At the international IBC Show conference in Amsterdam, Mike Darcey suggested that despite an exponential expansion in available programming, television may be reaching a steady state. The former chair of Arqiva and previously chief operating officer at Sky is an articulate commentator on the television industry. In his talk, he argued that on balance we may have already seen the most significant structural change.

The television industry has been in a state of disequilibrium since the start of the multichannel era of cable and satellite, followed by the dawn of digital distribution and the emergence of online delivery.

“The period of profound change is coming to an end, that the really big changes, the underlying shifts in technology, have already happened, as have most of the consequential downstream shifts,” he argued. “While there is more second-order adjustment to come, we are entering a relative steady state period.”

“The explosion of choice was soon followed by a revolution in control,” he said. “We had learnt the value of choice in what to watch, now we discovered choice in when to watch it.”

The adoption of fixed and mobile internet at a level that was good enough for video has enabled major media companies to go direct to their viewers and new content creators to connect with them directly, wherever they are.

“The journey has been one of an almost constant sense of disequilibrium, but I would argue that we have arrived at our destination, the logical endpoint, a television world with no distribution bottlenecks. If anyone can access any content, from any source, anywhere in the world, whenever and wherever they want, we have surely reached the end of the journey?”

He suggested that “the big building blocks, the 35-year reshaping of the framework, the field of play and the high-level rules, they are largely in place.”

The driver of change and disequilibrium in the last 35 years has been the arrival of a series of new technologies. The underlying technology drivers of change may have plateaued.

Internet access is pervasive, connected devices are ubiquitous and smartphone penetration is almost total.

Traditional television viewing, in decline for a decade, is starting to level out. There is a balance to be found between the desire for individual control and for shared experiences, between paying for things that we want to watch and viewing things for free, between a global experiences and local stories.

There may be infinite programme available, but consumer viewing time and attention is finite. “When finite time collides with infinite content, the big issue is discovery – how do I find the good stuff, the stuff I will like?”

Even in a world of algorithmic recommendations, marketing will still have a big part to play and will remain a major fixed cost. We already know this from the near-infinite worlds of music and publishing, where although there will be some breakout hits, marketing plays a critical role and remains a significant fixed cost.

Other than artificial intelligence, which could drastically reduce the cost of production and further democratise the process, he does not see any other technology likely to disturb the structural equilibrium at which we have arrived.

“Even if AI brings production costs down close to zero, the television world does not change that much from here. It does for some companies, for some individuals, such as the creators that will get their chance at fame, perhaps at the expense of traditional free broadcasters. But the fundamental framework of the industry, the rules of the game, remain largely as they are today.”

“In which case we are in steady state, the rules of the game are set,” he concludes. “You can stop saying that things are changing faster than ever. Perhaps, finally, they are not.”

www.ibc.org

Spanish broadcasters are working on a national pilot of the DVB-I standard for service discovery to assess its suitability as a strategic tool for improving the visibility, access, and relevance of audiovisual media services. The nine-month trial will involve a collaboration of public and private broadcasters, consumer electronics manufacturers, technology and service providers, broadcasting network operators, and regulators. Spain is the latest country to explore the potential of DVB-I, following early trials in Italy and Germany. A trial is also planned in France. Ireland and a number of other countries are also testing the technology.

The Spanish pilot is being led by the national broadcaster RTVE together with FORTA, the federation of autonomous radio and television organisations. It will also involve the National Markets and Competition Commission and the Ministry for Digital Transformation and Public Service as observers.

RTVE, or Corporación de Radio y Televisión Española, is the Spanish public broadcaster, a state-owned public corporation responsible for national radio and television services, including the La 1 and La 2 television channels, three thematic channels, RTVE Play, and RNE radio stations.

In Spain, digital terrestrial television remains by far the most widely watched audiovisual platform, guaranteeing access to free-to-air linear television channels for all citizens and delivering over 70% of television viewing hours. Nevertheless, it is essential to respond to new viewing patterns and offer complementary programming to compete with global media platforms and providers.

The initiative is partly in response to the European Regulation on Freedom of the Media, and in particular Article 20 regarding prominence. The DVB-I standard is emerging as an option that could guarantee prominence on televisions within the European Union. The European Broadcasting Union has urged its members to launch national initiatives in conjunction with commercial broadcasters.

DVB-I offers a standard way for media providers to announce media services and for devices and displays to discover them, both through broadcast and online networks, incorporating both traditional channels and on-demand services.

The first steps for the Spanish DVB-I pilot include establishing an implementation group, as well as gathering information on other European DVB-I pilots.

There are already pilots in progress in Italy and Germany. France is also looking at launching a pilot. Ireland and a number of other countries are also involved in evaluating the technology. The United Kingdom is so far going it alone with its Freely platform, which is based on similar ideas but not currently on open interoperable standards.

rtve.es
www.forta.es

The transition to online media delivery may seem technologically inevitable but putting a timescale on it is more challenging. The BBC has made noises about this for a while but still has no published plan. The head of the BBC was once again in front of a government committee defending his wicket recently, facing some fairly simple questions, but it seems the answers will have to come from government.

In March 2023, the Public Accounts Committee of the House of Commons reported that: “The BBC should develop a detailed plan including scenarios for how it could switch to an internet-only future, working with government, audience representatives and wider stakeholders, to ensure no-one is left behind.”

Back in front of the committee, Tim Davie, the director general of the BBC was asked how it was getting on.

“There has been some progress,” he said. “I think this is a big conversation that we should be having publicly. What we have said is that we need clarity over time from Government, because it is not something that the BBC can do alone in any way, shape or form. There has to be a decision from Government on whether they want to lay down the track and criteria by which a transition could happen.”

In terms of timescales, he said: “The BBC has no desire to have people who cannot get our services. The conversation is broader than the BBC, but unless you have universal provision of basic broadband of 20 megabits per second, or whatever it might be, to ensure that people can stream video, the BBC would have an issue with effecting the transition.”

“This is not my area of total expertise,” he said. “Part of it will be that they are just not connected yet; the other, is that they do not have a connection.”

“What we have to do, I think, is make sure the broadcast component of the BBC is very significant and retained through that period. We are already at the point where the vast majority of people have got broadband and can get all these services; they can go online and get the news. It would be absurd for us not to offer that service, but the idea that we are giving up on broadcast is not right. We remain utterly committed to DAB and DTT during this period.” He continued: “I do not want to see a position where anyone cannot get their television services from the BBC. That would be absurd.”

With a Government Green Paper due, to be followed by a White Paper and the question of the BBC Charter and its future funding, the director general suggested that the status quo was not an option.

“We cannot continue where we are. I just want to be clear about where the BBC is at: we will need reform of the licence fee. Just going on as we are and saying, ‘Look, it’s fine,’ is not a sustainable position,” he said. “We cannot just put our head in the sand and assume we are going to keep it. No one should be thinking we will just continue as we are going, in my view.”

He said that serious decisions are required about how we charge people and what is included. “Without that level of radicalism, I do not think we are going to safeguard public service broadcasting for a generation — I really don’t.”

The full video and transcript of the BBC Accounts and Trust Statement 2024-25 oral evidence to the Public Accounts Committee is available on the Parliament web site.

www.bbc.co.uk
committees.parliament.uk