertaken by the BBC Trust, and in time a revised offering may rise from the ashes.
The BBC is to my mind, at the moment, crippled by this concept of public value and market impact. If they do put innovative learning resources online the commercial offerings complain. If they don't, over time they will lose relevance as a simple website around resources doesn't cut it anymore. Similarly with iPlayer, the internet OnDemand service in development - despite C4/five and soon ITV having similar services, the BBC's must be assessed to decide if it's distorting the market. While I think this is valid in many situations, at some point it's clear that some services are keeping up with the market and not distorting it.
The BBC has always been market distorting in some ways, the British Broadcasting Company was formed by a consortium of Radio Manufacturers, their heavy involvement in DAB digital radio from the start has driven uptake of that, in particular for the comedy and drama service BBC7 but this has been to the benefit of commercial radio also - in digital homes there are more national commercial stations to choose from compared to FM where you have a choice of Classic on FM and Virgin or TalkSport on AM (this subject to the area you are in etc)
BBC Jam faced a difficult birth, from the moment the plans for the "Digital Curriculum" were announced, the commercial sector cried foul about the impact the BBC launching such a service would have on their business and that it wasn't something the BBC should be involved in.
Battles were had in European courts, negotiations took place and eventually a number of years later the project was resumed. I joined the project during this point, and was involved in the process of selecting suppliers and the early phases of the implementation. Like most people on the project I have my war stories (if you ever want to talk about the implementations of SOAP and W3C-XMLSec in open source when interfacing to .Net...).
The suspension obviously saddens me, as the project has a very infectious zeal to it - because it was seen as so important to the future of the BBC's role in education. Interactive Factual & Learning, as they were known had produced countless educational websites, including Bitesize which stood alongside TV programmes. This was the first commission the other way around - where the Internet was the commission. Not being an educationalist I'm not really in a position to judge the quality of the resources fully, but it did feel well made - with videos made to a standard closer to the TV than to the Web. I had friends who were teachers saying it was a really good resource - and for someone now involved in more shameless commercial activity, it was a project I felt proud to be involved in.
Damned if they do, damned if they don't
So as of tomorrow, the 20th of March 2007 the service will be suspended totally, this follows from a freezing of the service where no new subjects will be added. A further series of tests will be undertaken by the BBC Trust, and in time a revised offering may rise from the ashes.
The BBC is to my mind, at the moment, crippled by this concept of public value and market impact. If they do put innovative learning resources online the commercial offerings complain. If they don't, over time they will lose relevance as a simple website around resources doesn't cut it anymore. Similarly with iPlayer, the internet OnDemand service in development - despite C4/five and soon ITV having similar services, the BBC's must be assessed to decide if it's distorting the market. While I think this is valid in many situations, at some point it's clear that some services are keeping up with the market and not distorting it.
The BBC has always been market distorting in some ways, the British Broadcasting Company was formed by a consortium of Radio Manufacturers, their heavy involvement in DAB digital radio from the start has driven uptake of that, in particular for the comedy and drama service BBC7 but this has been to the benefit of commercial radio also - in digital homes there are more national commercial stations to choose from compared to FM where you have a choice of Classic on FM and Virgin or TalkSport on AM (this subject to the area you are in etc)
Is there a conclusion to this? Personally I hope the Trust aren't stopping Jam just to prove a point that they are tougher and more market-focussed than the previous set of BBC Governors. From a license payers' point of view, I'd hope that the work done behind Jam wasn't lost, and suppose in a slightly pious way I hope that children don't lose out because they are caught in the crossfire.
