Ci scusiamo anche noi per aver diffuso limmagine. Things happen...The BBCs news chief has said an incident in which the corporation used a photo of a girl who was not Nigerian that was trending on Twitter as part of the #BringBackOurGirls campaign caused a great deal of strain and anxiety in the newsroom. Questioned about the difficulties in verifying stories and images from the internet at the London Social Media Summit on Friday, BBC director of news and current affairs James Harding said that when it came to verification – I dont take that issue lightly at all. He said that the use of an image of a woman from Guinea-Bissau taken in 2011, published on the BBC Trending blog and also on Canadas CBC News, caused a great deal of strain and anxiety in the newsroom that prides itself on its accuracy. Of course we make mistakes and we work extrememly hard not to. Harding added: The world has turned into a giant fact-checking machine. You get something wrong, you can hear about it pretty quickly. That can be painful and as you can imagine quite annoying when you hear about it but its extremely healthy for journalists. At the event organsied by the New York Times and the BBC Academy of Journalism, Harding also talked about the challenges facing the BBC in a social media world and said the corporation was trying to be more open and open itself up to new technology and ways of distributing news via Instagram, Twitter and other outlets. He said the BBC is working with Twitter on a number of new projects but did not give details. Harding also said the BBC is asking how you tell a news story with an image and a number [and] weve got a group of people whove been looking at you tell long-form stories. There are amazing opportunities in storytelling. There is a rise in appetite for news around the world. He said he thought, weve moved from a world in which news was like a concert and the BBC sat on stage and the audience sat in rows watching, to being something closer to a music festival. However, he said that although I genuinely think its the most exciting time to be a journalist with the new outlets available, the most important thing is people trust and respect what we do in BBC news. And one of the fundamental questions when the corporation discusses social media use is: How do you actually harness all the people who work at the BBC and the people who listen to and watch and use the BBC and do that in a way that youre maniacal about accuracy and diversity of voice, impartiality? When asked about what the BBC could learn from rivals Buzzfeed and Vice, Harding said: You take them extremely seriously and you spend a lot of time watching a studying them and learning … weve a great deal to learn from our competitors. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email media@theguardian or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly for publication.theguardian/media/2014/may/19/bbc-news-chief-bringbackourgirls-photo-james-harding?CMP=twt_gu
Posted on: Mon, 19 May 2014 10:08:34 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015