BusinessBlog

TV and the Web: Two Tribes Go To War

By Nick Lockey on Mar 5, 08 10:20 PM in Creative industries

A few months ago, I attended a briefing for a broadcaster's new commissioning

round. Representing a particularly progressive department in a notoriously forward
thinking channel, the commissioners were adamant that they were going to hammer
the multiplatform message home and decided to invite an equal number of traditional
TV indies and new media production companies to come along and explore how
they could combine their efforts.
I think they were hoping to usher in a shining new era where telly luvvies and the
new geek army would fall hopelessly in love with each other and skip off merrily into
a brave new world of hybrid media together.
What they got instead was more akin to the Sharks and the Jets from West Side
Story.
Throughout the increasingly awkward Q&A session that followed, many of the die
hard TV traditionalists argued that they neither understood or particularly cared
about online content and seemed extremely concerned that a broadcaster would
even think about diverting so much of their budget away from TV.
The new media crowd, for their part, protested that they couldn't figure out the TV
commissioning system, and admitted they were struggling to get their heads round
the "broadcast sensibilities" that the commissioners desperately wanted to instil in
their projects.
I sat at the back watching the widening rift and couldn't help thinking both sides
were missing the point.
What we have here is an opportunity to try out something completely new. It's not
about us playing by their rules or either party having to shoe-horn their values into a
new way of work ing. It's about each side bringing their strengths and experience to
the table and creating something bigger than the sum of its parts.
Instead of fearing change and hoping that this whole multiplatform thing is a fad that
will quietly go away, the broadcasting sector needs to open its eyes and see the
digital age for what it is: an unprecedented opportunity to move our art form forward.
Television is a powerful medium for telling stories and, for most of us working in the
industry, the desire to craft and share narratives is the very thing that keeps us
hooked. Whether it's a BBC costume drama, a fly-on-the-wall documentary, a
reality series or a game show, the heroic struggle of triumph over adversity forms
the kernel of what we try and convey. And on the whole, I think we do a damn good
job of it.
For new media companies looking for interesting, lucrative and creatively
challenging avenues to explore, the broadcasting sector represents a massive
opportunity to break new ground. By collaborating with experienced TV production
teams, they can channel their own creativity and technical expertise into an
industry, and more importantly a talent base, that is well versed in the business of
telling great narratives and hungry for new ways of doing so.
Therefore the rise of blogging, IPTV, video sharing, social networks, alternate reality
gaming, wik is, podcasts and all the other trappings of the digital age shouldn't be
seen as a threat to 'traditional' media producers, but rather a gift. Suddenly we have
a whole new toolbox to play with and a hundred new ways to tell our stories, reach
new audiences and to collaborate with our viewers like never before.
I genuinely feel that the broadcasting and new media industries have a great deal to
learn from each other and that by working together we can achieve things that it

would be impossible to do apart. Indeed, TV must evolve to embrace these new

platforms or risk being left on the shelf as our lives move increasingly online.
After all, there's no more benefit in displaying stubborn mastery over a medium that
losing ground than there is in creating a new medium that fails to learn from what
has gone before. After all, you could be the best hieroglyph carver in the world but if
you don't get the hang of papyrus sooner or later then nobody is going to be paying
attention any more.
If the medium is the message then the message to the broadcasting industry is
clear: embrace new platforms or get left behind.
What do you think - do TV and the web really need to join forces or are they better
off sticking to what they know?

BusinessBlog
Indiana Jones and the Search Engine of
Revelation
By Nick Lockey on Jun 22, 08 01 :03 PM in Creative industries

A whip cracks in the darkness of an ancient tomb. Flickering torchlight casts the
shadow of our fedora-clad hero as he stoops in the gloom, his hand sweeping away
ten thousand years of grime from a forgotten relic. As the dust falls away an ancient
clue is gradually revealed and the secrets of a long-dead civilisation come slowly
into focus.
Like practically every 20-something bloke I know, I've been swept up in Indiana
Jones fever, eagerly anticipating last month's release of Indy 4 by reliving all of those
backyard fantasies of fighting Nazis, dodging fiendish booby traps and snatching
priceless relics from highly improbable places.
Whether watching an ageing Dr. Jones creak his way through two hours of sci-fi
mumbo-jumbo was actually worth the 19 year wait is a matter for debate, but the
recent tidal wave of Indy mania got me pondering our own place in the annals of
recorded history.
And I came to the conclusion that we're a future anthropologist's dream come true.
I mean just think about it- the social networking boom of the early 21st century has
seen millions of ordinary people documenting the minutiae of their everyday lives
like never before.
From the momentous to the banal our actions and experiences are recorded in
millions of biogs, wall posts, tweets, tags and comments. Every inch of the planet is
put on display through Google Maps, YouTube videos, and Flickr photos.
Factor in the environmental doom-mongering about air travel, carbon credits,
dwindling resources and the homogenisation of our global culture, and it's no stretch
of the imagination to conclude that we might be the last generation with true
freedom to explore our planet and document the unique cultures we encounter.
But, with more and more social networking horrors stories emerging all the time,
many of us are already beginning to fall out of love with our urge to lay our lives bare
online. Indeed the full consequences of the social networking revolution may not be
felt for several years. Sooner or later, however, as those skeletons begin to tumble
from the digital closet and people find their careers, personal relationships and
personal privacy increasingly tarnished by the things they've uploaded in the past,
the social networking bubble will probably burst for good.
So in a nutshell, the present civilisation blogging and uploading its way to
distraction will have documented its existence in infinitely more detail than any
generation before it. And, when the inevitable fallout kills the craze all together and
we wise up to the consequences of what we have done, then it is likely that no-one
will ever be naive enough to do it again with such fervour, passion or candidness.
In short, we could be set to become like a digital version of the citizens of Pompeii,
caught in the fall-out of an impending digital disaster but with our lives perfectly
preserved around us; a perfect snapshot of a few short years at the turn of the 21st
century. Presuming that digital archives are transferred from generation to
generation over the next 100, 1000 or even 10,000 years, we could well turn out to
be the most scrutinised, analysed and discussed generation in history.
This should give us food for thought in terms of our current notions of online privacy.
Sure, you can beef up the security setting1s on your Facebook profile to Fort Knox
proportions today to stop your boss seeing your dodgy holiday snaps, but who's to
say you won't fall pray to the digital grave robbers of the future?