Ofcom has recommended Channel 4 merge or partner with BBC Worldwide or Five to save it from financial ruin. But what does the broadcaster think of the idea? Writing for paidContent:UK, new media director Jon Gisby, speaking at the Oxford Media Convention today, says BBC.co.uk has not been innovative enough - and only Channel 4 has demonstrated the creative approach necessary to “re-invent public service media”...

“Sometime in late 2008, the UK media sector woke up in 2013. Broadband, on-demand services and social media have changed audience expectations profoundly. And the credit crunch has brought forward looming economic realities to confront commercial players, and regulators, with sudden and stark choices. There’s now a welcome urgency to find radical solutions. As Obama’s new chief of staff said recently, never let a crisis go to waste.

Despite the recent huffing and politicking, there’s clear consensus that innovation in public service media will remain vital. UK audiences still want distinctive, innovative and socially valuable content and services, and they need to be able to discover and use them easily. Public service content can meet important objectives such as solving the digital divide, tackling media literacy or improving health, education and public accountability. Read full post after the jump.

And public service investment in UK content and services can continue to ensure that the creative industries can punch above their weight in increasingly global markets. These may seem like expendable objectives given the current economic crisis, but they don’t just matter to the twittering digerati in the UK media industry. They also matter to anyone who’s a citizen, consumer, taxpayer, or parent; in short anyone whose identity, perspectives and values have been shaped by the PSB era over the last few decades. 

So how do we deliver? I don’t believe that leaving it just to commercial players is the answer. In my experience global players are not sufficiently incentivised to create socially valuable content specifically for the UK, and UK focused companies have increasingly little appetite for innovation given the fires blazing in their core businesses. Meanwhile start-ups are finding it harder to gather resources and achieve scale, particularly if they are UK focused social entrepreneurs. 

The public sector clearly has a role, but its record remains patchy. Government departments are recognising they’re in the audience business but, despite the millions invested, they generally lack the media skills to make and market engaging content and services. Arts organisations, museums and charities are having greater success, but often struggle to get scale. And although the BBC has invested successfully in creating new ways for audiences to engage with their core programmes, they are constrained by their heritage, funding model and ability to partner. As a result, their innovation in web-only services has been much less successful than it might have been.

So what are we doing at Channel 4? Let’s focus specifically on digital content: the stuff that goes beyond the diverse and high quality programmes on our channels or our innovations in video on demand. This is a new and significant commitment for us encompassing new multi-platform commissioners, and our £50 million 4iP innovation fund. First, some examples of where we are harnessing the potential of the web to go way beyond programme support…

—Embarrassing Teenage Bodies and the Sex Education Show engaged large TV audiences with difficult subject matter, and drove those audiences online. Once there, communities and conversations emerged around the bespoke content, including advice on self-inspection, achieving reach and impact which government health sites would struggle to deliver. The sites changed - and probably saved - lives and it’s hard to imagine them being produced by any other media company.

—We’re taking this approach further by using the web to create and curate public service communities in regions across the whole of the UK. School of Everything is a startup we’re backing and has a simple promise: helping people who want to learn, and to teach, to find each other online before meeting up in the real world. We’re helping Patient Opinion to achieve critical mass as it gathers invaluable feedback on the experiences of NHS patients. Landshare is designed as a new project which will help people who want to grow food find people with spare land, and will be promoted via our online food sites and television output. And Talk About Local will identify and support 3,000 people in 150 of the most deprived areas of the country to develop hundreds of local websites to galvanise their local communities. This is a specific and targeted initiative to stimulate community-based media in deprived areas, and to tackle the digital divide.

—We’re also exploring public service data. Through The Roof is our first example: a street by street aerial survey of heat loss from buildings, starting in Scotland. The resulting database will be searchable online, and have both commercial and public service value. Finally, we’re investing in tools and applications, particularly to enable new ways of creating and sharing content from mobile devices. 

No other player has created anything like 4iP to explore the possibilities of re-inventing public service media, and in many cases we’re finding that lead investment from 4iP is the catalyst needed to encourage others to step forward. These projects are the first fruits of our activities, and there are many more to come.

I passionately believe that Channel 4 has a unique contribution to make. Our brands retain national scale, and connect with hard to reach audiences. Our business model blends commercial and public funding, and can invest in both projects and balance sheets. Our approach is built on partnerships with often small suppliers, and we have a long track record of aggregating and marketing their best ideas to mutual benefit.

We make challenging content and innovations accessible, and champion diversity in an inclusive way. And we are a state-owned media company which can improve, promote and commercialise great content from across the public sector. All of these strengths are as relevant to new forms of digital media as they’ve been for television. If Channel 4 didn’t exist right now we’d be trying to invent it.”

• Ofcom Review: Online Not Popular Enough, BBC Continues Innovation, C4 Remodelled
• Cash-Strapped Channel 4 Abandons Red Button And Mobile Advertising
• 4iP Now Open: C4 Seeks Applications For £50 Million Digital Investment Fund
• Industry Moves: Tom Loosemore Leaving Ofcom To Head C4’s 4iP