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BBC plans for £68m local video network go public

The BBC has made public its plans to spend £68 million on a network of 60 local websites across the UK to provide on-demand video news.

The proposals have been opened up to the public as part of an approval process led by the BBC Trust.

The plans for an on-demand, local video service for online and mobile spanning 60 UK regions will require a £68 million investment by the year 2012/3, according to documents from the BBC Executive released today.

The plans, which have previously been criticised by local newspaper groups, will be subject to the Trust's public value test (PVT).

According to documents submitted to the Trust, the local video content would be 'focused chiefly on news and sport' with weather, user-generated content and educational footage also covered.

The service will provide up to 10 new stories a day in each area, accounting for up to 20 minutes of footage per day in total.

In addition up to three daily 45-90 second bulletins for news, sports and weather have been proposed, as well as live streams of events to a maximum of 10 per year for each area.

Upper limits on the amount of video content would be higher for London, because of its large population, and Wales to account for video content in Welsh and English.

To extend the service to mobile devices the content will be optimised for viewing on a mobile and would use location-based tecnology to deliver video based on a user’s location or preferences.

Users would be able to tag, rate and share video content under the plans and navigate through all multimedia local content using an interactive map of each of the areas.

Staffing numbers for the BBC's local online content would be increased from an average of four per area to ten as part of the proposals, with the introduction of a community producer responsible for the video output.

“BBC management's proposal for a local video broadband offer to complement existing BBC Local websites supersedes previous plans for a local television service,” Diana Coyle, BBC trustee and chair of the Trust's Public Value and Fair Trading Committee, said in a release.

“BBC management believes the proposition will help the BBC meet its public purposes and close the gap between the importance that audiences attach to the BBC's local role and their view of current performance.”

Following an initial four week public consultation period on the proposals the Trust will publish its provisional conclusions in November.

These will be subject to a further consultation period with a final decision expected in February 2009.

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