Can Grade make the grade

There were a lot of media reports(Guardian, FT) on Michael Grade's ambitious plan to "double the ITV income by 2012". As reported, Grade wants to cut regional programming from 17 to nine, and wants to increase in-house production, among others.

Can Grade make the grade?

The regional programming cut would be very controversial and very uncertain. There is a danger of union strike in protest, since hundreds of jobs would be lost as a result of the cut. More importantly, it is still uncertain whether Ofcom would give go-ahead to the cut.
It looks like a paradox for ITV, a commercial public service broadcaster (PSB). They enjoye great benefits of being PSB, like very cheap spectrum and visibility at the EPG, among others. But on the other hand, the commercial broadcasters feel the PSB remit is restraining its ability to generate more advertising revenue.

However, the paradox is not an issue. ITV unnecessarily will need to cut back on its regional programming to revigorate its business. It reminds me of the book "Doing what matters", written by James Kilts et al. When Kilts took over at the Gillette, the business got many problems, like decline of market share, flat sales and earning, acquisitions not deliversing, among others. Kilts could easily go for the divesting of some acquired business, instead he chose not to divest but focus on three strategies: ZOG, FE and TI.
ZOG means zero overhead growth,aiming to control costs and invest the savings in research and marketing.
FE is functional excellence, meaning achieving best-in-class capability and performance at the best possible cost.
TI stands for Total Innovation, meaning that continous innovation to come up with game-changing products.
The strategy revived Gillette, without making any divestment, and it is quite instructive for the ITV. Could ITV control the cost through other ways except the cut on regional programming? Has it achieved the best quality programming with the least cost? Has it been continously working to deliver new game-changing products?

These are what really matters. It makes no sense to focus on the psb remit, which the ITV has really benefited a lot from.

Olympic Logo, epileptic and doping

The BBC was in hot water again as the Coporation was yesterday censured for showing footage of the 2012 Olympic logo which could have triggered epileptic seizures.

While defending itself, BBC said that a major public body (hereof LOCOG) launching a promotion such as this to the public would already have taken steps to ensure compliance and that the graphics would have been tested for photosensitivity and be safe for it to broadcast. The BBC said it would not normally expect to test such images before broadcast."

But Ofcom ruled that "...it is the responsibility of the broadcaster to ensure that flashing images..... This responsibility is particularly important where there is the potential for harm to viewers. The broadcast of this material was therefore in breach of Rule 2.13."

The ruling of Ofcom reminds me of doping in sports. An athlete who failed doping test often claimed to be innocent, arguing that they did not take the forbidden substance intentionally, or somebody have spiked their food, and among others. But
whether intentional or innocent, the responsibility lies with the athletes themselves to ensure that no performance-enhancing drugs in their body.

The rules and regulations on doping serves as very good explanation of what is the responsibility. it is the same case on the issue of epileptic. BBC could shift the reponsibility to the Locog, which had the logo designed, but as a broadcaster, BBC has to ensure its content broadcast is free of those "banned substance" .

By the way, today's reading also led me to think of another question on the relationship between Ofcom and BBC. Recently BBC have been either fined or being censured by Ofcom, but BBC is actually a very special broadcaster as it has its own regulator in the form of BBC Trust. However, recent cases show that Ofcom has played a very active role in the regulation of BBC. I got full answers from the MOU between BBC Trust and Ofcom reached in March.

Noddys, media trust and media literacy

Winningmedia comes back after a half-a-month-long "dissertation leave".

Having gone through the recent media reports, what has interested me is the unabated discussion(see Newstatesman, MediaGuardian) on trust in media, in particular television. All this fuss about media trust has reminded me of the dissertation which I have just submitted.

The dissertation is about how media frame our our perception of the reality by emphasizing or selecting some aspects of an event while excluding others. What reporters are writing is actually not report but story. The media frame is acting like a window, through which we look at the world. How big is the window and which direction it is opening towards shape our perception of the world.

Compared with the media framing, the debate on the use of "noddys" pales in significance. The "noddys" is more about technique, but media framing goes to the heart of the issue, namely, the content and its orientation. Unfortunately, nobody seem to care about media framing, with all jumping to the bandwagon of "noddys".
it is nothing but a blinder which keeps us from seeing the broader picture.

We may have too high expectations for media, so that we tend to feel "decieved" by such things as noddys. But what I want to remind everyone of is that the news world is anything but perfect. Framing is something inherent in it, and noddys is simply a result of current media culture.

So we don't need to make a big fuss of the "noddys", instead we need to improve our media literacy, and always keep critical eye on the media world. That is the only realistic way or solution to the current issue of media trust.

busy with dissertation

hi, this notice serves to prove that I am still in London but work really hard on my dissertation. so can't find enough time to read and write. but will make up for this when submitting the paper on Sept.2.
See you soon

Vote for Google bid for open wireless spectrum

I will stand for Google's campaign for open wireless spectrum!
Guardian reported today that the dotcom group has looked likely to enter the US wireless market after the US regulator agreed to change the way it plans to sell off part of the airwaves in November.
There has been growing speculation on whether Google will launch its own mobile phone, like Gphone, or Google simply wants to use the wireless spectrum for his WiFi project which will enable more people to be online at any time and at any place.
But whatever direction Google will go in, I am most interested in the implications for its entry into the wireless market.
In the United States, the wireless spectrum has long been dominated or monoponized by the telecom operators, like AT&T or Verizon. Consequentially, when Iphone is launched, it has to be tied to the operator AT&T, as anybody who buys Iphone must sign up for the network provided by AT&T for at least two years. Such exclusive contract is nothing but anti-competitive. Unfortunately AT&T can't provide the best service, which has affected the sales of Iphone, and lead to the drop of Apple's shares.
So Google bid for an open wireless spectrum will challenge the current monopoly. Though the wireless operators will resist, the wind appears not to blow in their way.
I will stand for Google's wireless bid, and hope to see it does that not just in the United States, but in other markets as well.

Murdoch need PR

In China there is a saying: a person is so poor that he has only money left. It suggests that wealthy as they are, people are very poor in other respects, like knowledge, good image, or happiness.
This could be applied to Mr. Rupert Murdoch, who is undoutedly rich, given his expanisve media empire. But he is so poor in other areas like reputation.
The recent reports could underline my argument. The first is Murdoch's takeover of Dow Jones. People, whether politicians or journalists, had voiced their concern over Murdoch's hands-on approach to editorial policy. Though the takeover went ahead eventually, Murdoch had to fend off criticism which normally reserved for "genocidal tyrants", which he himself had confessed.
The second example is the decision by a green group to drop an attempt to becoming charity partner with BskyB, a media property owned by Murdoch. The environmental group, Friends of the Earth, had thought of using the proposed close tie with BskyB to access its great number of customers as well as donations from the broadcaster, however, the staff of the organisation warned that this could damage its reputation as indepedence, and the deal therefore was scraped.
The third example is that the Office of Fair Trading is considering referring BSkyB's purchase of Sir Alan Sugar's Amstrad electronics company to the Competition Commission. Currently, BskyB is also subject to competition investigation for his purchase of the ITV shares late last year.
So the priority for Murdoch, in my view, is no longer the continued expansion of his media empire, but some reflection on people's responses to his business development, and turn to PR guru to burnish its image.
In a sense, Murdoch is so rich that he has only money to burn.

Less regulation is not better regulation

following the phone-in scandal which beset some public service broadcasters, another scandal broke out, this time involving the broadband companies. Which? tested 300 consumer internet connections, which were promised speeds of up to 8Mb/sec. It found the average speed to be just 2.7Mb/sec, with the slowest connection crawling along at less than 0.09Mb/sec.
So it seems that consumers have been misled by the advertisment of the broadband companies, however, media regulator Ofcom appeared not to be in a hurry to address the situation, saying that they may look at the issue if there is increasing complaints.
I doubt this would be the right attitude for Ofcom on this issue, and I suspect Ofcom might have been aware of this issue long before the issue was raised by media reports. Actually when Virgin Media and Sky were locked in a bitter fight, they had attacked each other regarding broadband. The infighting between media companies provided some information which would otherwise be concealed between themsleves. If you take the Tube, you will not miss those advertisments by Virgin Media like "broadband, speed, and the truth".
it is hard for Ofcom to miss such revealing advertisement, but the issue seems to be not yet on their agenda.
Ofcom may have adhered to the faith that less regulation is better regulation, and only regulate only when necessary. Under this motto, they may have prefered ex-post approach, waiting for the situation to further develop. But in this case, the slow response to the broadband issue could only catch Ofcom off guard, and put them under fire for slow response. I would suggest them deal with it as seriously and quickly as possible, since broadband has been something very comon in our society and would have relate to many people.
Sometimes less regulation is not better regulation.