The End of Days

This will be my last post on this blog. The last two days of my internship were very relaxed. The other intern and I finished our work so quickly over the past few weeks that the work allotted for us was all finished as of the second last day. There were several background research tasks that I undertook in free time, and I ended up completing all of those as well. Our boss eventually found work for us to do. We compiled a list of Facebook and Twitter updates for shows in different regions. Writing this copy was fun as I got to be cheeky with them. I wrote the updates for the Canadian Facebook app page (Facebook posting can be geolocated), so I got to throw in some funny Canadian references. Unfortunately, Twitter was a tad less fun as there is no geo-locating functionality.

Such Facebook updates are representative of a shift towards a two-way communication approach to advertising where consumers and producers interact alongside one another.  I have mentioned this type of advertising in a previous blog-post.  Because the App itself is mobile and can automatically connect to social media sites (it is on an iPad after-all), users are able to share their experiences of watching shows in real time.  Part of the reason we are working on the Facebook page for the iPlayer is so that we can take advantage of this new-found social aspect of viewership.

At the end of the second last day I had a closing meeting with my boss to go over the good and bad of the internship. Most of my remarks were good. I kept bringing up how nice the organization, the people, and even the building were. It’s such a classy work environment. All of the members of the iPlayer team have been lovely and helpful. My only criticism was the vagueness of the job description. I’m sad to see it ending, but I will always look back on my brief time here with a satisfied conscience.

Day 12/13

On day twelve I started doing work on research for a new product demo video. I spent several hours researching the best product demo videos I could find, many of which were made by only a few production teams. The other intern and I both did our own research and came up with different examples and ideas. After my research I had a meeting with the GM of the project. We talked about what makes good leadership, the best ways to network, and what I should do after I graduate. I gained some good insight from this meeting.

On day thirteen the other intern and I discovered a classic Dr. Who Pinball machine in the office, along with two Nintendo 3DS. We spent a bit of time in the morning having fun with them and then got back to work. Work involved looking at ways to streamline promotion through social media. Our boss took us out for lunch and I was put on the spot to thoroughly explain my dissertation topic. They both asked some inquisitive questions that challenged me to further refine my topic. Later in the day I had a meeting with a visiting member of the team from Australia. I’ve considered moving there after my degree is finished so I wanted to pick his brain about the BBC offices in Sydney. I’m hoping that if there are any openings there I will have atleast some kind of foot in the door.

Day 10/11

Day ten started with a productive meeting with the head of programming for the iPlayer. We talked about my career aspirations which helped me clarify what I want to do. Since starting this internship, it has become quite clear to me that I like working in a relatively small team on a product. I have a rather fickle nature, so project based work is ideal for me. Also, I grew up playing team sports so I feels comfortable working towards a goal with a team at my side. The rest of the day was spent researching superfans for the country-specific launch of a show.

Day eleven started with the weekly team meeting in one of the meeting rooms upstairs. It was nice to see that my boss presented one of my ideas to the team. I can’t go in to details, but it revolved around how we will be using Twitter for promotion. In the early afternoon the office became abuzz with talk about a large fire nearby at a milk factory. Because of the size of the fire, and the risk of exploding gas tanks, two sides of the BBC complex were cordoned off…the sides I walk home from. Then the BBC building beside ours was evacuated, and because it was so cold outside, many of the employees came into our building – it was packed. I eventually had to leave 15 minutes early to get to class as I had to take a long route to the tube station. The area looked like a dystopian warzone as the chemical smoke settled amongst cold damp buildings.

Day 8/9

Day eight and day nine were, for the most part, spent compiling databases of information that would later be used to either inform programming decisions or update statuses on social media sites. The highlight of day eight was meeting with the head of the BBC Worldwide, Top Gear, and BBC Earth Youtube channels. We had a long and casual talk about how promotion is done through the site, how money is made off of ads, and how it acquires content. The latter was the most informative as there was plenty of obstacles to acquiring content that revolved mostly around copyright issues and contracts.  She also explained how Youtube is shifting towards original programming and the use of Channels with regular programming.  Youtube is throwing money at a few traditional broadcasters to produce shows exclusively for Youtube.

At the end of the meeting she showed me the tool the BBC uses to find copyrighted material that users have posted.  Video ID allows the content owners at the BBC to find copyrighted material and then decide upon how to deal with it.  They can request the video be deleted, leave the video as is, or even set up ads on the video and share the revenue with Youtube.  For the most part, the BBC choses to leave the video if it is either a montage to a particular show or under 20-30 seconds.  Rarely do they request the video be blocked.

Such blocking of videos represents the conflict between the original amateur driven community of Youtube and its top-down corporate ambitions.  There's no doubt that they need to monetize the business to run their servers, and they've taken their cue from traditional mass media - advertising.  Even their move towards Channels and original programming is evidence of what I find a rather unforeseen move back towards more traditional models of mass-media.

Day 6/7

I spent the entire day six and seven doing research. First I started off looking at how competition used social media. It was quite clear that the top companies had the most social media activity; I attribute this to the "network effect": once the activity reached a critical threshold it expanded rapidly. A common rule of thumb is that the more people who use something the better it is, which isn’t true in all cases, but in many it is. The classic example of this is the telephone: if you have the only phone then it is a useless technology. Its value is directly tied to the number of people using it.

I noticed that many of our competitors' apps don't have a traditional customer service hotline or e-mail service.  Rather, they use Twitter as their customer service platform.  Customers who need help will hashtag the app's Twitter account asking for help and then the customer service team will respond. At first I thought this was quite clever, but a few of our competitors also use the same Twitter account for general conversation with customers, in the form of social-media advertising in a Culture of Convergence.  I found that combining the two greatly devalued the brand as an app's Twitter page was full of complaints from the customer service side.

We have yet to set up a comprehensive Twitter page and it was my suggestion to my boss that we have both an advertising and a customer service Twitter page.  It is likely that they will develop our Twitter presence in this direction.

So far I have enjoyed doing plenty of back-end research into social media landscapes. It has given me the opportunity to learn the intricacies of social media applications while coming up with my own methods of research. Collating all of the information into readable graphs has been an informative experience as well.

Day 5

On my 5th day I got my tour of the BBC Media Centre. It was quite a bit longer than expected and went over the mission of the BBC and what it’s like to work there - and it was in the Dancing with the Stars themed office! It truly is an amazing company. It really shows how good a company is when every level of management you meet is just as fair and friendly as the next. So far everyone I have met at the BBC has been a nice and honest person. On top of that, learning about the BBC’s relationship with the government was fascinating, as there’s probably no other institution in the world quite like it.

After the meeting I spent the rest of the day analyzing the demographics of Youtube videos and reporting my findings back to my boss.

Day 3/4

I finally showed up on time for my third day of work. This day was mostly spent curating youtube videos and then annotating them. I was given a book on Youtube optimization and read the entire thing in an hour or two. I pulled ideas from the book and then spent some time brainstorming on my own. Later on in the day I presented my ideas to my boss. The best part of the day was having access to the BBC Worldwide Channel, which has over 650 million views and 390 000 subscribers. Plenty of power at my hands! Not to mention that I got to watch clips of Top Gear, Dr. Who, Deadly 60, and the Mighty Boosh all day.

My fourth day was spent doing much of the same. I then shifted my focus to doing a broad search for our youtube superusers.  What I found interesting about working on these Youtube Channels was how the BBC is using its clips as a cross-platform approach to promote its App.  Posting and effectively annotating clips is a form of advertising in what Henry Jenkins has termed the Culture of Convergence, where users and producers interact on the same level. This sort of cross-platform advertising is a far-cry from the traditional 30 second spot ad on traditional television.

Day 2

Much to my dismay, I once again showed up late, but not out of my own volition. I had an unfortunate event on my way to work: as I was about half-way there a truck drove by and sprayed a puddle all over me. I was drenched from the chest down and had to go home to change. I’ve secretly always wanted some sort of movie cliche to happen to me, and I finally got my wish. Unfortunately, it was at the most inopportune time.

My second day was business as usual (BAU), as there were no team meetings. I spent most of the day doing back-end research that would eventually be used to organize a programming campaign. 

After I completed this list I was given the task of annotating youtube videos on the BBC Global iPlayer Channel so that they would link to other playlists. I had a long discussion with my boss about the best way to go about accomplishing this. I recalled my readings on networks and quickly sketched out a way to link every video to a different playlist, thus creating plenty of “bridges” or “weak ties” between content.* Unfortunately, such a playlist would have involved over 700 annotations, which would take me more than the time I would be working at the BBC.

*The theory of "weak ties" was proposed by Mark Granovetter in his paper The Strength of Weak Ties. 

Day 1

For the two-and-a-half years that I've lived in London, my flat has been close to the BBC. I've walked by it many times and have even been to show tapings at its Broadcasting Centre. I never imagined that I would have the honour of working at such a well-renowned cultural institution.

I arrived a tad late on my first day as I didn't realize that I would be working in the BBC Media Centre and not the BBC Broadcasting Centre. The Media Centre is a couple hundred metres further down Wood Lane than the Broadcasting centre. The building is modern and remarkably designed. It's everything I imagine a modern post-fordist media workspace should be. It sits upon a well kept field. Around its base are a myriad of small shops and cafes that act as a tiny self-contained high street. The front lobby has a barrage of colourful art pieces and BBC paraphernalia, along with 3D televisions streaming the latest BBC Broadcasts. Beyond the futuristic security checkpoint is the ground floor of offices, on which I am now located.

The layout is open concept, with barriers only reserved for the kitchens, coffee shops and different BBC teams. The barriers are still only 1/4 of the ceiling height, making the offices spacious. The other floors can all be viewed from a large section of the ground floor as well.

The Media Centre houses BBC Worldwide, which acts as the commercial arm of the BBC.  I learned later in this first day that BBC Worldwide acts in a much different way than the rest of the BBC.  This is because it doesn't have to adhere to the Royal Charter (mandated by the British Monarch) that the rest of the BBC does.  Therefore, it has more freedom to pursue business ventures because their decisions  don't as heavily reflect upon the BBC's association with the British Government and the fact that it is partially funded by the TV Licensing fees paid by the general public.  In fact, I was informed that BBC Worldwide's revenue goes towards diminishing the TV License.

Upon arriving I had no clue what I would be doing. I was soon introduced to my boss and the other intern and was told that I would be working on the team responsible for developing and promoting the newly launched BBC Global iPlayer app. The app itself is available in Austria, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. What I find particularly intriguing about this internship is the fact that the app itself is still in an early phase of development, having been only launched 6 months ago. I’m very interested in working in start-ups in the future, so this is ideal for me. Over the next few months I am sure I will learn alot about how a product is developed and promoted, along with how it interacts with other teams in a larger institution.

With only a few hours under my belt becoming familiar with the product I attended a large team meeting done once every three months. These meetings are held to track elements of the application launch that have been a success and others that have could have been done better. Every member of the team went up to the front of the room and placed colour-coded post-it notes on a timescale with either positive or negative-yet- constructive comments. The comments were then re-viewed and discussed. I found this to be a very constructive approach to analyzing the relative successes and failures of a product in development.

....I should mention that I am not allowed to photograph any part of the office, so unfortunately this blog will be devoid of any images...

...Also, due to the sensitive nature of the information I dealt with, I will be unable to delve too deep into the specifics of the work that I undertook...