But having once upon a time been shared a dinner table with OfCom at an invite-only do last summer and having now – once – walked the corridors of Horseferry Road on the back of our oh-so welcome 4iP gig, how OfCom, Channel Four and the future of the nation’s PSB platforms is still of interest.

And we have touched on it before; as I tried to explain why I thought ‘backchat’ might have first tickled 4iP’s fancy last month – given that it was evidence of us at MyFootballWriter re-thinking the way we service our public’s media needs….

http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=201 …

Just as the great and the good at 4iP have set themselves their own goal of ‘Rethinking Public Service Media’.

And clearly there’s a lot of re-thinking to do as Channel Four looks to find new friends amid some increasingly turbulent seas; more a case of working out whose life-raft was leaking less, than actually setting sail for calmer waters with a sure and certain hand on the tiller.

They’re bobbing around, clinging onto the nearest piece of flotsam and jetsam like the rest of us, in short.

But this line did raise an eyebrow – if only for two of the medals that OfCom opted to pin upon C4’s chest.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jan/21/ofcom-channel-4

Or rather… “In addition to engaging audiences across a range of content, this might include a more explicit commitment to news and current affairs, additional responsibilities to older children, a much more significant commitment to programming made outside of London and in the devolved nations, and a pivotal role in delivering public service content in digital media,” the regulator added…

Put the phrases ‘more explicit commitment to news’, a ‘more significant commitment to programming made outside of London and in the devolved nations’ [er, that could be 'local', then...] and that ‘pivotal role in delivering public service content in digital media’ together and I’m starting to warm to OfCom’s theme.

News. Local. Digital media.

Mmm. How do we re-think the way that we service the public’s local digital media needs…

If memory serves – and it is a badge that Ewan at 4iP still wears with unashamed pride – one of Channel Four’s original remits was to ‘make trouble’.

Well, I can think of at least one way that they could get right up the Newspaper Society’s nose. And tick at least three of OfCom’s wishes, to boot.

Borrow the BBC’s toys and boldly go where Auntie opted not to…

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But, there we go… a 4iP-funded project out of the door and sat there on www.myfootballwriter.com/norwichcity

It’s the one that says ‘Powered by backchat’; the rolling conversation feed with pictures of our punters; and, me, no more than the badged-up steward in the crowd; with my MFW logo pinned to my jacket; keeping the conversation queue moving along…

We are, Jamie tells me, the first 4iP project to ‘hit the streets’ this winter; or at least one that’s gone through the formal submission process on www.4iP.org.uk and so it would be remiss at this stage not to do a couple of swift thanks before diving into what on earth it is we’re talking about.

Usual suspects; Neil, Kev, Ian, Karl and all at ETT (Norwich), Pete, Tom and, of course, the Mrs. And Annette. Natch. Plus our Shanes and Pauls – of Telegraph and BCU fame respectively who have been on hand with their words of advice and encouragement.

OK, welcome to ‘backchat’.

In short, it is Emily Bell’s thoughts on journalism as a conversation; of this being the ‘Age Of Participation’ made web flesh… http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=164

It is also this idea of media being these ‘camp-fire communities’; places of warmth and welcome; and decent chatter… with the journalist merely there to throw more logs onto the fire; to pass round the mulled wine and the mince pies as the conversation ebbs and flows around him or her. All very D Cushman… http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=119

But, equally, it’s all very Stephen Fry – http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=181 – given that all we’re doing is employing both the same kind of technological tool kit and the same kind of ’shepherd with his flock’ thinking that underpins Stephen’s ever-growing Twitter empire.

There is, of course, the odd tweak. We use #ncfc on Twitter as opposed to #oscarwildeday to ‘channel’ the conversation through ‘backchat’; and we also use www.jaiku.com – going forward we suspect that there might be all manner of Google app goodies that we can apply to other passionate niche communities in need of a voice…

What ‘backchat’, therefore, allows for is ‘platform agnostic conversations’ – a term that, let it be recorded now, was first coined by our 4iP/Channel Four ‘handler’ Jamie Arnold.

Where this is all takes us going forward will be fascinating; it is very much a pilot project out of just one, passionate niche community; and given that this weekend is derby weekend in Norfolk and Ipswich are due in town this Sunday, said community is likely to be more passionate than normal over the next 48-72 hours.

Which will, potentially, lead us into moderation issues; can the measured, semi-detached voice of the journalist prove to be a calming influence? A voice of gentle reason? Will a passionate niche community listen? Who knows…

Bottom line? I firmly believe that journalism cannot afford – in any sense of the term – to live in its ivory tower any longer; our futures lie in the heart of our audiences; in the midst of their conversations.

We have to get down and dirty; we have to be seen to join them… to not be handing out tablets of stone at 7am every morning. Or 5pm every evening when the paper boys deigns to show.

Or, indeed, in TV terms at 6.30pm when the local TV news show is scheduled to be screened.

Media is this 24/7, moveable feast and having dined out for the last 300 years on feeding our punters little more than scraps off our table, we now need to join them at their table; be part of their conversation; be seen to listen; be seen to be willing to be part of a two-way process.

If we don’t – and if we’re not – they’ll move on. Leave us behind; talking to no-one, in particular.

And that’s ‘backchat’ – it’s an empowerment tool, just as www.addiply.com is.

We’re empowering what was once our audience to chat back. And all I’ve got to do now is to learn how to listen.

We’ve been round this block before; as have others – we’ve even proposed an idea that, say, Channel Four could become this ‘House Of Many Conversations’… if we could only just give all those passionate niche communities that gather around www.channel4.com/lost a ‘voice’…

http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=166

It’s actually quite interesting poking our nose round that little Lost community – they have a forum that seems to have withered on the vine of late…

http://community.channel4.com/groupee/forums/a/frm/f/4290090682

and a Lost blog that, spookily, appears either to have been written three days in advance – or is a year out of date. How very Lost…

http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/L/lost/blog/index.jsp

Either way and there’s some interesting ideas floating around both spaces – even if Lost itself has packed its bags and headed off to somewhere into Sky’s space, there are still a lot of familiar themes to be found…. of community, of shared passions, of a shepherd looking for her ‘Lost’ flock in the shape of the official Mistress of the Lost Masses, ‘The Other Girl’…

http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/L/lost/blog/aboutme.html

What’s interesting is what you could get if you ‘mashed’ forum and blogger together…

Made the two into one, 24/7 conversation that ‘The Other Girl’ led, sparked, managed, curated, moderated and mediated.

Maybe with a little help from one or two of her C4 pals. Maybe she even went a found a cast member from Lost and introduced them into the conversation.

Fascinating. Because, in more and more ways, my ‘reporter’ day job hosting and writing for www.myfootballwriter.com/norwichcity is seeing me morph into this new media hybrid; this bastard child of old and new media; part blogger, part journalist.

A jogger?

But I suspect in the none too distant future I am going to have step out of the ivory tower that was old media and join the conversation that lies at the heart of new media – and all in a very real sense.

That part of our new thinking may well be mingling with the masses; rubbing shoulders with what was once our audience and getting down and dirty with them – in their new worlds as our old one implodes beneath our feet.

The test may well be whether or not we can still hold our own in said company; whether whatever ‘brand’ recognition and trust we still enjoy as a passionate niche journalist will then allow us to if not command a conversation then to guide and influence one – particularly if when we enter the conversational fray we can come ‘badged’ up; like a steward at a mass rally; like a shepherd with his crook; like a cinema usher with her torch.

Of course, to achieve any of the above we’re going to need a new piece of kit; such practices are going to have to be technology-led.

But what if when we rummaged around in the new tool-box of our trade and bolted this bit onto that and screwed this application onto that premise, you could find a way of being this jogger? Where would that then take us?

Could we, finally, find a role for ourselves as a leader of the Lost?

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Almost as good as Channel Four versus the BBC over where are they going to get their missing £150 mill from… from BBC Worldwide, says Channel Four, that’s a nice little earner…

Yes, it is. Get your grubby mits off, says the BBC.

Besides, you sure you actually need this £150 mill? Couldn’t you make a few more savings instead, says the lean, mean fighting machine that is the BBC…

OK, OK… how about we give you a few of our local news clips. And that little desk in the corner there…

Superb.

As for the Newspaper Society, we’ve done this one before…. http://outwithabang.rickwaghorn.co.uk/?p=88

But anyway, here they go again -http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/jun/24/pressandpublishing.digitalmedia1

That when the BBC have a problem linking to external sites, it’s not because there’s a particular unwillingness on their part to move towards some level of content share… it’s because, practically, it’s a nightmare getting potential partners to ‘fit’ when you have to speak to Johnston Press for Diss, Archant for Norwich, Newsquest for Colchester, Archant for Ipswich, etc, etc.

That’s the reality.

But the other problem I have with the Newspaper Society’s position is this idea that the BBC is in danger of threatening the ‘plurality of local news’.

Mmm. Run that one again…

“The risks to plurality of local news should not be underestimated. The BBC is a highly-valued institution but it should not be given free rein to trample over commercial rivals and become the sole provider of local news in the UK,” says David Newell, director of the Newspaper Society.

The sole provider of local news…

Whereas before there has been this whole choir of local news ‘voices’; after all, I could pop next door to my newsagents in Loddon and buy the local morning paper, the Eastern Daily Press, the local evening newspaper, the Norwich Evening News – and, once a week, the local weekly paper, the mighty Beccles and Bungay Journal.

Owned, in no particular order, by Archant, Archant and, oh, Archant… clearly a real ‘plurality’ of voices there.

It is real, ‘Get off my lawn…’ stuff.

“The regional press has evolved into a successful multimedia industry in recent years, employing many thousands of journalists and newsgatherers dedicated to providing local news and information to readers and viewers across a multitude of platforms – paid, free, print, online and broadcast,” added Mr Newell.

“The local market is well-served and there is simply no gap which the BBC needs to fill.”

Simply no gap… Mmm.

Apart from in Stamford, of course, where there’s now only one, local newspaper now that TrinityMirror have consigned the venerable Stamford Herald & Post to the bin.

There was a real ‘plurality of voice’ in the very heart of Middle England – the Trinity-owned Herald & Post competing against the Johnston Press owned Stamford Mercury. Fantastic.

And who’s fault is it that the good people of Stamford have lost that plurality of choice? The ’successful multimedia industry ‘ that is the UK regional press? Or the nasty, competitive BBC’s?

The BBC’s. Clearly.

Still, it’s not all bad news. Given the Newspaper Society’s new-found role as the champion of plurality in local news, they will clearly have no problems whatsoever if we park a www.mylocalwriter.com tank on their front lawn…

After all, that’s what we’re after isn’t it? More than one local voice…