Web users to help shape new TV series

Web users are to be given a groundbreaking role in shaping a BBC2 series, it was announced today.

Online visitors will be able to view unedited footage for the BBC’s forthcoming Digital Revolution documentaries and suggest content and stories which should be included.

The four-part series will trace the way the internet has influenced lives to mark the web’s 20th anniversary.

Tim Berners-Lee, the architect of the internet, will be closely involved with the project which will be developed with the Web Science Research Initiative of which he is co-director.

The “open source”-style series will be a first for the BBC and will be started with a series of blog posts at bbc.co.uk/digitalrevolution in which academic Aleks Krotoski will open up the debate asking people to share opinions and stories. These will then inform the production and be used to uncover personal stories about how the web is used and abused.

George Entwistle, controller of BBC Knowledge commissioning, said: “After 20 years of tumultuous innovation, now feels like the right time for us to take stock of the profound change our society has undergone since the birth of the web.

“I’m delighted the BBC audience will have the opportunity to play a pivotal role in the creation of this project, and I’m really looking forward to seeing it unfold online in the months leading up to TV transmission.”

Executive producer Dominic Crossley-Holland said: “This is a hugely important and timely series and it’s very exciting that the father of the web himself, Tim Berners-Lee, is involved.

“The production team is committed to being as open as possible in a way that may have far-reaching consequences for the way that TV is produced in the future.”

The series will be screened next year.