Barry Cox on Open Source BBC

Overshadowed by the launch of the David Elstein paper as commissioned by Iain Duncan Smith, Demos last week published "Free for All:Public service television in the digital age" by Barry Cox. Not mentioned in any of the write-ups I've seen were these interesting references to the proposed BBC Creative Archive and using this idea as a blueprint for a future BBC.
Download the full report (with a Creative Commons licence no less) here.

"Dyke’s announcement of the creative archive made a direct appeal to our residual feelings for the BBC as a unique cultural asset… There is much that is attractive about what Lessig calls a ‘Creative Commons’ ….it is possible to imagine a smaller, more purely public service-oriented BBC, which could indeed operate on this basis."

The imaginative BBC move to open up its archive to free public use could be seen as a slightly cynical attempt to reposition itself in the new world without sacrificing any of its present power….. it is difficult to see that an organisation of more than 20,000 people can easily cohere for long around both aggressive commercial values (reaching maximum audiences, optimising secondary revenues) and the public spirited ethos of the open source movement. The BBC will have to choose where its heart lies. Does it want to be big or does it want to do good?"

Comments

[Jamie Cason]

Nice spot Jem, thank you for bringing this to my attention.

Jamie

[david lee]

Hi I was the researcher at Demos on this publication ... and the ideas on the open source bbc which barry included were referenced to me in the publication. my view on it was rather more idealistic than barry's who had a more sceptical take. nonetheless it was great that he engaged with these notions. i have only just seen this post... obviously rather late. in my view the bbc make its archive available - although i think it is going to happen by stealth with gradually more and more content being made available online. it is interesting to think that what might actually eventually transform the archaic copyright laws which seem so redundant for thr digital age might be the chip chip chipping away of people's perceptions on this matter by the largest public service broadcaster in the world. we'll see.