Category Archives: Broadcasting

Media release: Former Newsnight editor appointed as director of BBC Vision

George Entwistle has been named as director of BBC Vision following what the broadcaster called “an extensive recruitment search” after Jana Bennett’s departure earlier this year.

Entwistle, a former editor of Newsnight, will take up the post with immediate effect. As part of his role he will also oversee Vision Productions and have editorial oversight for UKTV.

I am genuinely honoured to have been chosen for the role of director, BBC Vision.

The BBC’s television portfolio is of enormous importance to the creative and cultural life of the UK and is performing strongly in terms of quality and audience reach and share.

At the heart of its success, BBC Vision Productions is responsible for some of the best television programmes we broadcast.

I feel enormously proud to be leading these teams and I will do my utmost to build on the legacy of talent and excellence left by my predecessor, Jana Bennett.

You can see his full BBC biography here…

News teams nominated for 2011 BAFTAs

Nominations have been announced for the 2011 British Academy Television Awards, with production teams at the BBC, Channel 4, ITV and Sky all nominated within the News Coverage category.

The production teams behind BBC1’s Ten O’Clock News: Handover of Power, Channel 4 News: From Chile’s Ecstacy to Congo’s Agony, ITV News at Ten: The Cumbria Murders and Sky News: Egypt Crisis, all made the official list of nominations.

Other categories within the awards, which will be presented at a ceremony on 22 May in London, include Current Affairs, Single Documentary and Factual Series.

Metro: World media gear up for the wedding

The Metro this morning reported that “an international army” of 8,000 broadcast journalists and technicians, covering the Royal Wedding on Friday, will be operating from a temporary multimedia village in Green Park.

According to the Metro major networks have spent around £50,000 to set up temporary studios offering Buckingham Palace as a backdrop. Interest “has been strongest” in the US, the Metro report adds.

CNN alone is dispatching at least 400 staffers, including 50 journalists and producers to cover the spectacle and plans several news special this week. Even the Weather Channel has caught royal wedding fever with its Wake Up With Al programme based in London.

CNN announced last month that it would also be sending one of its iReporters to London to cover the wedding.

Media release: BBC gets Queen’s Award for sports graphics system

The BBC reports its Research & Development department received a Queen’s Award for Enterprise today for its TV sports graphics system Piero.

By laying graphics over the TV pictures, Piero gives sports presenters and pundits another way to view and analyse crucial incidents in the games, and explain them more effectively to the audience.

According to the broadcaster the Piero system was initially created by BBC R&D and has since been developed and licensed internationally by Red Bee Media, with the award being jointly awarded to both organisations.

Piero works by creating a virtual stadium, which is synchronised to the “real” pictures coming from the TV cameras. Pictures of real players are transposed into the virtual stadium, where it is possible to view and analyse the game from different angles in animated sequences.

In-game incidents, such as offsides and forward passes can be assessed by pundits from the best angle – even if the play has not been captured at this angle.

The system can also render graphics such as distance markings so that they appear tied to the pitch.

The BBC press release can be seen here…

Guardian: Royal Channel to cover wedding from all angles

Next week’s royal wedding is to be live streamed via YouTube, the Guardian reports, to accompany coverage on the official wedding website, on Facebook and on Flickr.

According to the Guardian Prince William’s press office will also be producing a live blog with commentary offering historical information, additional photographs and video footage, along the live stream on the Royal Channel on YouTube. See more on this on the official royal wedding website.

Besides the four-hour live web coverage, including the ceremony at Westminster Abbey, route to Buckingham Palace, and the newlyweds’ balcony appearance, there will be a video wedding book “for the public to sign”.

Media release: Al Jazeera launches new social media show The Stream

Al Jazeera this week confirmed the launched its new social media show The Stream, which will aggregate stories from online sources and discussions.

The broadcaster claims the show is “the first of its kind” and demonstrates its “commitment to using new media as a key source for news and information”.

At the media140 conference last week, Al Jazeera’s head of social media Riyaad Minty spoke about the value of online sources such as bloggers within the country before and during the revolutions. He said that at its peak Al Jazeera’s citizen media platform Sharek was receiving up to 1,600 videos per day, prompting the broadcaster to work on building its resources to dealing with, and verifying, this material.

The Stream, which launched this week in beta form with broadcasting due to begin in May, will monitor activity on the web and use live breaking accounts to present its viewers “with real-time development from around the world” a release said.

There is also a microsite for the show which “will allow the conversation to continue 24-hours per day”.

Visitors are encouraged to take part in the editorial direction of the show by adding comments and links and will have the opportunity to watch the final programming preparations in the five minutes before the show goes live on air.

Media release: PA signs UK video news deal for US with AP

The Press Association has signed “a landmark deal” with the Associated Press to distribute PA’s UK video news footage through the US wire’s archive.

Under the new agreement AP’s archive customers will be able to access more than 18,000 UK videos, with new content from PA added on a daily basis.

A release from both parties says the deal will help the PA extend the reach of its footage beyond the UK and “significantly bolster the UK news element of AP’s video offering”.

It added the stories supplied to AP have been “specifically designed as ‘archive-friendly’ compilations of the rushes from which the story was created”.

Fully shortlisted, the stories provide customers with longer sequences and greater depth than the tightly edited packages offered by other suppliers.

See the full release here…

BBC Scotland’s head of news to step down

BBC Scotland’s head of news and current affairs, Atholl Duncan, is stepping down, the corporation has announced.

Duncan will take up a role as executive director, UK and Global, for ICAS – the professional body for accountants, after overseeing coverage of the Scottish election on 5 May.

Duncan has been in charge of the BBC’s Scottish news operation since December 2006. He first joined the corporation in 1984 and worked in a variety of senior news roles.

In a release, BBC Scotland director Ken MacQuarrie paid tribute to Duncan’s commitment and professionalism: “Atholl has played a key role in delivering high quality journalism for our audiences, however they choose to consume it. Under his stewardship, our news team has won a string of awards and we wish him well in his new role.”

Following Duncan’s departure, John Boothman will become acting head of news and current affairs until the role is filled on a permanent basis.

#media140 – Get messy with mobile journalism, says Adam Westbrook

Quantity over quality – that needs to be the mindset for mobile journalists, UK online video journalist Adam Westbrook said today at the #media140 conference in Barcelona.

While there are similarities between video journalists and mobile journalists, being the latter, by its nature, is about being in a particular place, he said, and the ability to get information out quickly, and in volume.

You need the drive to be where the story is and once you’re there to get as close as you can. You’re not restricted to being close to the action. There is also the mindset of speed … You have to have an ‘always on’ mindset, always carrying your gear with you and always be looking for a story. Switch on and get your phone out and get some coverage straight away.

Because mobile journalism is still so new, you also need to be very willing to experiment. This runs across all spheres of journalism. It is about getting messy, in a way, there is no roadmap, there is no path.

Westbrook opened his presentation with the great example of UK journalist Alex Wood and his colleagues’ coverage of the G20 summit in 2009, despite being kept in a containment area. Unlike the mainstream media, unable to get their tapes out of the area, Wood’s team were able to connect to wifi and report on what was happening using their mobiles.

They sent Tweets and uploaded photos from their phones. For Alex and his colleagues its became quite a landmark moment for their journalism. Because they were mobile they had the advantage over the mainstream media. It really shows the potential that mobile journalism has.

Another practical advantage was illustrated in a photo Westbrook showed next, of a broadcast team filming an interview with numerous members of crew, a camera, autoprompter, lighting and “miles of cable”.

In comparison, the typical mobile journalism setup consists of a camera which doubles up as a phone, a high quality microphone, a mifi connector and a small tripod, he said.

Technology has allowed mobile journalism to happen as it does. Also the infrastructure has improved, there’s wifi in more places and high speed broadband.”

So what could the future hold for mobile journalism? Westbrook’s ideas were:

  • Location based news
  • Geo-tagging
  • Mobile moving mainstream
  • More citizen reporting

Guardian: ITN chief executive’s pay package nearly £700K

ITN chief executive John Hardie earned £682,000 in 2010, the Guardian reports.

The boss of the commercial broadcaster received less than the director general of the BBC, Mark Thompson for the year, however.

According to this article in the Telegraph published in July last year, Thompson received £838,000, including a £163,000 pension top-up.

The ITN chief executive, John Hardie, saw his total remuneration package rise last year to £682,000 as the broadcaster recorded a pre-tax profit of £400,000.

Hardie received a base salary of £350,000 in 2010, as well as a further £300,000 in bonus and benefits payments, according to the ITV News and Channel 4 News broadcaster’s full-year accounts published last week.

The former Disney executive took home a total remuneration package of £238,000 in 2009, after joining the company in June that year.

The Guardian’s full article is at this link.

Comment: Is the director general of the BBC overpaid in relation to the ITN boss? Or is the ITN boss, who is operating in a harsh commercial climate, underpaid?