BBC review
The latest on the BBC review, as of 10.04am on the BBC News website HERE is confirmation from Mark Thompson that BBC 6 Music and Asian Network will face closure.
Speaking to BBC staff Mr Thompson also announced that there will be 25% less spent on BBC online by 2013. Among the closures will be teen services Switch and Blast, with Mr Thompson admitting Channel 4 should lead the way with these audiences. He has also pledged that in the future 90p of every licence fee £1 will be spent on programming. The morning newspapers’ coverage of the story can be found in The Guardian HERE, HERE, HERE (where Greg Dyke accuses Thompson of being overpaid and out of touch), and Thompson’s own article acknowledging that the BBC must stop trying to do everything HERE. The Times’ coverage is HERE; Telegraph’s HERE, HERE and HERE.
Tech
The 80 or 90% market share dominance of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer looks to be nearing the end as users throughout Europe were yesterday shown a ‘ballot screen’ prompting people to choose a browser to use. The move is part of a deal with European Union regulators; last month Brussels dropped anti-trust charges against Microsoft in return for Microsoft agreeing to provide a software update with a pop-up menu of browsers. Dave Heiner, vice president of Microsoft said ‘users who get the choice screen will be free to choose any browser or stick with the browser they have.’
In an effort to take on Internet Explorer, Google launched a major advertising campaign in Britain to promote Chrome. Today Google will release several improvements in its browser including additional privacy controls and a foreign language translator for web pages. Apple Firefox is the other biggest rival. More in The Times HERE and background on the ’10 year web browser war’ in The Guardian HERE and HERE; Independent HERE; Telegraph HERE; and FT HERE.
Theatre
This month sees the long-awaited launch of National Theatre Wales. In Wales, English speakers outnumber Welsh speakers three to one. The idea of an English-language national theatre has been debated for almost 100 years, but it took Dai Smith, who has chaired the Arts Council of Wales since 2006, to cut through the competing reports on how it should be structured – ‘I decided that this pussyfooting around – should we have a national theatre or not? – was ridiculous… I firmly believe in this’. Like Scotland’s national theatre, the company has no permanent home. Its home is all of Wales. More in The Guardian HERE.
