Interactive TV - A Swindle?

The most basic form of interactive TV is viewers phoning in to programmes. It's also potentially the most profitable for the TV companies. BBC's Panorama programme has uncovered just how profitable and potentially corrupt this form of interactivity can be.

On the commercial channels, like ITV and Channel 4, callers can often pay up to £1 per call. Their calls are usually handled by an outside telecommunications company - in the case of GMTV this was a company called Opera. Panorama revealed that Opera was choosing winners from the GMTV competition callers before the lines were officially meant to close, meaning that many callers were continuing to call in, thinking they might win, when they actually had no chance of doing so. This is similar to selling raffle tickets and then not putting them into the drum to be drawn out. It's alleged that this could have amounted over £12m pounds being defrauded from viewers who called in. GMTV has apologised for this and claims to have had no knowledge of the alleged fraud.

But why do we have so many of these phone-ins in the first place?

Mark Thompson, director general of the BBC, claims that it's down to audience demand - many viewers like to interact with programming in this way so the BBC provides them with this opportunity. I suspect that in the BBC's case it's as much about competition as audience demand - so many of the commercial channels do it, thereby creating expectation amongst the audience that programmes will include such opportunities.

For commercial channels it's as much linked to a much bigger problem (created by the growth of other new media technologies like DVRs and the internet) - the decrease in advertising revenue. For a channel like ITV, who traditionally made all its money from advertising, the chance to make money from viewers using premium rate numbers to call in is too good to pass up. In fact, they've developed whole new digital channels to benefit from this new revenue stream (way of making money) - the quiz channel, ITV Play. According to Panorama, ITV Play made £8 million in its first year of operation, while the total prize money given out was £20,000.

Year 13 Press Regulation - Is Privacy More Important Than Freedom of Expression?

As promised, click on the title above to go to the Guardian article on the Loreena McKennitt case. She's a folk singer who successfully prevented a (former?) friend from publishing large parts of a book about their relationship, claiming that it invaded her privacy. This sets an important precendent for future cases that might be taken on these grounds. What will it mean for all those "kiss 'n' tell" stories that are the lifeblood of the Sunday tabloids? How might it affect the earning potential of all the WAGs an wannabe WAGs? How will the audience survive without salacious tales of footballers and pop stars misbehaving? More seriously, will this mean that public figures will be able to behave in a very hypocritical manner without ever being held to account for it? Imagine a situation where an evangelical bishop was able to block a story about a homosexual relationship on the basis that it invaded his privacy, while every Sunday he preached about how wrong homosexuality is.

Minority Report Almost a Reality

This one covers both NEW MEDIA (Year 12) and BROADCAST NEWS (Year 13). Before I go on, a reminder to sign up for the Media Guardian online - it's free and only by doing so will you be able to access this story. I know it takes time but it's time well spent.

The 3 mobile network will soon be sending its users personally targetted ads when they choose to watch news and sports updates provided by ITN. Here we're moving away from the idea of niche audiences, let alone mass audiences, and towards the concept of individual audiences. You may have seen Tom Cruise's character in Minority Report being bombarded with ads designed specifically for him. This is a classic example of how new media technologies offer even greater personalisation of media consumption and experiences.

From a news perspective, this carries all sorts of potential consequences. It increases competition for other traditional broadcast news providers like the BBC. However, it also shows that established news providers like ITN are inscreasingly turning to new technologies as a way of reaching audiences, expecially younger audiences (read the article to see the types of stories that may typically be sent to customers' phones. Within this there is also a threat to the role of broadcast news in helping to create informed citizens. News plays an important function in society. By informing the audience about events in our local and global community, the news empowers us to make more informed decisions about how we want to be governed and how we want to relate to other members of our community. If, however, we increasingly receive personally tailored news updates (by choosing the types of stories that are sent to our mobile phones, e-mail or Yahoo / MSN homepage) we will lose touch with the wider range of stories offered through longer news bulletins on traditional news outlets (e.g. 10 o'clock news on BBC 1 or the Channel 4 news), thereby becoming less well armed when it comes to making decisions about who to vote for or even whether it makes any difference to buy fair trade coffee or not. This is also true of those people who increasingly rely on blogs to find out what's happening in the world because they feel mainstream news media is just too, well, mainstream. By relying on blogs, or even newspapers for that matter, that they feel represent their perspective, they are reinforcing that particular perspective and limiting themselves to certain amount of information. Of course, some would argue that they read a range of blogs, which of course would overcome this difficulty. However, there is the issue of time - how many people have the time to devote to properly informing themselves in this way? So, I guess what all this boils down to is a question of whether you think the traditional broadcast news outlets still have a role to play, and if so how important a role?

Year 13 Issues and Debates Sample Questions

As I mentioned in the revision session this morning, you can click on the title above and go to the Mark Scheme for the Janauary exam of this year. There you will find the questions that were set for the Issues and Debates paper, including the one we went through in class, together with bullet points on what students might include in an answer. Practising answering the questions can be a great way to go through all your notes and refamiliarising yourself with the material. Most of all you should be practising structuring your responses.

Have Apple Bitten Off More Than They Can Chew?

The EU Commission (that’s the part of the European Union that regulates business and protects consumers in Europe) has started an investigation into the way that Apple allegedly limits the choice of music consumers who use iTunes. According to European Law, consumers should be free to buy the same product from anywhere in Europe, thus allowing them to shop around for the best price. However, if you use iTunes in Britain you can only buy from iTunes in Britain, meaning that you pay 79p for a track, compared to 66p if you were able to buy it from iTunes in France. Apple claim that their hands are tied by the record companies who supply them with the tracks. This is a classic example of how the internet has allowed institutions like Apple and the big record companies to take advantage of the lack of regulation aimed specifically at the internet. The regulators (in this case the EU Commission) are having to play catch up in an effort to protect consumers.

Do Rights Matter – What is DRM?

The BBC has an excellent article explaining exactly what is meant by Digital Rights Management. This is a key issue in the age of the internet and has major implications for how institutions continue to make a profit from the media content that audiences consume.

Can Gaming Kill the Cinema Star?

Computer games have come a long way since the Pong and Space Invaders. Where they were essentially a series of lines and dots on the screen, today’s games have almost cinema quality graphics and sound; so much so that many movie franchises like James Bond and Star Wars have extended their brand with a catalogue of computer games. Whatever the quality of the visuals and sound, however, games have, up until now, never been able to offer the audience the same depth of characterisation, quality of dialogue or compelling narratives as cinema. So while games may offer the audiences more interactivity than a movie, their ability to become a truly immersive experience has been limited by these shortcomings. Keen to develop new audiences, and improve the experience of existing one, the games industry is now looking to Hollywood screenwriters to help them overcome these problems. Click on the title above to read more about this and ask yourself whether games will eventually replace cinema as a mass entertainment form.