BBC TVC By Night by Lee Jordan licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic
It all started with James Murdoch’s keynote speech at the Edinburgh International Television Festival, in which he called for a “far, far smaller” BBC. Since then the BBC has put up a spirited defense (including a very angry Robert Peston), beleaguered commercial broadcasters have commented, Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw has weighed in and opinion polls have been taken. Has the BBC (now being criticised by MPs for its purchase of Lonely Planet) gotten too big? Is its news service stopping others charging for online content? Does a strong BBC restrict plurality in the broadcasting market? Or is the BBC a guarantor of free speech and quality? Would a smaller public service broadcaster begin a race to the bottom for British media, or usher in a new golden age? Perhaps more importantly, is the BBC simply a media company to compete (and be regulated alongside) others, or a vital part of our national fabric, to be protected like schools and the NHS?
However the debate is resolved in the short term it’s more likely that technology will change the debate far more than we can imagine, and the sacred cows and targets of today may be irrelevant tomorrow.
Mike Sharpe says: September 23, 2009 @ 3:50 pm
If the BBC were ’smaller’, what would then happen? Would other organisations and/or spin-offs move into those areas which it vacated?
And what does one mean by ’smaller’ – in budget, breadth or depth of activities, or capability?
This seems to be part of a moving picture going way back to privatisation / deregulation of the 1990s in UK. One can take a ‘market vs public sector broadcasting’ approach or even make a distinction between ‘content providers’and ‘delivery mechanisms’.
If one takes a view of the ‘theory of the firm’ based on resources and capabilities (pace Professor Robert Grant) the BBC is probably about the right size from a theoretical point of view. However there are a number of identifiable pressures and vested interests (namely the multinational news corporations) which will act to restrict its size in terms of its breadth of activities, and thus become ’smaller’. It may go the way to the sad end of UK nationalised industries under Thatcherism, but it probably won’t get any bigger.
In my view the current slimming down of BBC TV News regional content is one bad effect of it getting ‘much much smaller’, because it has implications for the role of the informed free Press in a pluralist society. I’d therefore say it shouldn’t get much smaller, but it could stop paying its ‘talent’ quite so much (Jonathon Ross being the example).
Cherry Gordon says: September 25, 2009 @ 3:28 am
No. The BBC is outstanding for its international coverage and involvement of listeners around the world, free to express different viewpoints. The world would be a lesser place as far as current events and comment, were the BBC to be downsized.