³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer Goes Local
Last week, the team put out an update which allows Scottish users to use the site in the Gaelic language.
This is the latest in a series of things we've done to build on the iPlayer's contribution to the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's role as a public service broadcaster.
One of the key themes of public service broadcasting is meeting the needs of audiences that tend to be neglected by commercially-driven broadcasters. Simply put, commercial broadcasters rely more heavily on a broad base of appeal for their programmes, so you get more 'middle ground' in their output.
The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ on the other hand, is able to offer a more diverse mix of content.
Although many people think of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ as One Great Big Organisation, in fact the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ is organised along more federalist lines. Aside from the 'corporate body' bit, where the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer team work, there are a whole host of regional divisions - such as ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Scotland, ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Wales/Cymru and the many local English outlets. (And not forgetting .--Ed (with thanks to our for pointing out the omission!)
Each of these divisions is empowered with the editorial autonomy they need to ensure we end up with a mix of content which is authentically local in flavour. The opportunity for ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer is to reflect this diversity in the content we carry. At the same time, the sheer physical dislocation of these divisions means that they have evolved distinct production and distribution systems. The challenge is stitching these elements together so we don't expose our seams to the audience.
Local content
From the launch of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer 10% of the TV programmes scheduled for the service have been ring-fenced for regional programming - this is typically about 40 hours each week. A good start perhaps, but we felt this didn't reach far enough into what the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ has to offer.
Over the summer, working with ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Cymru, the team developed a new platform that allowed the Welsh teams to publish their programmes directly into the infrastructure that sits behind ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer. This allowed us to make the available to viewers and you can now catch up on Welsh-language shows like Mosgito and CF99.
More recently we've extended our publishing capacity to provide a solid base of support for the newly launched ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Alba channel which serves the needs of the Gaelic-speaking community in Scotland. This is a really useful complement to the broadcast service, particularly as digital broadcast services are not available in some of the more remote areas.
Local languages
To state the obvious, what ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Alba and ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Cymru have in common is that the programmes are in the respective local languages. In a parallel stream of development, we've been working to bring the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer experience to these audiences in their own tongue.
First off the blocks was Welsh mode, again developed in partnership with the folks from ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Cymru. You just select the Welsh-language ("Cymraeg") in the toolbar at the bottom of every page...
...and the site flips into Welsh mode.
Of course sites that have already established that users want to interact in Welsh can link users directly in to Welsh mode and save users from manually switching it on. Also, in a few weeks we'll be moving this selection into the user's preference settings in the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's Identity login system which will mean it is 'sticky' between visits.
As I mentioned above, we've just extended all this to provide a similar level of support for the Gaelic language. The basic concept is very much consistent with the other language modes and it looks like this:
Of course, ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer is a fast-moving service with new features coming along every few weeks, so if you notice any quirks with the site in Welsh or Gaelic mode - since our development teams are mostly English speakers, errors can be trickier to pick up in our test processes.
³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ local radio
Up until this week, local radio stations were only part-integrated into the iPlayer experience. This meant that finding a programme was hived off separately and the playback experience was inconsistent with that for national radio. Last week's release changed all of that and we now have a fully joined-up experience across the entire radio portfolio. John O'Donovan's will be posting soon explaining this in full.
What's coming up next?
So we've now got pretty good coverage of both the local content and the languages people use, but what's in the pipeline for ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer with a local flavour? First up, since the radio audience consistently tell us that they appreciate the ease of use and sound quality you get with the MP3 listening experience, we're broadening out the coverage of MP3 material across all the stations. Expect to see substantial progress on this starting now and continuing into early 2009.
Meanwhile, in television we're looking hard at our media management platform to identify the bits that don't work as efficiently as they could. By making more of the computing capacity, and reducing the need for unnecessary human intervention we'll be able to increase the number of hours of material we can deliver each week. Since the greatest opportunities for growth in coverage are around regional programming, this is the area where you'll see the biggest impacts of this work over the coming months.
James Hewines is Product Lead, ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ iPlayer
Comment number 1.
At 3rd Dec 2008, lucas42 wrote:Will the iplayer also be translated into Irish?
It often seems that the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ often focus more on Scots Gaelic and Welsh than they do on Irish. Despite the fact that more people in the UK speak Irish than they do Scots Gaelic, the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ has both a dedicated TV and radio station for Scots Gaelic, but neither for Irish.
I know most of this is outside your control, but by providing iplayer in Irish, you'd be doing a bit to redress this balance.
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Comment number 2.
At 3rd Dec 2008, hackerjack wrote:It often seems that the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ often focus more on Scots Gaelic and Welsh than they do on Irish. Despite the fact that more people in the UK speak Irish than they do Scots Gaelic, the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ has both a dedicated TV and radio station for Scots Gaelic, but neither for Irish.
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Might that be becaus Ireland is NOT part of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's remit?
When the Irish start paying licence fees then the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ should start catering for them.
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Comment number 3.
At 3rd Dec 2008, gwenudanfysiau wrote:@James
Good work by the way, the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's offeringings on-line in Welsh is excellent (too good some might say, as it's a dis-incentive for others to compete - but that's another argument!)
I've just noticed today today that the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ now allow welsh language programes they produce for S4C to also be shown on that channel's own on-line 'watch again' service CLIC as well which is a good thing.
"Of course sites that have already established that users want to interact in Welsh can link users directly in to Welsh mode and save users from manually switching it on. Also, in a few weeks we'll be moving this selection into the user's preference settings in the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's Identity login system which will mean it is 'sticky' between visits."
Would it not also be an idea to use the user's browser language preference?
(on Firefox, it's Tools> Options> Content> Languages)
I've just signed up for a ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ identity login a few moments ago to post here, but didn't notice a language setting - will check again.
@hackerjack
I think lucas42 was referring to the North of Ireland which is is part of the the UK, and i believe the number of Irish speakers there alone is greater than that of Gaelic speakers in Scotland.
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Comment number 4.
At 3rd Dec 2008, lucas42 wrote:quote @hackerjack: Might that be becaus Ireland is NOT part of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's remit?
When the Irish start paying licence fees then the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ should start catering for them.
I did say "in the UK", which does contain Northern Ireland. The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's name can often be confusing as it starts with the word 'British'. But in fact, the whole of the UK (a.k.a. the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) has to pay the license fee and therefore IS part of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's remit.
I agree with @gwenudanfysiau's suggestion, using a browser's user agent language preferences would be a helpful default, especially for those without without a ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ identity login.
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Comment number 5.
At 4th Dec 2008, gwenudanfysiau wrote:Also, without knowing there's a language switch option to be had on the page, sticking the 'Cymraeg' button right at the bottom of the page next to terms and conditions is not a very obvious place (+ where's the Scottish Gaelic option?).
Language buttons are usually to be had in the top right corner in bilingual / multilingual websites.
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Comment number 6.
At 4th Dec 2008, hackerjack wrote:Also, without knowing there's a language switch option to be had on the page, sticking the 'Cymraeg' button right at the bottom of the page next to terms and conditions is not a very obvious place (+ where's the Scottish Gaelic option?).
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Agreed, I don't see why it can't be places directly under the player next to the high/normal quality and save buttons. A simple language drop down box would suffice.
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Comment number 7.
At 9th Sep 2009, felicioo wrote:This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.
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