[Seattle-editorial] Fwd: Imc-strategies Digest, Vol 6, Issue 2

[anarch3m]

i want one.  the government contact phone and emails....the community issue groups...lots of mir work groups, with autonomy for all.
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--------- Forwarded Message ---------

DATE: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 12:03:37
From: imc-strategies-request at lists.indymedia.org
Today's Topics:
   1. Fwd: <<strategies>> BBC follows indymedia (sheri at speakeasy.org)
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From: "sheri at speakeasy.org" <sheri at speakeasy.net>
Subject: [Imc-strategies] Fwd: <<strategies>> BBC follows indymedia
-----Original Message-----
From: eveline lubbers [mailto:evel at xs4all.nl]
Sent: Tuesday, December 16, 2003 12:16 PM
To: strategies at lists.myspinach.org
Subject: <<strategies>> BBC follows indymedia

November 10, 2003
The Guardian 

A portal for the people?: A new BBC site hopes to transform politically apathetic members of the public into single-issue 
activists. But will it just be a magnet for net heads and moaning nimbys.

Owen Gibson

The BBC's review of its political programming almost two years ago threw up few surprises. Young people felt disengaged 
from the political mainstream, single-issue politics was on the rise and most licence-fee payers thought that the stream of 
news coming out of the Westminster bubble had little to do with them.

Thus far, the review has produced some fairly inedible onscreen fruit. A tie-less Jeremy Vine presenting the Politics Show, 
Michael Portillo making a decent fist at political punditry on The Week and an unsuccessful attempt at engaging "yoof" 
viewers with the Rod Liddle-fronted Weekend are all we have to show for the much-trumpeted initiative. In the light of the 
Hutton inquiry and widespread cynicism in the run up to the Iraq war, the BBC has been fighting a losing battle to re-
engage a sceptical audience with the business of politics. 

But a major online initiative that also sprang from the review could yet have a more lasting impact than any number of 
revamped current affairs shows. Dubbed iCan, it claims to be an attempt to connect the public with the political process by 
engaging them in local issues. In development for more than a year, the site allows users to easily set up mini-sites on 
issues that affect them, from speed cameras to bullying, and attract like-minded folk from their areas and around the 
country.

By combining this facility with an extensive online database of local MPs, councillors and pressure groups and cross-
referencing with a vast library of BBC online resources and external sites, those behind the site hope it will emerge as a 
"glue" to bind together users who have real concerns but are unsure how to make a difference within the strict confines of 
local and national politics.

"The original research showed up two main points. People don't know where to start and they don't know who to talk to. So 
everything starts from that premise and it runs through the core of everything we've done," says Sian Kevill, who heads the 
project with Martin Vogel. "People don't approach politics through party allegiances any more, they approach it through an 
issue, and this (site) makes it easy for people to connect into politics through an issue."

The care, attention and budget lavished on the development of iCan is a reflection of its potential importance to the BBC. 
Since the web became a mass medium, people have talked of how it can act as a tool for democratic good. But up to now 
we've seen little real evidence of how it can bind together disparate voices, beyond one-off, single-issue examples such as 
the Stop the War coalition and the ongoing Stop Esso campaign. Overall, the web is still more about porn than politics.

Kevill says: "Whenever you talk about the site, it has a massively positive effect. Everyone's got something that gets them 
going, whether it's local schools or speed bumps or whatever, but where does that tip over into people taking action? The 
whole point of iCan is to lower those barriers so people find it easier to take that step."

Vogel says "People don't tend to see themselves as campaigners," but he believes that because of the amount of thought 
and research put into the design and content of the site, people will be drawn in. "It's very much in its early stages and it 
will be shaped by how people want to use it. The exciting, and nerve-racking, thing is that no one has any idea how it will 
grow and evolve."

Existing sites that also rely on user-generated content, such as the noble Open Democracy and the more militant 
IndyMedia.org, have tended to appeal to only a small section of the online population and concentrated on global politics 
rather than local issues. Meanwhile, the government's attempts to empower the population has led to millions being wasted 
to little effect on costly experiments like UK Online.

Ultimately, the idea is that iCan could become part of the BBC's news gathering operation, getting closer to the things that 
local people are interested in. A pilot project involving local television and radio news teams in Sheffield, Bristol, Leicester, 
Cambridge and Clyde is under way and, if successful, will go national.

"There'll be iCan reporters who will go out and find grass-roots stories and cover them and say: 'If this issue concerns you 
then go on to iCan and do something about it.' That's very important because it will extend its appeal beyond net-heads. 
They'll also be able to pick up stories from iCan, so you get a virtuous circle and enhance the news agenda," says Kevill. 
Each of those areas will have their own iCan reporter who will liaise with users and news reporters in the area.

"It could also introduce a new section of stories that we haven't covered before. And it could link in with a host of 
programming, like the themed NHS and crime days and even Comic Relief," she adds. "There's also no reason why it can't 
link into drama and soap storylines, Radio 1, Radio 5 Live. At that moment, when people think 'I'd like to do more', they 
now can."

Although iCan has been spoken of in hushed tones by BBC executives ever since the idea of building a community portal 
was raised (director general Greg Dyke has taken a keen interest), those involved try to play down its potential. At present, 
it is little more than an elegantly designed empty vessel, waiting to be filled with user-generated content. And Vogel and 
Kevill insist they are under no illusions about how fickle web audiences can be. "It's very difficult to get communities going 
on the web. We haven't got a God given right to attract people. It's harder than a lot of people realise, it's very organic and 
ongoing and we'll have to learn a lot from the next few months. We won't know until people start using it," says Kevill.

There are other dangers in handing over editorial control to your audience. At one extreme the site could be clogged up 
with nimbys moaning about litter on their pavement or it could attract controversy by inadvertently giving a platform for 
insensitive rants. But the BBC believes that the house rules, combined with the clever design of the site, will enable the 
iCan team to strike a balance between freedom of expression and censorship.

But if iCan takes off, its value could go far beyond providing news material. For the corporation, it could be the perfect 
expression of its public-service ideals. And with both a government review of its online activity under way and a stormy 
charter-renewal period in the offing, it will be campaigning pretty hard to make sure it does. "Participation in democracy is 
a value in itself and it's at a very low level at the moment. There's been a shredding of the civic fabric and this could be a 
way for the BBC to restore some of that civic fabric in a new way," says Kevill.


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Mobiel:	06 479 669 05
Mobile:	++ 31 6 479 669 05

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