There has been growing unease among staff at the BBC News website over proposals to sell advertising on the international edition of the site.
The plan has been under consideration for several months but as a decision draws closer, opponents are becoming more vocal.
Supporters of the idea say that international visitors to the site are getting a service for free as they live outside the UK and don’t pay the licence fee that funds the BBC. They look at the millions of people who read the website outside the UK as a way of raising money to fund the BBC’s global TV ambitions.
But the plan has provoked strong opposition from many of the staff on the site and from veteran correspondents. Earlier this year, 170 of them signed a petition against the proposal.
Now employees from the website have circulated a 10-page document condemning the proposal, which they say could lead to less serious journalism and damage the BBC’s reputation. Here is a summary of their concerns about advertising on the news site:
- Readers don’t want them. This proposal will put advertisers, not audiences, at the heart of everything the site does.
- BBC Worldwide has user-tested the least intrusive kinds of ad, but acknowledges that it may have to move to more intrusive forms to sell the space
- The BBC News website relies in part on grant-in-aid funding. We are giving that away in return for the much riskier promise of commercial revenue
- Editorial decisions may very likely begin to be taken on commercial grounds
- Those who contribute articles, tips, photos and video for free are likely to charge
- Inappropriate ads are likely to find their way onto sensitive news stories
- Hundreds of thousands of UK citizens will see ads when they access the News website due to imprecise technology
- Download speeds will almost certainly slow, ruining the BBC’s recognised reputation as one of the leaders in the field
- Collaboration between journalists working for the News website and BBC World Service will become much more difficult, leading to duplication and waste, because of the sudden need for separation of commercial and public service activities. Clear, auditable separation of commercial and public revenue streams will be impossible
- Sizeable chunks of the commercial income will have to be spent on extra technical capacity required to put ads onto the page, rather than driving the editorial quality of products in a fast-changing media environment
This could be the thin end of the wedge; if ads appear here, where else will they be in a decade? World Service radio looks particularly vulnerable - Familiar arguments accusing the BBC of alleged abuse of its position as a public sector broadcasting operating in a quasi-commercial environment will become harder to defend.
These are all good points. But additionally, there are questions over the business plan for the ads. The BBC would be competing for scarce advertising dollars with big, well-established news organisations, particularly in the US. While online ad revenue is rising, anyone working in the commercial sector will tell you that it is tough market.
So there is a question over how much revenue the ads would bring in. Ultimately, would a few million dollars make up for the damage to the brand and potential long-term repercussions?
PDF