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Copyright of Communication & Society is the property of Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Navarra, S.A. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The migration of audiences to digital environments has motivated the media to develop a content distribution strategy that has a presence in these new spaces. In the case of European public broadcasters, they have strengthened their digital news services and have built video-on-demand platforms where they organise and screen their products. Even so, the overload of information and content reaching users forces corporations to look for new mechanisms to present an adequate, interesting and diverse offering to each of their followers. This research project analyses the use of artificial intelligence in the recommendation systems implemented by 14 European public broadcasters in Germany (ARD and ZDF), Belgium (VRT and RTBF), Denmark (DR), Spain (RTVE), Finland (YLE), France (France TV), Great Britain (BBC), the Netherlands (NPO), Ireland (RTÉ), Italy (RAI), Sweden (SVT) and Switzerland (RTS). The results reveal that there is no unanimity among the corporations with regard to the operation and origin of these systems, which vary between homemade developments, acquired from third parties, or collaborative solutions. Operators differentiate between news recommendation processes and those executed on their VoD platforms and aim to distance their systems from those of commercial media, for which they have already started working on a public service media (PSM) algorithm that includes traditional public media values, avoids filter bubbles, and pays special attention to the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The multiplication on the offer of current news and audiovisual entertainment content in the renewed digital context, motivates public and broadcasting corporations to implement and internalise innovative processes that allow them to be relevant in people's lives. These processes are not only limited to the development and integration of sophisticated technological prototypes, but are closely linked to a philosophy of constant change and renewal of ideas and ways of thinking. This research project offers a complete deep insights of the innovative proposals of the state-owned public service media from the Iberian Peninsula, Radiotelevisión Española and Rádio e Televisão de Portugal, with a particular focus on the strategic, technological and young audience engagement prism. Methodology: In-depth interviews were conducted with the directors of the innovation and technology departments of the corporations, as well as with the heads of their main youth content projects, PlayZ and RTP Arena, respectively, complemented by a review of the online products and social networks of both groups. Results: It is identified that RTVE's proposal has a greater disruptive component, with initiatives aimed at optimising the user’s experience, mobile first or technologies such as AI, 5G or 4K; while RTP's approach has a greater cultural cut, trying to renew the language and routines of creation of its traditional and native contents. Conclusions: The innovation strategies of both corporations start from a central objective of updating, with cautious approaches to new technologies. The recent creation of a bubble department in RTP contrasts with the reality of RTVE, with the intention of blurring the limits of this section in its structure in order to achieve a fully transversal innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As artificial intelligence (AI) gains space in the media, public broadcasters are testing and experimenting with these technologies to raise their services to the new standards of the audiovisual ecosystem. From algorithms that help recommend the most suitable content for users, to others that detect news and automate some of the tasks of journalists, these tools are increasingly present in public audiovisual corporations. The data were obtained from semi-structured in-depth interviews with a convenience sample of 15 corporations from 12 countries. The results reflect a heterogeneous application of artificial intelligence in corporations, oriented towards the automatic creation of content from structured data, the improvement of audience interaction through chatbots, and personalisation or verification. The implementation of these technologies also poses major challenges. Firstly, the economic cost of adapting these systems to each corporation and the difficulties in hiring experts to develop AI solutions prevent a complete deployment of these tools in public broadcasters. As main conclusions, we have understood that AI as a "culture" is believed to be vital for the public audiovisual services of the future, although its application is still far from being a standard and generally does not occupy a relevant strategic position in the innovation departments of corporations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the response of European Public Service Media to the crisis caused by Covid-19, especially the impact of the pandemic on Europe's major public broadcasters, with a particular focus on technical and professional constraints, alterations in audience volume and habits, production strategies, type of broadcast content and journalists' routines. The research is based on public information from the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and 19 in-depth, structured interviews with a convenience sample of innovation and strategy managers from public broadcasters in Austria (ORF), Belgium (VRT and RTBF), Denmark (DR), Finland (YLE), France (France TV), Germany (ARD and ZDF), Great Britain (BBC), Ireland (RTÉ), Italy (RAI), Netherlands (NPO), Portugal (RTP), Spain (RTVE), Sweden (SVT), Switzerland (RTS) and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The results indicate that the corporate projection of PSM was increased by emphasising their role as essential services and their defence of the values that characterise them. The pandemic forced the adaptation of programme production from technical standards to an emotional approach, accelerating a formal hybridisation with native online contents. Dependence on software grew and newsmaking processes were altered towards 'remote journalism'. Changes are drawn that may be maintained in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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