Third Party Shakespeare.

TV Small tipbit in amongst this blog post about the process of working towards the emergence of third party content on the BBC iPlayer. My emphasis:
"We already have some experience of showcasing third party content with S4C on BBC iPlayer and over the next few months we are planning to dip our toe in the water further by undertaking some small scale pathfinder projects to get a better understanding of the issues and questions we will need to address. This will start next month with content to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death where our plans include a digital event on 23rd April hosted in Birmingham and co-curated by the BBC and the British Council, in collaboration with some of the nation’s greatest performing arts institutions."
Apart from the fact this was just the sort of thing which would have been broadcast on television back in the day (see Fanfare for Europe, "a celebration in words and music from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden to mark the formal entry of the United Kingdom into the EEC, in the presence of the Queen and Prince Philip. Introduced by Tom Fleming.") it is nevertheless exciting to see the event receiving a national airing.

It is of course, the event mentioned in the press release back in 2015 but the fact of it being hosted on the iplayer rather than in clips boxes on the website is what makes this interesting, a potential flood of content that hasn't been broadcast on television - and being attached to this third party content initiative.

The BBC Trust's restrictions seem fair.  Essentially it has to be material which is connected to what the BBC is already doing or more specifically the kind of thing the BBC has already done.  At best this could be a way for performance material to be seen without it having to be broadcast and contextualised for television broadcast.  We'll see.

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