Seth Keen

Presentation at Melbourne University on New Media and Journalism by BBC World’s Anchor, Nik Gowing, BBC World. About:

BBC World is the BBC’s commercially funded international 24-hour news and information channel broadcasting around the world from its base at BBC Television Centre in London.

Nik Gowing is a major news anchor, presenter and works for BBC World a continuous news channel. The presentation titled ‘Community in Crisis New Media & New Real Time Tensions’. A excerpt from the brief for the talk sent out by email:

In the new, fast-changing information environment the traditional media are no longer alone in being witnesses of acute real-time crises. With the advent of camera phones, PDAs, broadband and ‘blog’ technologies, a new breed of ‘information doers’ have emerged. Illustrated by video examples, Nic will highlight the increasingly unresolved tensions in newsrooms, governments, military commands and corporate organisations.

Opening image for the presentation poster, a television with the cord pulled floating on an angle. Context given for the talk by Nik – political science, securities and new media. Title on his powerpoint, ‘Real Time Crisis – New Real Time Tensions’ These following notes are my own interpretation of what was presented and in some cases are direct quotes or my own short hand.

Tyranny of real time – previous paper online; other paper ‘War and Accountability – Media in conflict: the new reality not yet understood.’ The battle between rumours and news. News wants to deal with hard facts. How reliable are images from mobile uploads for example? The potential for a digital camera or mobile phone to challenge government policy. A “creditability crunch”. The issues centre around “immediacy”. His immediate example video taken of people arriving to the presentation dropped into his powerpoint.

Transparency, the connected networked nature of the world. Level of denial. What do I mean about real-time? Governments believe that they will be able to control real-time events. Example given of President Bush receiving news on television while he was on-air, of major events he was not aware had taken place. Governments, officials trying to shut down public and personal media coverage when events take place. The issue of perceptions sticking when news breaks (often based on personal media coverage) which may not be accurate.

Much of the points around immediacy in relation to video reminded me of the theorists Paul Virilio’s (Open Sky. London: Verso, 1997) comments on real-time video technologies and their effect on perception. Another theorist Jean Balludriard and his ideas on Simulacra and Simulation.

Back to Nik. The battle that goes on to secure the air waves (media) during and after a crisis. The acute difficulty of getting accurate real-time facts in a crisis situation. Transparency, the ability to transfer into the airwaves instantly from isolated high security locations through broadband, the Internet. A live feed in Lebanon is being streamed in real-time from a mobile phone from the Syria border. In detail in this example the video is delayed (called Store and forward video held on a laptop). The audio is real-time (when it was received – broadcast to the on-air TV news desk).

Transformation of the media by personal media producers. What is the status of personal media content? – the ability for anyone to record and upload. Serial deceivers. A real issue with accuracy. “A proliferation of attempts to confuse and mislead.” “Insurgents as media producers.” Stressing the trend of validation, working out what is accurate. Validation, trying to work out the source proves to be more and more difficult and a paramount issue. Also, concerns that journalists are being targeted, camera people recording events.

Digital divide – journalism – personal media making governments accountable. “Creditability Crunch” – the openness is leading to “law-fare rather than warfare”. The military needs to be aware due to “omni media” that they have to be accountable for everything.

Conclusion – We need to get smarter in regards to the battles emerging in the contemporary media sphere. “Asymmetric power”. The new empowerment creates ad-hoc groupings in a time of crisis. In the final example he showed mobile phone video recordings of the explosions underground in the London bombings. The way people are prepared to record events in a time of crisis in very insecure environments. From a news perspective there is working with what he calls a “user centered hub” at BBC world. During and after the bombings, they where barraged with personal media content (“1000 images, 20 video clips, 20,000 emails, 3000 text messages”). Dilemma for the news room, who do you run with the government who is behind what is actually going on, or the material coming from people at the scene? But, eyewitnesses also exaggerate or misinterpret and some are eager to get their faces in the media. How do you check what they are claiming? Where will it all lead? Next development will be live broadcasts streamed live on the Internet.

We need to question what the media is today. “Media ?” The technical definition of media. The ability to reveal. YouTube, Flickr, Crikey ..they are all becoming significant broadcast platforms.