BBC press release verbatim:
The BBC and Microsoft Corp took a step toward strengthening their working alliance yesterday when the two companies signed a non-exclusive memorandum of understanding.
The memorandum of understanding will define the framework within which the companies can explore opportunities for the delivery and consumption of BBC content and the evolution of next-generation broadcasting.
In Seattle, as part of a fact-finding tour of the US, BBC Director-General Mark Thompson and Director of New Media and Technology Ashley Highfield met Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates to officially sign the memorandum of understanding and discuss the BBC’s digital strategy.
This includes plans for its online archive, for a radically re-invented website in the web 2.0 world — a second generation of internet-based services — and for ways to share its online content in the future.
“We are currently witnessing unprecedented rates of change in technology and audience expectations,” Thompson said.
“To ensure that the BBC is able to embrace the creative challenges of the digital future, we need to forge strategic partnerships with technology companies and distributors for the benefit of licence payers.”
“Microsoft’s strength is in driving digital innovation, and our vision is to open up rich, new consumer experiences that allow people to enjoy digital content anytime, anywhere and on any device,” Gates said.
“This vision fits squarely with the BBC’s charter to lead the industry in delivering content that is compelling and accessible. I’m delighted that we’re taking this important step, and I look forward to working together to develop new models for content delivery and consumption.”
“Microsoft is not just a key supplier to the BBC, it is also a key gateway to audiences that the BBC needs to reach through web services it runs like MSN and Windows Live Messenger, and hardware such as Xbox and the Windows Media Center,” Highfield said.
“The BBC needs to work with all players in this space to make sure our programmes and content are enjoyed by the widest possible audience, without always having to come to bbc.co.uk to find it.
“The learnings from our US visit will very much inform our thinking on the BBC’s creative future.”
The memorandum of understanding aims to identify areas of common interest between the BBC and Microsoft on which a strategic alliance could be developed.
Areas of potential investigation and collaboration include search and navigation, distribution, and content enablement.
Any actual procurements of new technology, or launch of new services by the BBC, would be subject to appropriate regulatory approval.
Press release link here.
I think I’m going to throw up Active X controls!!!
I smell kickbacks.
Cheap software licenses if the BBC goes with MSFT media solutions.
All these pompous words and BBC still relies on a 10 year-old technology like the awesome WebObjects…
“Microsoft’s strength is in driving digital innovation . . .”
Driving it where? Straight to hell, no handbasket required?
If Microsoft continues to innovate digitally, binary code will soon have three patented, proprietary digits each one a six.
So the Beeb bends over for the final time. “How the mighty have fallen” is an understatement of titanic proportions.
Wouldn’t surprise me if NBC, a little-known subsidiary of MSNBC, buys it, and the World Service turns into DRM’d 60-minute reruns of “How Congress Works,” with Ralph Reed and color man Jack Abramoff — in 60 languages. So much for empire.
A press release that says absolutely nothing.
another soul sold…
This is disgusting, in the UK we are forced to pay a licence fee, I am a Mac user. The BBC content needs/has to be available to all licence payers, equally.
Take one national broadcaster being forced to increasingly support and sustain itself as public monies are reduced and combine with an overly rich monopoly that is desperately looking for leverage in the media market. Add liberal amounts of money. Spin.
bbc are a total joke
license payers being ripped off with lame repeats and shit shows
digital channels that cost millions and have less than a thousand viewers
screw em
i totally resent paying a fee for something i don’t watch
channel 4 is prob the best uk channel right now and that’s commercial
“Microsoft’s strength is in driving digital innovation”
too funny
innovation and microsuck in the same sentence is just too damn funny for words
their only innovations are in underhand business practices and avoiding responsibility for user’s problems
They got em… and the BBC corp peeps are so naive they think they made the right decision.
sad really
As an ageing Brit living in Berlin my long-held admiration for the BBC’s World Service has been slowly crumbling over the last five years or so.
It started with their adoption of slick American-like delivery which includes something the old BBC never used to do: blowing its own trumpet.
For example, they use to announce: ‘This is the BBC’ in a normal matter-of-fact way.
Now we get an over-emotional, melodramatic delivery: THIS is the BEE BEE CEEEE. It’s not even well-done melodrama – i.e. the Americans do it better.
Parallel to this, from what I can gather from their tech programmes and so on the old lovable ‘Auntie’ is almost 100% Windows orientated – and that ain’t lovable.
The once lovable, fragrantly-scented old auntie is turning into a stinking old whore!
I don’t mind paying a license fee, the bbc comes up with some good shows. BBC1 is crap but 2, 3 & 4 come up with some interesting stuff. I also make listen to their radio offerings every day. That said, it pisses me off that their media offerings are all windows media or real player, they’re not even drm’ed or anything, you can view those on a Mac – they’re just not very good quality.
In Seattle, as part of a fact-finding tour of the US? More like a bended knee hind-tit sucking tour
“The once lovable, fragrantly-scented old auntie is turning into a stinking old whore!”
Then she should drop her prices along with her drawers. It’s the only honourable thing to do.
The GovSpeak station continues to whore its way into the arms of the Blair-approved Gates & Co.
And to think I have to pay a hefty tax for dreck like this.
Grrr.
I used to think the BBC was good reporting, but over the past few years, it became clear to me that it is just as screwed up as any major American news station. And, yes, the skew is clearly towards MS – always has been.
This is so appalling as to be unbelievable.
I wonder who else the BBC loooked at? I bet it wasn’t Apple, or Google, both of whom represent the future, not the past.
But then perhaps it’s appropriate for the BBC to work with another icon that’s past its sell by date?
Guess we can continue to look forward to even more instances of hack journalism from the BBC with speculative headlines implying negative Apple/Mac circumstances. Vague speculative headlines that imply and promote sullied Apple reputation and crap like that.
We’ll see, but I’m about ready to remove the BBC from my information resources if they keep it up much longer.
. . . of the takeover by the Illuminati.
I can see it coming: only the first Flip4Mac is free.
Now that so many Mac users are satisfied with Flip4Mac — conveniently forgetting it’s run by the evil empire — every computer in the world, including Linux boxes, will be forced to have media player under some guise or other. Then comes the day you have to pay your pusher — $100 a month to Microsoft or no signal from any radio/TV station on the net.
I suggest all UK-based readers send an email to the Beeb asking them to ensure full compatibility across ALL platforms in the future.
Also, write to your MP.
All licence fee payers have an equal right to access the material they paid for, not just those who use Windows.
MiSFiT is driving an old beater (XP) which they plan on taking into the shop, giving it a new coat of paint (Vista) and rolling back the odometer before foisting it off on an unsuspecting Joe Public. Beware, its just a rebuilt write-off!
BBC-Big Bloody Commie
BBC-Big Bloody Commie
Sigh. It’s NON-EXCLUSIVE. That doesn’t stop them from using QT or continuing to use Real. If it was exclusive QT, it would be worse.
What will probably suck is when, even though it’s non exclusive technically, it ends up being windows only codecs. I had to install real to view some content. Flip4Mac wouldn’t play the WMV files.
What I thought they were going to do was write their own free cross platform player that would enable delivery of content for 7 days after broadcast within Britain. That’s what I’d still like them to do.
Open standard codecs are needed for this kind of thing.
No wonder they need to raise the licence fee by £30. Any deal with MS dosen’t come cheaply & the poor British public have to pay for it some way or another.
<< Open standard codecs are needed for this kind of thing. >>
what’s wrong with H.264?
We are currently witnessing unprecedented rates of change in and audience expectations
Like non-proprietary, platform-independent solutions? That’d play for sure.
we need to forge strategic partnerships with technology companies
Then you’ve contradicted yourself by choice of partner.
Microsoft’s strength is in driving digital innovation
Third strike, ye~r out! And clueless to boot! Hey, but it’s the tax-payers who’ll pay anyway, eh?
“Sigh. It’s NON-EXCLUSIVE. That doesn’t stop them from using QT or continuing to use Real. If it was exclusive QT, it would be worse.”
It is worse. The old whore will say it plays QT through Flip4Mac. So be happy.
Weeeeeeeeeeeeeed!
Lucifer makes a move…I make a move…it continues to blossom.
Those BBC guys weren’t saying their prayers anyway. They can have Microsoft.
Well, I suppose they think that Billy G. owes them something since they gave him a title into the peerage.
I never said there was anything wrong with H.264. To me it seems like the obvious choice too.
Don’t care what they say, it doesn’t play in Flip.
It isn’t automatically bad that the BBC partner with Microsoft, but if they end up being the only partner,if they’ve bought themseves in then I agree it’ll end in disaster.
“Well, I suppose they think that Billy G. owes them something since they gave him a title into the peerage.”
No, the Blairites gave Bill a KBE, which is well below the peerage. Is the BBC Blairite? Definitely not. Are they commie? Maybe. For sale? No, because nobody owns it. In Microsoft’s pocket? Better not be.
Who cares anyway. It’s not like they show much worth bothering with, and I can record anything I want using EyeTV.
British institutions one day are going to work out that Microsoft isn’t even liked by most people, and certainly isn’t respected.
It would be irresponsible to it’s owners for the BBC to use anything that was not an ISO standard. And it is irresponsible for proprietary systems to not support ISO standards. Microsoft rejects supporting any kind of ISO standard. This is one nasty company.
What idiots!
How much money does the BBC make selling DVDs like the box set of Doctor Who? And they still expect British taxpayers to support them?
Web form for complaining to the BBC:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/newswatch/ukfs/hi/newsid_3990000/newsid_3993900/3993909.stm
A slight overreaction going on here.
If it was an exclusive deal then it would be a problem but as it’s non-exclusive and they’re free to also work with Apple and anyone else then there is no problem.
“A slight overreaction going on here.”
New here? (j/k)
“A slight overreaction going on here.”
“New here? (j/k)”
Haha no, overreaction is par for the course here I know and I was feeling a tad sarcastic when I typed it.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”wink” style=”border:0;” />
“The learnings from our US visit will very much inform our thinking on the BBC’s creative future.”
“Learnings” ???!!! The BBC should hang its head in shame.
AhHAHAHAHAHHohhahahahaha..
Oh, gasp! hahahah…
Quote from article: “Microsoft’s strength is in driving digital innovation…” HAHAHAHHohhahahahaha..AHAHHohhahahahaha..
Good Lord! Pick me off the floor, I can’t even catch my breath that sentence was so freakin’ hysterical! What planet is BBC on or what drug!?
MDN word: Kept as in just kept laughin’
Perhaps this explains BBC World’s “Click” program this evening (seen in Germany) in which a UK viewer took them to task over an apparent recent report on computer security – or rather the lack of it in Windows. The host — with a world-class condescending attitude, and claiming to cite “experts” dismissively reverted to the “obscurity is security” myth. I came here to look for statistics with which to rebutt and found this article. Aha. The light turns on….
the viewer who wrote to the BBC was advocating a switch to Macs on security grounds. The host basically blew him off.
No take?
MDN! I can’t express myself for this one, I need your help!
I’ll try: 😮
Did I miss something? Where has MS done anything for portable news technology, what device have they created, what the heck is the BBC thinking? Podcasts are revolutionary, and here MS wants to take credit for them…absolutely remarkable! (they must be taking credit for podcasts, since there are no other major updates in the digital realm!)
What is going on???
Is this a JOKE?
For those whinging about support the license payers, wouldn’t it be totally amiss if the BBC *didn’t* sign an agreement with Microsoft to ensure compatibility with future Web 2.0 content? Really? 95% of their audience are, after all, Microsoft users. There’s no room for silly MDN fanboyisms here. And note, the agreement was “non exclusive” – in other words, they remain perfectly able to sign a similar agreement with Apple. And no doubt they will, if Apple has anything to add.
A note to Bill Gates:
Please define ‘innovation.’
I didn ‘t know Flip4Mac was a M$ product, but it makes sense – it never works. I tried to use it a half dozen times then totally gave up.
BBC and Micro$*it will make excellent partners….
They are both in the BS propaganda business!
Microsoft paid a bundle to the developer, so it could flog Flip for nothing. If it doesn’t work for you, and you have a Macintel, download the newer universal-binary version if you haven’t done so, or run your browser and plug-ins through Rosetta so the PowerPC Flip version will work.
BBC – Bloody British Commies