Large data and intermediary research on the latest strategies and ideas of BBC News reform

Recently, James Harding, director of the BBC News and current affairs department and News team director, James Harding a new strategy for editorial and programme adjustment in an internal speech for BBC News team staff and is scheduled to be completed by mid-October this year. The BBC Council has also passed a "BBC store" plan, a change that the BBC has responded to in the wake of the November 2007 reform.

If the 2007-year reform of the BBC News has been implemented by the media-oriented to divide the business and the organization to the business-oriented transformation, then this time will achieve business-oriented transformation of user behavior-oriented, reflecting the user-oriented, to intermediary and large data three new ideas. This transformation will bring BBC News closer to contemporary information consumption behavior, better meet the needs of new era users, and realize the seamless connection between BBC News and users.

Integrating news resources to increase core business investment

The first is to further promote the comprehensive integration of news resources. Resource integration is the key to the transformation of digital news and the integration of media. The main measures currently being implemented by the BBC include the integration of the BBC News Channel and World News, the merging of the radio News newsroom with the world news headlines and abstracts, and the merging of "The World of the Night" and "News Hour" into a newsroom, Continue to integrate the international news collection, service and monitoring Office, to achieve cooperation in office.

Second, increase the core business investment. Fusion is not a simple combination, or blindly thin body, but the thin thin, the fat fat. The BBC is not stingy with content innovation and technology research and development, especially in the original, rich news and digital news, the cost of direct content production in the calendar year is more than 60%, 2013/2014 is 64%, 2.4 billion pounds; 2012/2013 year is 66%, Count more than 2.5 billion pounds. and began employing professional editors for China, health and education, and a team of disabled journalists in the Salford area, as well as a small team of African-caribbean community, with a large number of political and urban journalists.

To be aware, since 2010, the BBC has laid off 220 people, and by 2016 the total number of layoffs has reached 415. In the context of digital news transformation, in addition to the increased investment in MYBBC, IPlayer and Future media in 2014, the BBC has also been broadcasting to local broadcast, news laboratories, IPTV, data news, digital weather services, TouchCast, career live, interactive news programs, Social and mobile transmissions put in 4 million pounds. Third, the cost of the non-business unit is compressed. The BBC is now reducing its headquarters function by more than 30% and merging the financial management of international news and services.

Reorganize news editors and program organizations to seamlessly connect user behavior

The BBC's Newsroom and program department (The newsroom and programmes Department) are now being restructured into three major sections: 24-hour news, daily news programmes, and current events Affairs). This is the BBC and the digital normal era to further promote the integration of the information sector concrete measures, its core is to the media, intermediation radio, television and internet, the boundaries between the deepening of business-oriented, but also to explore the user needs and news business close combination of a new path, that is, based on user access to news behavior to readjust the organization, We take the program department adjustment as an example to study this change.

1, 24-hour Department of Public Information. The focus of the sector is to integrate current television, radio and webcast and continuous news to provide uninterrupted, up-to-date live and digital news to all users overseas, with the aim of expanding the BBC's user base, which extends from a focused audience to a full media audience.

The department will integrate television news channels and the BBC online to provide live and digital news services for anyone and any place to live and digital news at the time of the incident. This includes live and digital news for the UK, news Channel, the one and UK online, and world-facing journalism, including magazines, Digital publishing and development business, including digital news and news laboratories, and five sections such as visual News (visual journalism) and Newsbeat.

2. Daily news program Department. The department is a new program department that integrates the daily news resources combined with six channels, 10 channels, morning news, World News and Radio Five Live news and four frequency Daily news, the current radio and The Newsroom of World News are merged, and the World News and the "Tonight World" of frequency four are merged. , which aims to provide the best news stories, excellent reports and professional news advice to the most numerous audiences every day.

3. The Department of current affairs. The Department is committed to interpreting news on the basis of public interest in order to investigate, explore and explain the world in which we live, mainly by integrating all current affairs-related departments, aggregating television current events, broadcasting current events, Panorama, Newsnight, and digital news teams related to current events.

At the same time, the editorial Department in accordance with the three major plates to reorganize, after the reform of the 2007, the editorial department reorganized 24-hour news, daily news and current affairs into three departments, integrating and reconstructing 7 departments including network news, broadcast news, TV news, 24 hour news, morning News, World News and technology. Similarly, the programme department has been integrated into the above 3 departments by the original 4 departments (current affairs, television, broadcasting and interaction).

Open digital store to enhance user seamless consumption experience

In July 2013 the BBC proposed to open the BBC store in 2014, which will be run by BBC Universal (BBC CSM), which is expected to provide the most recent one-year program (about 6,000 hours) and 4,000-hour archive for registered users ( Includes current 3,000 hours of content sold in media such as DVDs (currently iplayer can only look at the show in one week) and an additional 500-1000 hours of archived shows per year.

The goal is to expand user search capabilities for the BBC's public services and business content, and to integrate the BBC's content commercial sales platform, allowing users to buy, watch and replay programs from the BBC STORE via iplayer, To build a seamless consumer experience for BBC users and to make their content and services more tightly connected to their users, that is, to enable users to get what they need directly from the BBC without going through other channels. In order to improve the content of the program, promote the BBC online, especially iplayer fusion degree, enhance the BBC brand in the mobile digital era of influence.

The immediate reason for this is to address the lack of display and sales of BBC content on digital platforms such as Amazon, and the BBC Vice President Tony Hall has said that only 10% of the BBC's content on the Amazon and itunes platforms will undoubtedly hamper the effective spread of the BBC's ideas, The deeper reason is that in the digital normal age, the operation of the products should be in the Apple Store model. It can be said that this is a kind of intermediary operation mode, the purpose is to enhance the product and service and seamless docking users. This can be more accurate, comprehensive and in-depth understanding and mastery of user behavior, on the other hand can better achieve content appreciation, extend the value chain.

Revelation: Three new ideas of news production

Since 2007, the reform of the BBC News department has been deepening, its basic context can be summed up in the following three stages: the division of Business and Institutions (2007 ago) by media such as radio, television and the Internet-guided by news acquisition, editorial and programme Business (2007)-User-oriented (since 2014 )。

Further, according to the behavior of people's access to news is divided into daily news and current affairs, including daily News and 24-hour news and daily Normal news, the reorganization of editorial and program departments, not only to further integrate resources, reduce institutions, expand the communication platform, And more close to the user to obtain news behavior characteristics and rules. And throughout the reform has at least three new ideas, the first is "user-oriented", which is today's news production needs to have the first concept, and then should be "to mediate" and "large data."

1. User Standard

Digital technology, Internet, mobile communication technology, sensor technology and wearable equipment and so on a series of new information dissemination technology development and widespread application, bring a new revolution to mankind.

It is the media, communication, computer and cultural entertainment and even the boundaries of consumer areas, changing people's information dissemination behavior and lifestyles, subversion of traditional industrial patterns and business models, restructuring the relevant organizational structure and business processes, thus, new ideas, new concepts, new models are emerging, but in any case, The first question to be addressed in this revolution is to whom or around whom to change?

From the BBC's reform process, it is user-oriented. This is because, from the transmission of power relations, this revolution can be said to be the field of information dissemination of an empowering movement, so that a long time relatively passive audience (audience, audience, readers, etc.) to the active acquisition, dissemination and production of information users change.

such as WikiLeaks, the Snowden incident, the Hollywood actress event, and a lot of UGC content, at least to illustrate the problem that the source of information is no longer in the hands of authoritative and professional institutions, the contemporary people are not satisfied with passively receiving information, and more interested in active mining, processing and dissemination of information. At the same time, people and information, equipment increasingly seamless connection, smart phones, wearable equipment, like human beings with the innate organs, news and other information as the skin as the perception of the outside world.

Therefore, people's information dissemination and other behavioral data can easily be more accurate, comprehensive grasp, access, analysis and application of these data is undoubtedly the key to the invincible position of contemporary media organizations.

2. To mediate

I remember that the Canadian scholar McLuhan had divided the evolution of human society from the angle of media revolution into the tribal, non-tribalism and no longer tribal three stages, whose core criterion is whether people live in the world of sensory synchronization, he believes that the advent of electronic media to eliminate the printing media caused by the separation of sensory and fragmented, Let the human return to the sensory synchronization of the tribal era.

Today's digital, networked, mobile and wearable people to return to the sensory synchronization of the society, the so-called communication without the moment, the connection is everywhere, people, things and information seamless cross-linking, the intermediary is declining. In this sense, the human information dissemination process can be divided into no intermediary, intermediary and to mediate three stages.

At present, the intermediary transition to the transitional period, this not only manifests in the traditional medium and the new medium is tending to merge, the entire information dissemination and the cultural entertainment as well as the daily consumption domain each industry blends, manifests in the information production and marketing process to mediate, the supply and demand direct docking, the circulation link weakening even disappears, the information produces and the consumption sharing resonance , a new "sensory synchronization" information dissemination mode is brewing.

Thus, it is not difficult to understand: why did the BBC open its own digital store, why adjust its news editors and program departments, why a large number of traditional media to launch their own news clients, why Hunan Radio and television group no longer export Internet program copyright only on the Mango TV platform broadcast ... All this is a sign of the arrival of the intervening period (or the new intermediary period).

3. Large data

In fact, in the BBC News reform process, the construction of the database is a play, its internal database not only network, the collection of a large amount of news sources, news materials, works, etc., but also including the news team, UGC and user information, What is more noteworthy is that the BBC has implemented a data-performance mechanism that is used by various editors to assess journalists through press releases. And the adjustment of the editorial and program departments and the forthcoming opening of the BBC's digital store will undoubtedly provide a solid foundation for a more comprehensive understanding of its news user behavior data.

The big data of the news production and sale not only can have the massive related data, more important is the data deep excavation, the so-called deep-data mining. The BBC News reform is a big deal, separate Daily News (24 hours, Daily News) from current events, which is intended to distinguish between the two types of business styles and consumption behaviors, which are regular news reporting and deep news, the former is more time and freshness, while the latter emphasizes deep excavation and analysis; The former is more informed, sharing timely information, The latter is based on the public interest of the interpretation of the world, the formation of public opinion and share value.

As a result, data on different user groups can be collected, mastered and analyzed more accurately, and the BBC has been committed to improving data mining, algorithms, and social planning capabilities in the past two years. Such cases are not uncommon in the country, such as "Today's headline" app based on user reading behavior to push the user's own headline news, Tencent News app relies on user behavior data to open up mobile advertising market.