Less Haste More Speed

Pete Clifton's lecture today was reminiscent of an episode of Casulaty or Star Trek. Jargon, jargon, jargon.

The head of BBC News Interactive discussed blogs, UGC, API, Wiki Backgrounds, Aggregation Pages, podcasts and vodcasts. Many of these terms were alien/comical to me.

Clifton wasn't just spouting them at random, however. He was explaining the new interactive initiatives the BBC was launching.

However, the BBC seems so desperate to set these hi-tech wheels in motion that it appears to be launching them before they are fully, thought through. For example the offer to the audience to personalise their webpage so that they can, as Clifton said, "have more control over their experience", is underway although it cannot allow people to do all that much at the moment.

I noted in the Media Guardian an article by Richard Benson in which he voiced similar concerns for news companies in general. He said, "Our national newspapers have got their variously sized pages in a flap over competition from the internet. In the offices of several titles there now seems to be more concern with blogs, podcasts and vodcasts...than there is with actual newsgathering". Thus it seems the companies are putting these things out there without stopping to consider whether they're actually any good.

Clifton would probably argue, however, that the only way for these interactive initiatives to work is if they are tried out on the public who can give feedback to the BBC on how to refine them. There's some truth in that I suppose.