Breakfast embraces social media

One point that occurred to me listening to this morning's discussion is that with Facebook and the loss of anonymity you are maybe able to trust the provenance of comments a little more.



Sometimes I wonder if texts, emails etc are actually from a member of the public or from an orchestrated spin campaign on behalf of a particular group.



Oh and can we have a station messageboard back please? I'd love to raise some constructive points about 5's sports coverage and have nowhere to do so.

What a disappointment you ignored Prosperogirl's second point completely Steve.

You miss the point though Steve about how authentic some FB accounts are. I have two. One in my real name and another for a quite legal purpose, in another name. I don't use it to spam, or flaming or anything sinister but there is a purpose to it. All you need are two different email accounts. A comment through FB is no more authentic than some anonymous email or txt.



When do we get a message board back?

Thanks for replying in part to my comments Steve, I have learnt a new word - sockpuppet!



Having had a week or so to think about all of this, I think that what is most clear is that the feedback and interactive aspects to 5 live and BBC output in general are in an awful muddle. How can it be that within one organisation one station has a messageboard and another doesn't? Some programmes use facebook and twitter and others don't.



Within stations there is no consistency let alone across the board. I have no idea what Now(?) is and I can't be bothered to try and find out. By adding more and more options to the mix it is just getting more and more confusing.



It seems to me that I can start the day by contributing to one facebook page or a blog for breakfast , then I have to go to a different facebook page for Victoria's show. Then I have to text Gabby because I don't know whether she has a facebook page and even if she did I would have to track it down, then I can tweet Richard and finally I can text drive.



And that is only the daytime schedule.

What 'we need' Steve, is the message board back.

Mr Bowbrick your comments are amusing.



"As you can imagine, individual networks set their own priorities and will always have different needs" -- it seems that all of the other main BBC radio stations see a message board as a priority. So, if individual networks set their priorities clearly 5Live didnt want a message board.



I think the "trample their personalities with some kind of central command" comment is a red herring. Firstly, the BBC has editorial guidelines and secondly Mr Huggers, Mr Davie, et. al. must have "commanded" that it is was acceptable and appropriate to allow certain social media channels to be used, or in the case of twitter, abused.



So, you (5Live) according to your own comments can listen to listeners and make the message board a priority.

It should be standard policy of the BBC to have an accompanying message board/blog for all BBC News and Current affairs programme.

Mr Bowbrick says "As you can imagine, individual networks set their own priorities and will always have different needs so we don't want to trample their personalities with some kind of central command" meanwhile Mr Peter Horrocks, the new director of BBC Global News says "This isn't just a kind of fad from someone who's an enthusiast of technology. I'm afraid you're not doing your job if you can't do those things. It's not discretionary", he is quoted as saying in the BBC in-house weekly Ariel.



That looks like a "central command" to me Mr Bowbrick.



https://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2010/feb/10/bbc-news-social-media



"Twitter and RSS readers are to become essential tools, says Horrocks."



Horrocks, formerly head of the BBC's multimedia newsroom, finds clear words for it: "If you don't like it, if you think that level of change or that different way of working isn't right for me, then go and do something else, because it's going to happen. You're not going to be able to stop it."



Pretty unambigious I'd say.

Thanks again for responding Steve. You seem to have a difficult job which just keeps getting harder. I wonder what effect the Peter Horrocks' comments have had on things.



3 explicitly clear questions.



Why was the messageboard for Five Live closed?

Why do other stations have messageboards?

Are Richard Bacon's, Nicky Campbell etc Twitter pages BBC pages or personal pages?



Thanks

Last night on Livesey the host and the money man discussed whether it was OK to use social networking sites while you were at work. In many places it is not OK. Apparently it is alright for BBC employees to use them because it is "for research" according to the money man.

I also think some distinction between personal and BBC twitter accounts is needed. For example, when Nicky Campbell first got his account he was mainly using it to plug some CD he was on, and where he was performing. That is fair enough, but surely it is against some BBC guidelines for him to then promote his account on air?

Dr_Bean, Ian Hunter, BBC Online Managing Editor, in an email to me on 7 December, in response to a question I put said :



"I can confirm that BBC people using Twitter do fall under BBC editorial rules."



I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees the blurring of personal and professional Twitter usage as a concern.



As Mr Campbell (a) promotes his twitter account on air (b) posts commercial messages on his twitter account (CD/event information etc) (c) list the BBC in his bio on Twitter this is clearly a contravention of editorial guidelines.



This needs to be urgently addressed. The BBC are preparing new guidelines as I have said (and I have submitted my thoughts), but they are moving at a snails pace and this needs to be fixed fast.



I have raised Mr Bacon's indisgressions a number of times and I know Mr Controller is aware.

"I can confirm that BBC people using Twitter do fall under BBC editorial rules."



And if they are breached how do the BBC get the material removed?

Why are 5 Live comments on this 'Now' system restricted to 140 characters when SMS, Email, Facebook and Twitter comments are allowed considerably more. Plus of course selected comments only seen!

Good point Stirling. You only have to look at https://twitter.com/nickyaacampbell tweets from today to see that Mr Campbell is promoting his non-BBC commercial affairs. Now, if these accounts, promoted on air fall under the BBC editorial rules this _must_ be a breach.



I suspect the account is his alone to manage so the only person who could remove content is he himself.



So who's checking these twitter accounts that are promoted on air? I suspect no-one is.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy on his twitter account says "shock revelation : the BBC is checking the tweets of key presenters before they are published. Trusted to broadcast live but not to tweet!" https://twitter.com/krishgm/status/8983683461



There's an interesting debate going on there.

Thanks for replying to my questions Steve.



I think with both twitter and facebook there is maybe a divide between those who still recognise the dangers of writing in a medium in the public domain and those who do not. Hopefully the BBC guidelines can keep twitter pages interesting without overstepping the impartiality mark.



The messageboard issue is a problem which I doubt will go away. I think there are suspicions that they were closed for reasons other than resources and when you consider the resources needed to monitor facebook, twitter etc it surely cannot still be used as a valid reason. There is nowhere now to comment on vast sections of the station's output which I think is a real pity. Messageboards can be used as a way of gaining valuable feedback.



Anyway thanks for the discussion - I am in danger of repeating myself so am over and out.

I think this issue is very black and white.



1. Anyone can use twitter.

2. Any twitter account promoted on the BBC must be a BBC twitter account used to aggregate or disseminated information relevant to the programme.

3. These accounts should 100% comply with the BBC editorial guidelines.

4. Personal twitter accounts of BBC employees must not be referenced in BBC twitter accounts.



I TOTALLY disagree that the current social media guidelines are robust enough or robustly reviewed. Nicky Campbell is continually (as recently as yesterday) plugging his commercial activities on his twitter account -- this account is referred to in his programme and also linked to via the 5Live twitter account and online.



Richard Bacon -- as Mr Van Klaveren is well aware -- has posted partisan political views on his twitter account -- which is heavily promoted on-air too.



Both practises are inappropriate when they are faux-BBC accounts.



There must be no shades of grey. Having personally discussed this with the policy team I will be deeply disappointed if the social media frontier is not much more closely scrutinized.



This is not about the talent not being able to tweet just being very mindful of their responsibilities -- which current they dont seem to be -- although I think Richard may have got the message by now.

I have come to the conclusion that Twitter is completely unsuitable for a rolling news audience response. For heavens sake! Totally ridiculous soundbites and inane comment. Have you read the ones about Alexander MacQueen just as one example? OK I can see Facebook as having some value but not tweets as they give no thought, depth or opinion within their short life before being lost in the next 2000 tweets to follow.

It just seems to me that all this social networking nonsense has absolutely no roll in a news based radio station. Nothing can be substantiated, the presenters abuse their position to promote self interest ... (Campbell) ... where are the journalists? Do they not have any input these days or is (are) Jo Public the source of all their stories?



Sad days for news people.

What an excellent point prosperosgirl makes in the opening post, that unfortunately has gone unanswered.



I have always thought that with so many spin doctors being employed by the major political parties that it is now far too easy for them to bombard a radio station with texts, emails and facebook account comments to direct a radio discussion and make statements to make them look favourable for their own purpose.



Someone has to take into account at 5live that it is not always the general public who contribute with comments that are read out but that there are people out there paid to manipulate and want to gain advantage through the radio airwaves.I just hope that someone is aware of this at 5live and particularly with a general election soon to be thrust upon us.

Well well well, here we go again. This will be an interesting test case of the new BBC Twitter guidelines. Nicky Campbell hawking his wares on his Twitter account yesterday: " we are plying with our swing band JazzCafe at Madjeski March 11.https://bit.ly/6GLQ9u come along and i'll buy you a drink. password TWEET about 14 hours ago https://twitter.com/NickyAACampbell/status/9295704598



This is the account that says he is clearly associated with the BBC, "Bio: BBC Radio and TV Presenter, Journalist and Musician." and is promoted on the BBC5Live twitter page: https://twitter.com/bbc5live/status/9326800677



Now, this should be a clear breach, which I will write to the BBC about today.



We'll see if the new policy is a toothless tiger or not.