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BBC annual report: executive bonuses remain despite job cuts and calls for management restructure

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The BBC’s executive directors’ pay rose by £708,000 in 2007/8 with pay for the 10 directors totalling £4,960,000, according to figures from the corporation’s annual report.

Jana Bennett, director of BBC Vision, received a bonus of £41,000, while outgoing director of Future Media & Technology Ashley Highfield received £34,000. Director general Mark Thompson rejected the offer of an annual bonus.

Both the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) and BECTU have challenged the rises in light of 2,500 proposed job cuts at the corporation announced in October.

“Management should have the decency to show restraint at a time when so many BBC staff are under huge pressures following major cutbacks. This announcement will only serve to disillusion staff further,” Paul McLaughlin, NUJ broadcasting organiser, said in a statement from the union.

Michael Lyons, chairman of the BBC Trust, reiterated the need to improve the management structure of bbc.co.uk before approving further investment. In May the site’s management was blamed for losing ‘effective control’ after a £36 million overspend.

More figures from the report:

  • average monthly page impressions for bbc.co.uk are more than 3.6 billion, while weekly unique users average more than 33 million;
  • BBC Mobile is the ‘most accessed’ mobile browser for news, sport and weather in the UK;
  • levels of audience trust in the BBC have remained steady year-on-year with 75 per cent of viewers rating BBC news programming as ‘fair, informed and balanced

BBC Worldwide

Analysis of BBC Worldwide (part of the annual report and separate reviews released) emphasised the importance of online in growing its global audience. The service’s online audience rose 34 per cent year-on-year. However, the review highlighted the failure of Spanish-language site BBC Mundo to meet the demands of increased internet access.

The launch of BBC Arabic came in for particular praise in the review, creating ‘trimedia’ BBC coverage in Arabic:

“With the launch of BBC Arabic television, our multimedia strategy took a giant step forward. That moment in March 2008 marked the successful culmination of a four-year journey to secure funding and deliver a high-quality television service in a vital region of the world.”

Online revenues accounted for 2.7 per cent of total sales for BBC Worldwide in 2007/8 – rising from 1.1 per cent previously, the report said. The creation of bbc.com and syndication deals with YouTube and iTunes were cited as key revenue drivers for the service.

links for 2008-07-01

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Belgian newspapers seeking £39m damages from Google

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A group of Belgian newspapers are seeking up to £39m (€49m) in damages from Google for the search giant publishing and storing their content without permission or offering payment.

Last year Google lost a case brought against it by the Copiepresse group – an organisation that represents the French language press in Belgium – forcing it to remove cached versions of newspaper articles and take down content from its Google News service

The organisation’s secretary-general told Bloomberg yesterday it had summoned Google to appear again before a Brussels court so that it could decide on the damages. Copiepresse is seeking between €32.8 and 49.1m.

The damages would be in addition to the €25,000 (£20,000) daily fine imposed on Google by the court for each day it kept Copiepresse material on its site.

Google appealed the original court decision of February 2007, which ruled that it could not claim ‘fair use’ – acceptable under copyright law – for using a lines of text and linking to the original article.

A Google spokesperson told Bloomberg that it was still awaiting the results of its appeal and that it had not received notification from Copiepresse of any new court dates.

Future websites attracting over 11m unique users per month

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Future publishing’s portfolio of websites, which includes TechRadar.com and GamesRadar.com, are attracting over 11 million unique users per month, figures released today suggest.

GamesRadar alone attracts three million page views a day, according to the publisher’s financial report for the six months to March 31.

The report also stated that revenue from digital advertising now accounts for 19 per cent of the group’s total advertising revenue – an increase from 15 per cent last year.

“Our digital strategy, which attracts the lion’s share of our investment in new product development, is at a very exciting stage. With the launch of MusicRadar and TechRadar networks earlier this year, we now have pillar online properties in each of our specialist sectors,” Stevie Smith, chief executive of Future, said in the release.

However, operating profit for the publisher fell from £7.7 million over the same period in 2007 to £5.2 million.

PA Group appoints James Murdoch as non-executive director

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James Murdoch, chairman and chief executive, Europe and Asia News Corporation, has joined the PA Group board as a non-executive director.

Murdoch’s appointment, which was announced today as the group released its financial report for 2007, is one of a series of changes to the board with Sir Harry Roche stepping down after 20 years as a director and 13 years as chairman.

The group announced a 25 per cent growth in revenues from its digital business, but a drop of £1.2 million in its total operating profits.

The fall from £2.6 million in 2006 to £1.4 million in 2007 was a result of significant multimedia investment, the group said.

DMGT digital revenues boosted by search portals while local media profits fall

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Revenue for Associated Northcliffe Digital (AND), the digital division of Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT), rose by 12 per cent to £46 million over the six months to the end of 2008, boosted by specialist search portals Jobsite, Findaproperty and Primelocation.

However, AND’s total operating profits fell by £3.6 million to £2.2 million after developing automative website Motors.co.uk, according to the group’s report released today.

Operating profits from the group’s local media assets under the Northcliffe media division fell by £4.9 million (13 per cent) to £33.8 million over the same period.

Associated Newspapers also posted a drop in operating profits, but stressed the acquisition of a new printing facility at Didcot was a key factor in this downturn.

Guardian: Indian Premier League to live stream matches online and on mobile

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The Indian Premier League has signed a deal to stream live coverage of cricket matches on the internet and mobile devices.

The deal, which is reported to be worth £25 million over 10 years, will cover India, Pakistan and the Middle East and will be a subscription based service.

Online Journalism Scandinavia: Metro Sweden’s deal with Schibsted part of its ‘Freesheets 2.0′ strategy

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Norwegian media giant Schibsted this morning announced that it’s paying £30m to take a 35 per cent stake in the Swedish edition of Metro International’s free newspaper.

In what is a key freesheet market the former rivals have forged a partnership to collaborate on advertising sales with the new company offering advertisers the chance to reach 4.2 million readers across the Metro and Schibsted paid-for dailies Aftonbladet and Dagbladet.

In February, Metro International CEO, Per Mikael Jensen, discussed his company’s strategic goals with Journalism.co.uk saying that consolidation and online innovation would be key for the development of his newspapers, in what he called the ‘freesheet 2.0 phase.’

“We are entering a freesheet 2.0 phase where we are consolidating our core business and looking at more ways to attract readers,” said Jensen, who succeeded Pelle Törnberg as head of Metro in 2007.

In Sweden, this consolidation will mean Schibsted will stop publication of its free paper Punkt SE with immediate effect so that the new joint venture can focus print advertising around a single free title.

The deal has similarities with the one Metro struck at the end of 2007, when it sold 60 per cent of its Czech operation to its competitor Mafra.

The freesheet giant is currently undergoing a strategic review, and when Journalism.co.uk spoke to him, Jensen said we could expect more deals of this nature.

Today, Jensen refused to rule out further consolidations when questioned by Danish media and said he expected dramatic changes in the Danish newspaper market in the coming months (but refused to go into details).

“We do not just sit there and wait for the strategic review to be completed, but implement strategy from day to day. Strategy is something we evaluate each month. Those who believe the strategic review we now are in the middle of will become some sort of bible, will be disappointed,” said Jensen in the interview with Journalism.co.uk.

In addition, Metro is looking to attract more readers online. It’s launching new versions of its websites in all its markets – it recently launched online for the first time in France – and will consolidate some of its editorial activities by creating an internal news agency in London which will serve all its editions.

Jensen is behind Metro’s new developments and alliances but he remains as pessimistic as ever about the future of paid-for printed newspapers.

“I would be very surprised if more than 25 per cent of today’s paid-for newspapers exist in ten years. Of the newspapers that will survive, many of them will be published online only, or make its paper edition free,” Jensen said.

The two newspaper giants may have forged a partnership in Sweden but they remain embroiled in a head-to-head competition over their market leading freesheets in France and Spain.

However, Metro International still has a lot of work to do to convince investors that its business model – the company is still loss-making even though it narrowed its first quarter net loss to £5.1 m – has a profitable future.

Press Gazette: Express editor Hill leaves PCC after McCann libel payout

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Daily Express editor Peter Hill has left the Press Complaints Commission.

The move follows two months after his newspaper (along with its sister Sunday and the Star and Sunday Star) published front page apologies and paid the parents of missing child Madeleine McCann £550,000 in libel damages.

He’s replaced on the 17 strong commission by Mail on Sunday editor Peter Wright.

FollowTheMedia site faces closure

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News and commentary website FollowTheMedia could be shut down unless €35,000 (£27,444) is raised by May 16.

FTM, which focuses primarily on US and European media news and analysis, did not give any reasons for the potential closure in an announcement on its site.

The site is urging readers to make donations or register for membership – annual membership costs €99. Alternatively sponsorship packages are available for €1,000 a year. Это гарантирует игрокам надежную защиту от манипуляций казино в свою пользу, чем, к сожалению, нередко грешат многие другие игорные операторы. А еще в этом казино неплохой набор игр — много слотов, есть настольные игры, рулетка и игры с live-дилерами. Всего в два клика проходит регистрация в казино Пин Ап , после которой ты получиш стартовый бонус. На портале доступны лицензионные слоты ведущих провайдеров, крупные бонусы для новых клиентов, интересные акции для постоянных игроков и многое другое. Не могу сказать что я любитель такого бонуса, но я думаю фанаты у такого типа бонуса так же есть.