I get the feeling that today is the end-of-the-BBC day: BBC.com users "unequivocally" believed advertising would reduce their trust in the BBC brand, so we now hear that..
Ads set for BBC.com website http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,,2193103,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=4 *Mark Sweney and Tara Conlan Wednesday October 17, 2007 MediaGuardian.co.uk<http://www.mediaguardian.co.uk/> * BBC News and BBC Worldwide have agreed a deal that paves the way for advertising on the corporation's international website, BBC.com. The BBC Trust is discussing today giving the green light to plans to allow adverts on BBC.com. But MediaGuardian.co.uk has learnt that last week BBC News and BBC Worldwide, the corporation's commercial arm that oversees BBC.com, came to an arrangement that is being put to the trust this afternoon. According to sources, Worldwide has agreed to pay a minimum guaranteed income to the public service broadcasting part of the BBC. In return Worldwide gets the rights to use BBC news content for commercial gain and a licence to exploit the BBC brand commercially. Worldwide will also cover the loss of around £4m a year the BBC's international news website gets from the Foreign Office in grant-in-aid. On top of that, Worldwide has guaranteed a percentage of revenue raised from BBC.com advertising will go back to BBC news. It is not known what the percentage is. Last year the National Union of Journalists was told that the figure would be around 20% but it is thought the actual percentage is less than that. Opponents of the move to allow advertising on a BBC website have sent a round robin message to staff and a message to the BBC Trust, claiming that deal does not benefit BBC news as much as first thought. They claimed that while BBC.com ad revenue would be in dollars, costs to BBC news would be in pounds, leaving the financial benefit to the corporation's public service broadcasting arm open to exchange rate fluctuations. However, other sources denied BBC news is unhappy with the agreement as "all the major advertising firms work in dollars" and all major companies have to "hedge against market fluctuations". BBC executives are keen for advertising on BBC.com to go ahead to help fill the gap left by a lower-than-expected licence fee. Although the terms of the deal have been hammered out, BBC Worldwide cannot proceed with the proposals without the approval of the BBC Trust, which has already deferred the decision once. The trust asked senior management for more information on editorial safeguards, how revenues would be fed back to the BBC and how the site fits with Worldwide's wider strategy. But it is understood that BBC Trust chairman Sir Michael Lyons is keen to resolve the issue and sign it off today. Last month MediaGuardian.co.uk revealed that BBC Worldwide sidelined research that found that US audiences would be turned off by advertising on the international BBC website. According to a source involved in the research, a study commissioned by the corporation in late 2005 on the US west coast found that BBC.com users "unequivocally" believed advertising would reduce their trust in the BBC brand. Further research, conducted in key US cities including New York and Boston, drew the same conclusions. However, the BBC subsequently focused on later research studies that were more positive about the likely response to adverts on the international version of its website. On 17/10/2007, Brian Butterworth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Thus... > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_oil_(cryptography) > > > On 17/10/2007, Andy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > On 17/10/2007, Glyn Wintle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > The BBC could avoid all this mess if it eschewed DRM and instead > > employed > > > standard formats. > > > > The problems of DRM and Cross Platform are entirely separate concepts. > > Evidently the BBC has hoodwinked you. Ah large media companies trying > > to con the public, why does this seam like a bad dream? > > > > Implementing DRM at the OS (here I really mean lower level OS, i.e. > > the kernel, or wherever else you put the proper access control stuff) > > layer on an untrusted machine is pointless, the user has hardware > > access and can drop down to that level. If you are going to allow them > > to go under your DRM "protection", why not place it at the application > > layer? (most if not all DRM schemes do this, note that simply being > > shipped with the OS doesn't place an application in the OS layer > > security wise). > > > > So OS layer DRM is absolutely useless, now you have a 3 choices (4 if > > you count no DRM): > > 1. Implement DRM at the Hardware Layer, using tamper-proof hardware > > (has it's own problem hinged on key distribution, or getting trusted > > data to the hardware). > > 2. Accept it's going to be insecure and implement at the Application > > layer. > > 3. define an open standard (based on otgher standards, HTTP, XML > > TV-Anytime etc.) and let implementers worry about it. > > > > Selecting option one means the BBC will have to have a conversation > > with the likes of Intel, AMD and hardware manufactures, who will no > > doubt laugh them out of the office. It would them have to wait years > > for the old hardware to be replaced (or you could produce an external > > add on, but production of these would be tricky, who gets to produce > > it, without interfering in the market. If anyone can produce it have > > you compromised security be releasing decoding keys, etc.) > > > > Option 2 can (and does) "work" irrespective of Operating System. (by > > work I mean is implementable, it may also may attacks harder but in no > > way offers what a security expert would consider secure). > > > > Option 3 certainly works, it's worked for HTTP, Email and numerous > > other technologies (too many to mention) > > > > The BBC have never answered why they simple did not use a standard > > that would reach all platforms. It can be done. Why does the BBC pay > > OUR money to join standards committees (W3C, ETSI) if they are not > > going to use the standards produced? > > (Easier, Faster, Cheaper, Compliant with regulators, I see no > > downside, unless you work for Microsoft (or know someone who works > > there)) > > > > > This is not a technology problem > > > > Cross Platform development was a technology problem, it's been fixed > > in many different ways. Unfortunately the BBC is either too > > incompetent or too corrupt to use any of the fixes developed by the > > likes of the IETF, IEEE, ISO etc. > > > > Andy > > > > -- > > Computers are like air conditioners. Both stop working, if you open > > windows. > > -- Adam Heath > > - > > Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, > > please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html > > . Unofficial list archive: > > http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ > > > > > > -- > Please email me back if you need any more help. > > Brian Butterworth > www.ukfree.tv > -- Please email me back if you need any more help. Brian Butterworth www.ukfree.tv
