As you watch the tide of indignation that threatens to wash over the Murdoch clan this weekend, I can’t help feeling a touch of sympathy for James Murdoch.
Because in certain aspects, he is right. And some of what he is saying is long over-due.
And, I think, the danger is that we can get too carried away in our defence of all things Auntie; as if butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.
Equally, because Murdoch Jnr’s speech was made at a ‘TV’ festival, it is easy to assume that the two sides of the argument can be encapsulated by casting the division as one of Fox News to the right (sic) and the Six O’Clock News to the left.
That the debate is cast in pure ‘TV’ terms when, to my mind, the term is all but redundant.
We’re all broadcasters now; we all own a mobile phone. Indeed, the very fact that someone from The Guardian was wandering around an Edinburgh street getting the reaction from the great and the media good… http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/video/2009/aug/29/edinburghtvfestival-television – saw The Guardian acting as ‘a broadcaster’.
Camera-work a bit shaky; intros, a bit DIY. But, in essence, there was what-was-once a print-only newspaper rolling a tank onto Auntie’s ‘TV’ lawn. Or rather a lightly armoured car; I suspect the only organisation with a ‘tank’ at its disposal these days is News International.
Otherwise, the BBC pretty much has the place to itself.
I suspect what’s now left of ‘Channel M’ in Manchester doesn’t exactly ruffle too many feathers with BBC North-West. You wonder if GMG had had access to a crystal ball five years ago, just how many digital TV studios they would have built into King’s Place…
But the point is that we’re all digital ‘broadcasters’ now; I can do a podcast… ergo I’m a radio station; can my content better that of Radio Norfolk’s one-hour ‘Scrimmage Show’ on a Thursday night as Chris Goreham and two guests talk Norwich City Football Club?
Occasionally. I’ve been talking about Norwich City Football Club for the better part of 17 years and at www.myfootballwriter.com/norwichcity we can ‘tow’ a more independent line; I can even swear if needs be… drop an ‘aitch; stray away from the Queen’s English.
So, we’re all in the same space. TV. Radio. Words.
But the point – I think – that Murdoch might be making when he draws the fate of newspapers into this debate, is that the ‘land grab’ he alludes to is that of the written word.
That’s where the BBC is treading onto other people’s turf; that’s where it is a one-way street.
That if somewhere in the midst of all our futures, Jeff Jarvis’ old maxim that ‘do what you do best, then link to the rest…’ holds true, it is the sight of the BBC morphing itself into a factory of the written word that is, indeed, ‘chilling’.
Murdoch cited the purchase of ‘The Lonely Planet’ travel guides in his defence; I’d add another… You look at the level of their written coverage that accompanies their new Football League TV rights package this season and that’s where another big ‘land grab’ can be seen.
They are churning out ‘live’ reports during the course of the game; come Sunday, what was once four pars and an audio clip are now full-blown, post-match quotes pieces – all timed, of course, to roll out on a Sunday long before any provincial newspaper hits the streets on a Monday.
Or, indeed, before The Sun’s ‘Goals’ supplement ever hits the news-stands.
And football sells. It’s the very foundation of Sky’s prosperity. And here is the BBC running amok on the traditional, written word fiefdoms of the newspaper barons.
Of course, it’s not all churned out by the transcribe teams that gather in the MailBox overnight on a Saturday. The live feed comes via the Press Association. It says so at the bottom.
So, that’s where my ‘TV’ licence fee is now going… paying PA for minute-by-minute, written Football League match coverage when – for example – a TrinityMirror reporter might be churning out exactly the same content at the same game via a CoverItLive ‘package’… Or, indeed, an Archant one.
I’ll defend my pals on the ‘circuit’ to the hilt.
Who knows more about Birmingham City, Norwich City, Bolton Wanderers, Ipswich Town… etc, etc… me or the bloke from PA? Who is churning out the homogenised stuff; and who, actually, knows both players and club inside-out cos this it is their expert field? Their passionate niche…
Cos they have been watching this club for years and years.
Now, as a BBC licence fee payer where would I like to see my money spent? On a middle man that is PA? As the BBC suddenly decide that they too can do words; or by actually sustaining independent expert opinions that are the rightful preserve of the written, provincial Press industry?
And how do they do that? They link. Because they don’t do that best. They can do video through their rights deal; they do audio through their BBC local radio commentaries, but when they start to do sentences, that’s when they are moving into areas that they don’t ‘own’…
Which is why that local video plan was fine by me; newspaper groups aren’t ‘video’ production houses; it’s not what they do best. They swap their mags court words for BBC’s local video; that’s the deal.
But if, say, GMG is struggling to re-invent itself as a digital video broadcaster, so the BBC should be very mindful of trying to re-invent itself as a house of the written word. And act all innocent when the charged is being made.
Particularly if it’s all being achieved at the expense of my licence fee.
Written words is not what the BBC does best; therefore, you link to the rest… while there is still a ‘rest’ to link to. You give people a chance.
That’s the deal.
[...] It’s when the BBC morphs itself into a Factory of the Written Word.. that’s when Murdoch Jnr hit… But the point – I think – that Murdoch might be making when he draws the fate of newspapers into this debate, is that the ‘land grab’ he alludes to is that of the written word. [...]
Rick,
I am 100% behind what you say in this post.
The BBC is distorting the market and I am really suprised have people have turned on James Murdoch’s speech on Friday night.
As you say he said things that were long overdue.
Your example of the BBC encroaching on the Football league reporter sums it up exactly as it has done with the Lonely Planet venture in the travel writing market.
I don’t pretend to have a solution for this,but for a new journalism model to succeed where as you say we are all journalists,the playing field needs to be levelled
[...] creating an obstacle for the print media in their attempt at saving the industry. Rick Waghorn at Out With A Bang believes they are ‘land grabbing’ in the territory of ‘written journalism’. [...]
[...] http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=317 [...]
Problem is, the US provincial newspaper industry is in an even worse state than the UK’s regional newspapers and they don’t have a BBC to blame for their woes. (Naturally that’s where the “pay for news” proposal came from.) Also what’s to stop national newspapers/ITV/Channel 4/Sky News from reporting what the PA feed says in their news bulletins and on their websites well before the provincial newspapers?
And where is this so called BBC “landgrab” occurring? It must be Murdoch referring to the pay-for-news proposals perhaps being derailed by the BBC’s “free news”, although there are numerous other free news sources that won’t start charging overnight just because Murdoch and others feel they have to. The BBC has actually been closing subsites like their once-popular “Cult” section and is generally cutting back on programme investment, so likewise it can’t afford to expand much more (if at all) at present.
Don’t provincial newspapers have websites of their own for reporting these things when they happen, or have they been sidelined for waiting for that quaint process involving paper and ink? Likewise why should the BBC stop its news reporting just because ITV, Channel 4 and Sky, etc., all have news bulletins and channels?
And finally, the Lonely Planet deal was made by BBC Worldwide *not* the BBC, although to James Murdoch they’re presumably all the same, as with the Government/the BBC allegedly being “state sponsored” despite the open conflict(s) between the two (cf: Hutton Report, etc.).
The American newspaper sector is in a parlous state, and for reasons that have nothing to do with the BBC: free classified sites like Craig’s List have drained the lifeblood of local and regional newspapers. Over here, we have sites like Gumtree.
The BBC may be taking some flack for things like its online news operation, but if its print competitors are experiencing the same problems that their compatriots are in markets where the BBC does not operate, you have to cast your net a bit wider to find possible causes of the problem.
(Incidentally, Didn’t Ofcom publish a report a couple of months ago that found that Sky had abused its dominant position in areas like football (remember Setanta?) and movies? David Elstein said on Friday that it was ironic for James Murdoch to cite Germany as an example of good regulation: the Germans would have shut Sky down years ago.)
The only trouble with Murdoch blaming the BBC for all his problems and suggesting that the US has the media model to base the UK’s on is that media, notably newspapers, in the US – with no BBC to blame – are in an even worse state than they are here.
The fact is that the days of traditional newspapers are fast coming to an end. Media businesses make money where there is scarcity. While it was difficult to get information on what’s happening, then making that information available was valuable. But today, everyone is reporting news in one way or another, so event information itself is virtually free, and the newspapers don’t even get it to the public first. Sorry, guys, it’s a fact. There will soon be no room for “news” papers.
So where’s the scarcity? Where are the places you can make money? there are several: Fact-checking – everyone can tweet or blog the news as it happens, but who is telling the truth (look at how quickly Iranian opposition tweets were compromised); Analysis – we all have the raw information, now let’s assemble it and make sense of it, sort the wheat from the chaff and tell us what’s important; Comment – is it a good thing or a bad thing, and why? What do informed people think is going on? This is where today’s print media can shine, providing evaluation and long-form analysis that’s impossible on TV (and not particularly easy on a web page).
Trying to hold back the waves of digital change is something worthy of King Canute, and equally foolhardy. The BBC is without doubt the best broadcaster in the world and the envy of a great many others: killing it off is not an answer to anything.
And when it comes to broadcasting, while there is certainly an argument that suggests that the BBC should focus its programming on the things that the commercial content providers are not doing, you can equally argue that the BBC is already doing that, for example by offering to support regional television news when ITV decided this was one more area of its public service commitment, along with children’s TV, that it would rather release. Commercial providers can hardly complain. We want proven quality and depth in our programming, and that is something that the BBC provides, and the commercial boys would rather not have anything to do with. If they want to compete, why don’t they try and make some decent programming that’s actually worth watching?