Last year’s Graf report hit the BBC’s New Media arm hard, forcing the closure of several of its sub-sites, and the re-appraisal of its current practices. The BBC’s response to the report is a turgid document to say the least, but blogger, journalist, and gentleman adventurer Ben Hammersley spotted a most interesting paragraph in it this week. The BBC are planning the launch of “Backstage", which will be, “a public site for the BBC’s in-house development teams to share development plans with their peers and audiences".
Involving members of the public with development and beta-testing of new projects isn’t just good for geeks; it’s the BBC living up to its charter - something which the Graf report had suggested it was failing to do. And it could be beneficial for the BBC too; Google, Amazon, and flickr have all taken a similar approach and found the feedback and ideas generated from letting the public play with their systems invaluable.
Until now, glimpses of the BBC’s New Media research and development have been limited to its developers posting articles on their own blogs (such as Matt Biddulph’s explanation of how Radio 1’s Ten Hour Takeover was run). Backstage would give developers far more opportunities to show off their work in progress and gain the feedback of their peers. There’s no word of when it will be live, but it’s definitely worth keeping your eyes out for.