ugc@thebbc: A Production Study Examining the Ways in Which Audience Material is Used at the BBC (Top Three Faculty Paper).

This paper provides a case study of the BBC, and the attitudes of its news workers towards Audience Material, or as it is more commonly referred to, User Generated Content (UGC). It is based on a major study of Audience Material at the BBC, co-funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the BBC. A team of five researchers spent ten weeks in nine different newsroom across the BBC, both in London and across the United Kingdom, and as part of these observations undertook interviews with 115 journalists and ten senior editors. A typology of the different types of Audience Material is offered, along with descriptions of the different roles they play within the BBC, the tensions which exist between them, and the different attitudes journalists hold towards them. It becomes clear that news workers are enthusiastic about certain types, and perhaps unsurprisingly, these are the types which fit the traditional model of journalism: audience footage, audience comments and experiences, and are types of Audience Material which the BBC has always received, and used. However, there are certain key people based in individual newsrooms, and some holding senior management positions, who are also enthusiastic about types of Audience Material which challenge traditional models of journalism: collaborative and truly participatory models of journalism. But while it is true that there are a number of impressive examples of collaborative and participatory journalism that exist throughout the BBC's UK operations, most news journalists perceive 'UGC' as simply another newsgathering tool. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]