Last month Mark Thompson, the BBC’s director-general, pointed the finger at the Iranian authorities for allegedly intimidating employees at its Persian service.
Now the corporation’s chief is taking things a step further by accusing Iran of masterminding a “sophisticated cyber-attack” that involved jamming satellite feeds in an effort to wreak havoc with broadcasts into the country. Read more
Tech news from around the web:
Google is profiting from illegal advertisements on its search engine, even though it takes them down, alleged a report published on the BBC website on Tuesday. Read more
The BBC reboots its homepage
The BBC today unveils a new homepage, as one of the UK’s most popular websites begins a ground-up redesign. Read more
The BBC is making a fresh push to take its iPlayer service from the computer on to television screens in an attempt to widen the appeal of the online video service.
With a rising number of games consoles, set-top boxes and internet-ready televisions being plugged into broadband connections, the BBC believes that iPlayer viewing on television will overtake that on computers in the next few years.
Mark Thompson, BBC director general, talks to Ben Fenton, the FT’s chief media correspondent, about why we have over-estimated the speed of change in television consumption. Read more
Erik Huggers on changing the BBC
The BBC announced on Monday that it would reduce its online budget by a quarter, resulting in more than 300 job losses.
As well as responding to ongoing pressure from commercial rivals, behind the cutbacks lies a longer-term strategy to bring greater coordination between technology and editorial to the BBC’s online output – something its director of future media and technology, Erik Huggers, wishes had happened sooner. Read more
UK’s Project Canvas opens up as YouView
YouView is finally open. The BBC-led internet-TV consortium, formerly known as Project Canvas, is open for business, open to all comers, and open-ended in its ambition.
That’s not a quote from Richard Halton, appointed chief executive of the joint venture on Thursday. It is the message that its new logo – as Project Canvas rebrands as YouView – is designed to send to viewers, content owners and developers. Read more
Saving the telly
At the FT’s digital media and broadcasting conference in London yesterday, it was pretty clear which players are in the driving seat as the British television world gets turned upside down.
The BBC, clearly, is one. As Andy Duncan, CEO of Channel 4, pointed out, the sharp contraction in TV advertising is about to tilt the market even more in favour of the Beeb, whose licence fee revenues will keep rising whatever the pain being felt elsewhere. The BBC’s £3.6bn this year will exceed the advertising base of the free-to-air broadcasters by £1bn, and according to Duncan could result in it eventually dominating TV as it does radio, where it owns 55 per cent of the audience. Read more
| About this blog | Blog guide |
Richard Waters has headed the FT's San Francisco bureau since 2002 and covers Google and Microsoft, among other things. A former New York bureau chief for the FT, he is intrigued by Silicon Valley's unique financial and business culture, and is looking forward to covering his second Tech Bust.
Chris Nuttall has been online and messing around with computers for more than 20 years and since 2004 has reported from the FT's San Francisco bureau on semiconductors, video games, consumer electronics and all things interwebby.
Maija Palmer has been writing about technology for the FT since 1999 and is fascinated by cybercrime, privacy and all the other issues of the information society. Based in London, she covers European tech companies and hopes that they won't all get acquired by American rivals.
Robin Kwong is the FT's technology, media and telecoms page editor in London. Formerly he was the Taipei correspondent and wrote about the companies that manufacture the vast majority of the world's computers and gadgets. He is interested in the intricacies of the technology supply chain and how China is increasingly changing the tech landscape.
Tim Bradshaw is the FT's digital media correspondent, and has just moved from London to join our team in San Francisco. He has covered start-ups such as Twitter and Spotify, as well as the online ambitions of more established media companies, such as the BBC iPlayer. He also covers the advertising, marketing and video-game industries. Tim has been writing about technology, business and finance since 2003.
