TVMORFOSIS/CONTD SUMMARY
AUDIOVISUAL CONTENTS IN THE NEW MEDIA SCENARIO
2-4 June 2015 - La Nau Building of the Universitat de València
TVMorfosis meeting, a reference for the analysis and reflection on the audio-visual sector in Ibero-America has come to its 10th edition. Its done, for the first time, taking the leap to Europe by the hand of CONTD-Content for Digital Television Conferences- sessions which have taken place for the last eight years at the UV (Spain) as an ending point of the Official Master’s degree in Audiovisual Contents and Formats. During this time, the CONTD sessions have also been considered as an unavoidable encounter for communication academics, professionals and students from Valencia and the rest of Spain. From this greatly enriching fusion, the TVMorfosis/CONTD has arisen; it is an initiative born with the objective of opening a discussion forum between Europe and Ibero-America in order to draw a radiography of digital media flow’s current state, its conclusions and the references of equilibrium and regularisation of the different fields of Audiovisual Communication.
The event has been produced by Canal 44 of the Universidad de Guadalajara (Mexico) and the Taller d’Audiovisuals (TAU) of the Universitat de València in order to be broadcasted live through Ibero-American radio and television networks and the network of Spanish, Euopean and Ibero-American university televisions. It was possible thanks to the collaboration of ATEI (Associations of Education and Cultural Ibero-American Televisions), the APAU (Association of Communication Univeristy Professionals) and the ASECIC (Spanish and European Association of Scientific Cinema and Images).
TVMorfosis/CONTF has a different format to that of classic sessions or congresses, as it is presented in an audiovisual format composed of debates and interviews. The aim of these debates/interviews- which have been moderated by Marga Landete (UV) in this occasion- was to offer attendees and viewers a wide range of opinions and experiences as well as to tackle questions to favour the reflection on the new flow of audiovisual contents within the frame of digital multicast. These opinions and reflections come from experts and analysts, from audiovisual production professionals, creatives, broadcasters, researchers and communication students (Europeans and Ibero-American) who have provided a wide picture of the current situation the audiovisual sector is going through in both territories.
A great deal of these questions was already set out during the opening given by Esteban Morcillo, Principal of the Universitat de València and by Itzcóatl Tonatiuh Bravo Padilla, Principal of the Universidad de Guadalajara. Likewise, the first act counted with the intervention Rosa Marín, Vice-Principal of Postgraduate Studies of the Universitat de València; Gabriel Torres, head of the Canal 44 of the Universidad de Guadalajara; Miquel Francés, head of the UV Audiovisual Workshop; and Jorge da Cunha Lima, president of the ATEI.
Da Cunha highlighted that the TVMorfosis/CONTD was a great opportunity to give an answer and discover how to make television in a complex world with such diversity. Francés, for his part, explained that this encounter meant a full challenge worth assuming, specially for universities because they are the ones training future professionals. Torres highlighted the wide range of incentives extracted from this encounters as it means a reflection where talent, professionals, professors, academics and television managers are called. Afterwards, Marín insisted on the creative and innovative part included in this kind of acts due to their ability of brining together students whose projects may be defined in front of a representation of the Spanish and Latinamerican audiovisual industry. The Principal Bravo Padilla took part through a video thanking the UV’s hospitality for allowing this debate nexus between both continents in order to deal with challenges, regulation and treatment of audiovisual contents in the digital era. Additionally, he added that his analysis and discussions are necessary both for professionals and for citizens, as they both interact with these contents daily. Lastly, the turn was closed with the participation of the Principal Morcillo, welcoming all lecturers and participants from Latin-American and defending these sessions as a necessary media and communication flow between both continents, a collaboration which should be extended in the future.
Interview: Towards a new media model.
Giuseppe Richeri (Universitá de la Svizzera Italiana)
Professor Richeri started the interviews with TVMorfosis/CONTD talking about Internet’s impact on the global communication outlook; not only economic but also social and culture. This topic, of course, was very present throughout the lectures and debates which took place these days in Valencia.
Among the cultural and social changes in media introduced by the Internet, Richeri talked about how networks and other media allow interacting with people and have doubled the opportunity of access to audiovisual content. From a negative point of view, he insisted on the breaking of social functions due to digital television, mainly as a consequence of individualised consumption provided by multiscreen. Television, from its part, is the base for the creation of social identity and cohesion and, with the rising of its breaking, this matter has been more affected. Audience fragmentation means that each segment of society chooses according to their interests, which makes it our duty to analyse it critically. Television is related to democracy and the evolution of media is changing this connection in an uncertain way. Hence, for professor Richeri, diverse television consumption provokes a personalised and individualised cultural heritage. In this sense, Internet can be considered as a discriminating element, because we still have not fixed the digital breaking.
Regarding the economic sense, the main transformation is related to the so-called video on demand, that is, accessing a very wide catalogue of audiovisual content through an only generic product. An example of this is Netflix, which is currently the most successful company offering this kind of offer. In fact, it has over 40 million subscribers only within the USA. Among other consequences, with this type of service and companies, the penetration of Hollywood has been way stronger (although 20% of the offer is local content, 80% is foreign). Hence, the arrival of Netflix to Europe and other territories can rise inequality for local audiovisual industries.
According to Richeri, this transition does not only regard economy, society and culture but also modifies the value of business. All the value chain is affected. The spectator now has to decide what to see, and in order to be successful among the public, a new element plays: the big data. The searching methodology is still approximate, so individualised and defined products are made through an analysis of what people do on the Internet or through the design of an algorithm which allows obtaining such information. Netflix has understood it perfectly and invests over 300 millions of dollars per year in big data research, which allows them to control the market.
In this scenery, Netflix not only manages the trade of distribution rights, but also modifies products according to the results obtained from the big data. Netflix ensures that the subscriber, who can access all programmes, are overwhelmed by the great quantity of products to be consumed, which generates frustration. Through these algorithms, insists Richeri, what it does is to help them find the products which suit them better and helps them select what they like, generating satisfaction on the client.
Hence, the debate on quality has now added new elements to be considered. For Richeri, quality is hard to define, because it may refer both to the technical part and to the television format content in itself. Anyway, the expert pointed that the channel is the one who has to bet for quality in television, as it is the one in charge of improving the public’s taste. Money does not usually condition quality, but it is a very important factor in order to achieve it. Hence, it is necessary for public televisions to have a good financing system, because they are the counterpoint of commercial television contents, whose offer seeks for other interests. Quality depends, hence, on the public and their exigence. Consequently, the main problem is the spectator’s education, because if we want to improve the contents’ quality, we have to improve people’s culture. This is what the Government, the schools, the families and even public televisions have to do, even if it takes time.
Another of the questions which worry professor Richeri is the loss of European identity as a consequence of the importation of foreign countries, mainly North American, even given the existing laws for protection. A problem which is affecting the whole audiovisual industry in Europe, which is now highly dependant on the USA. A similar case is found in China.
For the author, the ideal situation would be to produce movies which can be attractive for the public although the reasons for American dominance are various. One of the main differences is that of the budget, mainly for marketing and advertisement. When a European movie invests 3 millions of dollars in promotion, the biggest productions from Hollywood spend over 20 millions of dollars. This fact conditions everything.
Nevertheless, for the expert, Europa has not done enough in order to maintain and promote European audiovisual productions. In this sense, European public televisions should play an important role and, among others, should buy European TV series before that of American, which would mean a rise in the common sense of identification, it would mean a unified European culture. Normally, audiovisual products consumed in European countries are national and American series, but there are very few from other European countries. These changes, insisted Richeri, should make the EU reflect in order to find measures which allows us to feel optimistic, put the signs are not positive.
Debate: Audiovisual Communication Models in the Digital Era.
During the first debate programmes, experts from the audiovisual media of Colombia, Mexico and Spain, reviewed the main aspects of new European, Iber-American and North American communication models. They also talked about the changes which have come with digitalization; cultural representation and new relations established among new audiovisual contents and scientific community.
Emili Prado, professor of the Univesitat Autònoma de Barcelona, stated that the great quantity of contents which are currently accessible in the different screens leads to a large audiovisual storage. A good storage out of which we can extract contents of our preference and under the conditions we establish. Hence, the current user has the possibilities is to say how, when and where to use and consume a content.
Prado highlighted, additionally, that this unknown audiovisual panorama brings as a consequence a deregulation process which makes it way more diffuse to maintain the sector’s regulations has they have been thought of until nowadays in Europe, Iberoamerica and the United States. The expert emphasized that, in front of these changes in the way television is consumed, the medium has started to be considered more as a content than as a distribution channel.
On the subject of new wats of television production and consumption, Alfredo Sabbagh- audiovisual producer, documentary maker and professor of Universidad del Norte in Barranquilla- highlighted that the speed of change in this area of communication is so high that nothing is neither clear or firm. Everything is in constant movement. Sabbagh ensured that- briefly- we will go from an “audiovisual democracy to the dictatorship of a device”. Consumption of audiovisual contents is increasing daily in the different devices the users now have; it is not going to change but rather audiovisual content creators will be the ones to adapt themselves to this new reality, insisted the Colombian documentary maker. Hence, Sabbagh appointed that we need to be ready to create contents in new formats which may captivate new users, specially digital natives.
Towards the unstoppable rise of audiovisual consumption in the several devices and the abundant offer of contents, Carmina Crusafón, professor of the Universitat de Barcelona and deputy director of the Iberoamerican Observatory of Communication, explained her worry for the present and future public policies in audiovisual regulations.
Firstly, she highlighted that it is necessary to rethink the deregulation process and to talk about creative industries instead of audiovisual industries, because the process’ hybridisation, makes frontiers between the media more and more powerful. The sector is living a process of synergy which goes beyond collaborative schemes and impacts the creation of the final product, according to her vision. Cursafón also expressed her worry for the magnitude of the economic dimension as a condition for the production of contents within the sector. She appointed that this situation goes at the expense of a social and cultural dimension in audiovisual creation, as it underestimates audiovisual influence, specially in cinema and television, in the construction of collective imaginaries.
Insisting on the risks entailed in giving privilege to quantitative criteria over qualitative criteria in the process of audiovisual creation, Gerardo Ojeda (technical secretary of the ASECIC362 Audiovisual Platform, highlighted, however, the great advantages that classical and digital media conversion can bring in favour of content production for cultural and education media. This is, according to him, a good moment for television education contents and, hence, we need to make use of it.
For tis part, the deputy director of the Universidad Javeriana, Germán Franco, matched the need of making contents the key centre of sense in audiovisual production. He pointed out the potentiality of hybridisation and convergence of media in favour of the so-yearned popular and alternative communication promoted during the 60s. Never before, he said, have the users held the possibility of creating their own content and of putting emphasis on what they are really interested about. In the end, being the creator and main character of his own narratives. We are, hence and as highlighted by Franco, before a new communication actor, a receptor able to turning into an emissary without the need of traditional mediations. In this sense, contemporary communicators must be more and more conscious of his role, which is no other than enabling society to create its own narratives.
In this line, and to finish up, experts in Mexico, Colombia and Spain who participated in this debate coincided in the affirmation that creating channels where users/prosumers can watch all their produced contents is one of the main pending tasks. For it, they appointed the call made to public and university televisions to become the natural stages for this process.
Debate: The current regulations of the contemporary audiovisual system.
This debate aimed at settling the importance of regulation changes and the evolution of audiovisual contents, a question which is usually given littler attention. It was professor José Mª Vidal, from the UV, who highlighted the contents which may or may not be regulated because, even given the need of regulating contents, there will always be a debate related to freedom of speech. He gave the example of the Valencian Community, region whose capital city holds these sessions. Right now, said Vidal, there are no correct public media or audiovisual regulations, but when there was a public television, it was very conditioned and instrumentalised by public powers.
In a more general context, Vidal spoke of Spain, where there has always been a tradition of a public regulation of the media except for the period between 2006 and 2012, when there was a law promoted by the government of Rodríguez Zapatero, who tried to degovernmentalise public media. In his opinion, this dynamic does nothing but prejudicing the public and its rights. This excess of European regulations contrasts with the American Situation. According to John Ospina, deputy director of International Channel 31.2 Los Angeles (USA), he made reference to the different regulation frames between the two continents referring to the audiovisual sector, whose scenery is more flexible in the North-American case.
Afterwards, Elisenda Malaret, professor of the Universitat de Barcelona, appointed that there is always some regulations in audiovisual contents which guarantee a minimum of requirements: regarding the right for democracy, diversity of opinion, social, cultural and political diversity, etc. Once these requirements are present, each Government adapts and applies the regulatory framework in different ways, resulting in very different regulations. In the case of Spain, she expressed that the country has an obvious peculiarity which is that “it is always late for audiovisual regulations”, a very sensitive sector which includes many rights and liberties. Hence, the challenge for European regulations is, according to Malaret agreeing with Richeri, how to grant the diffusion of European works and the promotion of cultural diversity after the rising of platforms such as Netflix.
Alexandra Falla, professor of the Universidad Javeriana de Bogotá, opened his intervention giving a context to Colombian television regulations where, in his opinion, developments have overflown former audiovisual regulations which date of 1995. Falla explained that, in Colombia, public television lives off of private televisions’ income and hence, it is necessary to reflect on this business model and turn public television into an efficient institution. Additionally, he appointed that public television also plays an important role in audiovisual regulations of a country, so it is important to reflect on the cultural and political context in which each regulation is put into force.
In the subsequent debate on which elements need to be calibrated before developing good regulations of the audiovisual sector, Vidal ensured that, when trying to conjugate all elements participating within the sector’s regulation, there is always a tendency to prioritise come of them. The problem is that in Spain, the element which always prevails is political control: “In Europe we have the opportunity of making television more democratic and make it for the citizens, because there is always a reason to change regulations, we just do not do it”, said Vidal.
Malaret, for her part, highlighted that the current regulation is very far from the objectives for which it was created: strengthening freedom of opinion and cultural and social plurality. Nowadya, thanks to technological changes, the audiovisual sector was living a media concentration by two or three enterprises which hold most of the information and entertainment. This fact was also denounced by the rest of the lecturers.
Ospina continued the discussion ensuring that “regulations are based on the fear of losing control”, and precisely, our systems regulate with the big groups to keep that control. To avoid that control, he said, it is necessaty to carry out a social conquer to regulate according to society’s preferences and not those of the big groups; although in Spain is two or three enterprises, in Colombia it is onlly one man who controls all the media.
As an example of what a good regulation of the audiovisual sector would be, Elisenda Malaret gave the example of Finland, where even though there are very few media, plurality of opinion and diversity is more than granted in the audiovisual sector. Similarly Vidal, apart from supporting the opinion of Malaret, expressed that what had to be done was to change the perspective so the user could participate in the contents. According to Vidal, laws and regulations are made from the top, and they should be made from the bottom, “a regulation with more participation of citizenship, specially in this sector”. Alexandra Falla added that besides giving it participation, it will also train the spectator and strength a different audience, that provides reasons to value the television and its contents. In her opinion, many people complain about their lack of good contents, however when they are broadcasted only very few people watch them.
Regarding the guarantee of plurality in television, Malaret and Osina agreed that it is necessary a strong will of the public power to stablish a good regulation that respects the basic rights and freedoms of society, in addition to an authority that ensures the enformcement of these laws. Ospina gave the example of Chile, where the audiovisual productions funded by the government are declared as Creative Commons, that is to say, with a license that allows for the free dissemination of content to make the public aware about that if the production is payed with their taxes, they also have responsibility on the work. Nevertheless, Vidal expressed that it depends not only on public powers, but also on professionals of the sector and media involved.
Before concluding the debate, Vidal added that the most important challenge in Spain was to stablish a good regulatory framework, since the result was always bad. According to the professor, now we have the opportunity to influence from the perspective of professionals and citizens in order to avoid the production to be concentrated and decided by a few ones. In his words: “we need the regulation and we need it now, with or without crisis”.
For Ospina, the fundamental thing is to achieve a good democracy so “the citizen becomes empowered and able to decide”, while for Malaret the essential is not to forget that the discussion is on individual rights. And this is why the audiovisual sector needs clear rules to respect and guarantee these rights. Finally, Alexandra Falla expressed that the regulation has to be always addressed to build a better society and, consequently, it has to think beyond the platforms and markets. “It has to think the purpose of contents in order to build plurality and democracy”, concluded.
Debate: Audiovisual contents and formats in the digital multicast.
The new way of classifying the audiovisual contents and formats, developing and producing them, as well as the new audiences, public and users, focused the attention of this meeting between audiovisual experts from Ibero-America and Europe. Here participated Guillermo Orozco, professor of the University of Guadalajara and coordinator of the Latin-American Observatory for Television Fiction; Eduardo Prádanos, advisor of new media; Francesc Escribano, director of the producer Minoría Absoluta; Matilde Delgado, professor of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and constituent of the Television Programming Observatory; and Carlos Lineros, Coordinator of Communicative Mediations of the National Distance Learning University of Colombia, UNAD.
Orozco started his intervention reviewing how the link of the audience with the fiction contents have change in the last few years. According to him, this results in that the credibility agreement of the users before the fiction work has been moved from the plausibility to the probability. With the new fiction stories, users now contemplate that that “could have happened” instead of “happened”, explained.
He also talked about that even though we have all the technology, we are not taking advantage of all of its potential, not as producers nor as audiences. It is not true that we all can produce, he said. Once thing is being an active receptor and another is being a contents producer. In any case, our aspiration has to be producing contents, which does mark an important difference between the classic and contemporary audiences.
Another consequence of the digital multicast is the tendency of producing shorter contents. In Televisa, he illustrated, they are producing novels for the web with four-minute chapters. The intention is capturing the attention of saturated users by the abundant offer of contents and that also have the possibility of creating their own contents from their daily devices.
On the other hand, Eduardo Prádanos, expert in branded content and storytelling, alerted on the impact that the permanent exposure to the multiplicity of devices and the oversaturation of information cause on the social relations. The relationships based on the human factor are being replaced by the relationships build from the devices. We have to pay attention to it and make an effort to avoid it, since we cannot let that the devices control our daily life, he said.
Regarding the new role of the users, Prádanos agreed with Orozco in stating that it is very difficult for users to create content. Beyond the phenomenon of youtubers, beyond the massive and almost immediate fame this medium has meant for many people, the truth is that, according to recent studies, the percentage of users that create content is still law.
It is also very important the transmedia content production, despite having become a tendency about which people have talked a lot during the last years, is still very difficult in Spain. There is no a real disposition yet to assume this audiovisual modality in the producers and channels. So far, it still is a great adventure for whom decides to go on it. A recent example is the fiction series El Ministerio del Tiempo (TVE), which has become a successful transmedia experience thanks to the creating team rather than the channel which took over the production. Getting creators and producers/channels to combine their interests and resources for the transmedia production would be the desirable scenario.
Prádanos finished by indicating that the social audience measurement has been included in the plans of the media and that this should be the next big step in the audiovisual industry, since we have to take advantage of all the potential of the prosumers. The study of the social audience would let us approach and knowing them better, to have a more precise knowledge on how including them in our projects.
Delving into the limitations for the massive production of contents on the part of the users, either by the low access to technology or by the lack of interest on doing it, Francesc Escribano, from Minoria Absoluta, introduced in the discussion the economic aspect. It was asked who will pay for the content production of the users. Regarding the obstacles that Spain still faces for the audiovisual production with transmedia narrative, Escribano informed that, despite this scene, the transmedia constitutes without doubt the best tool for seducing the new audiences. Some audiences that reclaim a space in the construction of the story, who reclaim the direct participation in the work.
Regarding the validity of the classical production models opposite to the transmedia, they are not exclusive production ways. On screen they can both co-exist because there are contents that are better connected in the classic way than in the transmedia one, and vice-versa. The professional reminded how, at present, the traditional media are looking for the “direct effect”, that is, the possibility of a high interactivity from the live contents transmission that allow for interact with the public at real time. To do that, the channels are supported by tools as the social networks, specially on Twitter, which enables instantaneous and easy interactivity for the user. The objective is, hence, to make that public place -which is the traditional way in which the audience is called- has other expressions, such as the case of social networks which need to be totally used.
For its part, the professor of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Matilde Delgado, highlighted the transience of formats and contents in the different audiovisual screens. It is so high the rhythm at which contents and formats suffer a quick wearing, she said. In this sense, the expert appointed that, until now, the genre with a greater ability to survive was that of entertainment and this has provoked a general extension of the treatment of all contents under this macro-genre; hence, we are facing a situation in which all the channels end up offering the same contents. In this scenario, the macro-genre which dominates the screen since the 90s is the infotaitment or infoshow, which has achieved to position in the television screen based on a tendency which favours the real or, at least, all that which seems real.
Delgado also said that the hybridisation phenomenon in television is an equivalent of technology convergence, which means a great motor for innovation; hence, he considers this a fascinating moment for the study of television in particular and of the audiovisual in general. The professor ended his intervention highlighting that television logics will still remain on force during a long time. Internet’s Prime time exactly coincides with prime time of classical television; this is a key symptom of conventional television’s validity.
In his turn, Carlos Lineros, Coordinator of Communicational Mediations of the Universidad Nacional a Distancia de Colombia (UNAD), put an emphasis on how screen diversity has introduced changes in audiovisual narratives. The tendency is now producing shorter contents, indicated, with the objective of captivating the attention of users exposed to a constant and superabundant contents offer.
Specially, he higlighted how technology has made an impact on the consumption of contents during the so-called “dead time”. Hence, for example, some studies confirm that 30% of the consumption is done in the bathroom; the case of children is different as more contents are consumed in the bus on their way to school. The bathroom, the school bus, etc. are non-conventional spaces of consumption which are becoming more important everyday and which also need to be measured.
Other aspect on the impact of technology in content production and consumption, Lineros appointed, is that technology neutralises stratums as the exposure to contents does not discriminate on socio-economical levels, which means a democratisation of the phenomenon. To reinforce this statement, the Colombian expert showed statistics related with media and new technologies in Latin America. According to him, the growth of internet users in Latin America is above the 50%, while the audiovisual consume in Android platforms has grown a 70% and in smartphone a growth over 30% has occurred. This data show a tight relationship between technology and contents consumption, and for these reason we have to think about producing contents (informative, formative and entertainment) for all these screen devices.
During the debate, among other things, experts agreed that the transmedia contents production will co-exist with classic audiovisual contents, since there is still public expecting these kind of contents in their traditional televisions. What we do have clear, said the participants, is that we are witnessing the born of future audiences. Audiences that understand communication as a new way of entertainment. For this reason, we have to think that these audiences will be very different as the ones we know. These audiences will require more interactivity and, therefore, we should try to make productions whose development is not closed beforehand by the emitter. That is to say, there will have to be space so the user is able to interact with the content. From now on, the way to question the audience will be the key to success of new contents. We are not any more in front of a passive consumer. And for this task will be very useful, as the professor Orozco suggested, to recover the radio creative codes, since it is the unique media that proposes the user to build its own images.
Interview: The public radio-television within the crisis framework.
Enrique Bustamante (Complutense University of Madrid).
The interview to the professor of the Complutense University of Madrid, Enrique Bustamante, was focused on analysing the role of the public television and its contents within a context of crisis.
The expert started with a general reflection about the increased supply of television contents, that actually hides a systematic impoverishment: “Everything is full of devices and formats, apparently abundance, and however, researches say that these contents and formats are being reduced, discriminatory and less diverse”, said Bustamante. Regarding the television production in Spain, he ensured that it is sunk and it has reduced its budget, while thematic channels produce less and less contents. According to the full university professor, quantity it is not the same as quality nor diversity. An in Spain the tendency has been an “incredible concentration of media. Only few companies control almost all the contents”.
This, also, leads to a world where participation as citizens is decreasing. And the solution would consist of starting to lead all the change process of culture and moving towards a quality public service medium, he explained. For Bustamante, a good example to follow of what a public service should be is what the BBC in the United Kingdom has done regarding its Internet service. On the contrary, in Latin and Mediterranean European countries things are not been done properly, since the public service should be regenerated. “Today, a qualitative leap is necessary, as well as giving voice to citizens to take the control of the media back”, explained.
The full university professor wondered that if there are enough tools for citizens to take part in politics, why can’t them be used in public television? Bustamante himself participated in an proposal to the Spanish public television and to the political charges to introduce the participation of the citizens consumers associations into the Advisory Council acquiring an important position here, while people from the group or medias will constitute only a minority inside the Advisory Council. A proposal ignored to the extent that is completely opposed to the current situation. In addition, Bustamante thinks that, at the top of the public media, the appointments of directors and senior positions should be done by public competition, so the registered civil entities could be able to participate directly. The right to participate in thees processes should not be limited, continued Bustamente, but it should be systematic of the civil society.
This proposal was delivered to the government of Zapatero, and all the political parties, small and big, agreed to avoid it to take place, explained Bustamante. During the government of Rajoy, this dynamic of taking part in the public radio-television service was taken to the extreme, and politicians and other members were back into the Administration Council. “The result is a free fall of RTVE an an absolute discredit of the media”, pointed out the full university professor”.
The proposal of the Bustamante team consisted of decentralising the public services, which means the ending of the previous system that do not take into account the proximity television. “We propose to build a television from the bottom, a public radio-television federal system for every autonomous community to retransmit contents with total autonomy and to collaborate with the state system to build a system nourished by all the regions”, explained.
Regarding the financing, Bustamante thinks that in Spain there have always been bad practices. During his intervention he proposed the return of the publicity and the tax paid by every citizen to finance public television to be included in their tax declaration according to their income. Thus, citizens will be more conscious of what they pay for this service, vital for the cultural cohesion. “Let them see, check, demand, participate, and their demands to be transparent and clear”, expressed Bustamante. Furthermore, he also demanded the contracts and internal activities of the public sector to be completely transparent and a justification of all the incomes in audiovisual production, since “a public service has to be an engine for the audio-visual own production”, added.
Regarding the allocation of licences, the full university professor finds inadmissible that private licenses are given for fifteen years, with automatic prolongation, to big companies: “It should be a shorter period and a more transparent tender”. He also added that the existing duopoly in Spain should be broken by which the two groups control all the private television scenario. But a revision of the local and community television regulations will be needed, both models of public service. The full university professor defended that the television has to be an engine for culture and democratisation, and for this reason efforts and contents between traditional and digital television have to join in order to achieve a democracy of quality.
Regarding the contents, Bustamante explained that it should be mechanisms so citizens were allowed to decide the contents, like a systematic consulting process to say which contents they do prefer. For this, he explained that there should be a “commitment with the citizens” and also a great advance in the international cooperation of the different broadcasting networks.
To end, Enrique Bustamante highlighted fervently the importance of citizens to project their culture through public media; the absolute independence of workers of each broadcaster and channel; and the participation and vigilance by citizens. In short, Bustamante explained that there is a need of “refunding of good practices” in the Spain public radio-television services: “Spain is the perfect manual of bad practices and now we are at the end of it. The public service has definitely hit bottom”, pointed out.
As data, he added that the audience of the Spanish public television does not reach 15%, and the 18% in the case of autonomic regions with public televisions. “If we do not make a radical reform, in four year we will only talk about death of the public service. And we are going into a system where citizens do not have the possibility of participating and we do not have to wait until the degradation of the Spanish public service reaches that point”, concluded.
Debate: Proximity television in the digital environment.
In this debate session participated Javier Marzal, professor of the Universitat Jaume I de Castellón; Josep Lluís Fitó, ex-worker of Canal 9; Ángel García Castillejo, professor of the Unversidad Carlos III de Madrid; and Pau Martínez, president of Escriptors de l’Audiovisual Valencià (EDAV).
Marzal started his intervention highlighting that the subject under discussion was particularly relevant nowadays. Firstly he explained that when we talk about proximity television we are not aware enough of the great importance it has for the local and closest industries. According to the academic, we are in an absolutely digital context where the consume of audiovisual contents is done via multiple screen devices showing the emergency of the new paradigm, and in this scenario he highlighted the importance of proximity public television to settle the different cultural industries of each territory. In addition, he defined as very “hard” the experience in the Valencian Community of losing its public television, which served to understand how necessary is a solid media as a public service.
In this line, Fitó also pointed out the “drama” for the Valencian people caused for not having a public radio-television. However, he did not stop here, he also explained that in the Valencian region there is not only a lack of public television but also any powerful “community newspaper nor radio station” able to supply all the territory and and “to project the own culture”. A situation that Fitó described as “catastrophe”. According to his opinion, it is paradoxical that in a moment of such a globalisation we need so much a public local service or any kind of powerful industry that provide us with a television, radio or digital media. According to Fitó, the cause of this harmful situation for the society is that “there is no political decentralisation if there is no informative decentralisation”.
He added that Canal 9 is at the same time an example and a contra-example. Specially, is an example of how a society has become orphan of public service, since in such an important date as were the last municipal and autonomic elections the 24 of May, there was no powerful public television nor radio to tell us what was going on in the Valencian territory with the electoral results. “It is a drama and a challenge for the Valencian citizens and politicians”, he explained.
Ángel García Castillejo continued the debate speaking about laws and the regulatory framework that always surrounded the other pillar of the proximity television, the local television. He explained that even the first regulatory framework of the local television was approved in 1995, it was not until 2004 when the first development of this law was approved. A law approved during the time of the brick and construction, “when everybody wanted to have a local television”, explained García Castillejo. However, the result of all these situations is that there is still everything to be done, and now is the appropriate moment to build this still non-existing proximity model, he added.
According to Pau Martínez, the most important subject to debate is how the contents of this proximity television should be, and to do so it is necessary to undertake an overview of how these contents evolved and became specialised. In his opinion, while generalist channels are very thematised, an appropriate definition of what a proximity television channel is that it has to be a “regional thematised channel”. At the content level we have to think about the objective audience and spectator who are going to watch that TV channel. And other very important aspect, according to Martínez, is how new screen devices end up influencing traditional television. There is many people who only watch television through the internet, and this should be taken into account when deciding how contents should be in a proximity television, explained the president of the EDAV association.
Then, Marzal answered that we must not forget that great part of the audience is middle or old aged. “Challenges are very important and it is very important that citizenship feel the new Valencian radio-television as their own”, added Marzal. The challenge consists of, according to him, satisfying all the Valencian society, a diverse and complex group.
In every case, he explained that nowadays we face a dialectical and non directional communication; and the second challenge is that production models keep this new transmedia nature. According to Marzal, it is important to observe what other regional radio-televisions do, where the radio, the television and digital contents are completely connected to a young audience who wants to have them à la carte. In his opinion, all this means an “extraordinary opportunity” to focus on those voices that had always been ignored. And also the universities could contribute and enrich this radio-television, whose contents must be not only informative but also entertaining.
Furthermore, all the speakers there agreed that the lack of pubic television in Valencia consists of an expropriation without any compensation for citizens, since it tis a public media paid with everyone’s taxes. In addition, according to García Castillejo, it is absurd that this situation happens in a region with its own language and culture, as it is the case of the Valencian Community.
In this context, García Castillejo defended that the Valencians deserve a television like the other ones and also deserve to achieve a normality where everybody feels identified with their programming. “We need normal media, where political humour is possible, that we can be proud of for having a plural media”, he said. Following this line, he also highlighted that for all this to be achieved, citizens must start to require private entities to enforce the law and to make quality television.
Participants also pointed out that this lost of public television meant a possible lost of developing the Valencian audiovisual industry, thus this public service could have provided the necessary tools to invest in this sector. To conclude, Javier Marzal explained that this sinking of the public service it is also related to the bad education of citizens regarding public issues. “We are not well educated in public aspects. And for this reason there was that disaffection when RTVV was closed. There is no pedagogy, nor ever was during the last years”, concluded.
Interview: Quality of audiovisual contents in the digital flow.
Agustín García Matilla (Universidad de Valladolid).
The approximation of the professor García Matilla to the concept of quality of audiovisual contents was quite wide. Among other questions he spoke about diverse topics such as pedagogy and education od the spectator, new television formats and financing of the television. According to García Matilla, contents should be addressed to young people allowing them to choose the contents of the television programmes. “We have been through a period where programmers chose to the contents to a time where citizens programmed their own contents via internet”, he explained. Now the context has changed and are the citizens the ones who can choose duration, contents and formats. This tendency is not negative, but has to be considered in order to think about and analyse the quality from other perspectives.
According to the academic, there has been a dismantling of the proximity television, and that shows that the Spanish citizen is not well educated in the reception of audiovisual contents, while in other countries they are. “There is a need to educate citizenship so that they know that television is a cohesive, social and cultural democratisation mechanism”, he added.
He also appealed the profession of journalism and its relationship with audiovisual contents. In his words, without journalists there is no journalism, and no matter how much citizens can create contents, the journalist is necessary since he/she consults sources, gives consistency to information and confirms the contents quality. However, in the Spanish system journalists are very linked to political powers and, actually, it should not be like that because the contents quality is what comes off worse. “There should be a social transformation trough information”, explained García Matilla.
This quality of journalists and their contents is very different according to each country, explained García Matilla. While in the US professional journalist are experts in their field, in Spain the same journalist with contacts in TV programmes ends up participating in all talks and debates, speaking about every topics without having a deep knowledge. In the Spanish case, what talk programmes do is to confuse citizens. “If our young people are watching these programmes, they will believe that what they are watching is to debate”. Nevertheless, when we avoid interview of good experts in a news programme, we are depriving them of great information”, assured.
An example of good practices in Spain, for the interviewee, would be the programme Salvados (La Sexta), which consists of a good format in which the journalist and host of the programme debates politely by empathising with the citizens, because he makes the questions that a normal person would do and that anyone would want to do: “These formats of emphasising with the viewers are essential”, he said. For García Matilla, these formats that has not been very exploited and what allow for is dealing with topics in depth and rigorously should be recovered. They are formats requested by viewers, which should be even more.
Regarding the financing of television, García Matilla opined that “investment funds” in television should be more productive and not only for political powers. Additionally, it would be important to imitate other models and propose ourselves that whether the experience of education television has been good in Ibero-American countries, it should be rescued and implemented in other scenarios, as in Spain.
García Matilla also spoke about the importance of education for transmorm the citizenship. Even though the education system has always worked on differentiated parts, it is time now of stablishing a holistic knowledge, the professor explained. This way of educating is changing to create critical and aware citizens, and thanks to the new technological tools we should contribute to them from the television spaces and “make a good use of digital contents and tools”.
Regarding new formats, he explained that is positive that students of the sector are proposing new and shorter formats. A tendency that is transforming the traditional audiovisual formats. Interaction between the old formats and the new ones is increasingly getting bigger to integrate in the digital flow. All the digital innovations and the success of online games have to also make reflect to professionals, academics and professors, so that they do not train students in the same way, since the context has completely changed. “Students have to be more aware on the use of technologies and new formats, so professors we must to adapt our teaching to take part of that awareness. We have to stand up from the audiovisual, communicative and educational point of view to create a more aware society”, he said. Also, he defended that citizenship should rebel also against politicians that do not give enough importance to education, and that in Spain, education television should go from the concept of isolated television to accomplish a much more educational function at a general level.
As a conclusion, García Matilla indicated that quality on screens means quality on reality and what people ask for is precisely this quality. This is why he is surprised, when people talk about the extinct Radiotelevisió Valenciana (RTVV), that the good professionals that worked on the medium have not met yet to create a new quality television.
Debate: Cultural and Scientific Contents in the New Media Scene.
In this debate session participated Fernando J. García, from the Brazilian Association of University Televisions (ABTU); Miquel Francés, head of the Audiovisual Workshop of the Universitat de València; Gustavo Lomelín, general director of the Mexico Educational Television; Alberto García Ferrer, general secretary of ATEI; and Julio Cabrero, from the University of Sevilla.
The first one in open the session was Fernando J. García, who proposed that it should be created a model of alternative television, not only public, but also non-governmental, that has a well defined role. According to him, the essential is including the role of university televisions, specially in a moment in which “crisis sharpens creativity.” Also, he talked about ABTU, which was created with the objective of sharing contents. García explained that, even though the association was created the new technology was not really used because it was not entirely developed, now they are fully reflecting on how including it in their contents. From this point of view, it is necessary to work with interactivity so people can have more access to the contents and citizens become more active.
On the other hand, Miquel Francés explained the works in pedagogy that his university is carrying out. They are developing for TVE’s La 2 a scientific journal called “Universidad y Sociedad” (Univeristy and Society) -temporary title- whose intention is to make university daily life publish. The project will be carried out together with other Spanish universities under the management of the Universitat de València. In his opinion, all these television formats are essential for the development of current universities.
For Gustavo Lomelín, the main challenge is to know how join together the three pillars of entertainment, knowledge and technology. Moreover, he talked about the model of Mexican educational television. One of its difficulties is to discover how to distribute the contents through different platforms. “There are no enough means and we have to be witty to find ways to share cultural and scientific contents in order to unite the country”.
Alberto García Ferrer spoke about the necessity of creating synergies. Cooperation must be a change in television. He also defended the necessity of finding a reliable instrument so as to consider the profitability of educational programs and its importance. We must pay attention to create new and better things and forget about negative aspects. To reach this goal it is important that people participate by showing their preferences.
For his part, Julio Cabero spoke about the role universities play and its approach to citizens. University should empower citizens, since it is one of its main aims. Universities should think about the new type of audiovisual users and the new uses of technologies. We ought to analyse how users receive the information nowadays and to work in cooperation, cooperation that does exist so as to produce these educational contents. It is essential that Universities think about how to transmit the information to the citizens.
According to Francés, what we have to do is “go further”. Not only show what University does but also go deep in the audiovisual contents that are made. Universities have to think about the creation of new formats and take responsibilities of the new ones that are being created. Universities and teachers must be capable of creating critical professionals. They will have to avoid the placebo effect formats and contents that sometimes are made by university televisions and reach only a minority audience. As a solution, Francés suggested “to think about formats and take responsibilities in the university area”. In order to support this theory, Cabero suggested to work with technologies, avoiding old educational methods and adopting new techniques that could bring new aspects.
Furthermore, Francés declared that audiovisual resources must be optimized. He also exposed that in other production fields we are very meticulous but we are very arrogant in the audiovisual industry. We don’t have into account collaboration with other members. Francés defended a more participative production models. Now is the moment to progress in a unite and collaborative way. Similarly, García Ferrer affirmed that we should create our own resources and not being always in the opposite side. “We have to open windows. We have enough resources for creating them. Young people can also participate in these new creations”, he added.
Similarly, Fernando J. García assured that we have to empower young people that works in university televisions. According to him, we face a difficult moment. We have to understand how we must work with audiences and because of that it will be favourable to introduce young people since they are the ones that bring the change. That is why we must give them a responsible participation.
To sum up, Francés remarked that universities must become the bond between young people and employability. We also must maintain the traditional specialized profiles since nowadays the profiles are different and we cannot loose the traditional ones or we can loose quality.
All of them agreed about the presence of the entertainment in new contents. To have time and creative space is a must in order to create innovative contents. An entertained content but without getting into a show. “Creativity and methods are a must”, Francés explained. According to García Ferrer, there are no closed creation models, “we must be prepared for failure and always use creativity”, he remarked.
To sum up, Gustavo Lomelín declared that there is a social stress caused by the commercial TV. What we have to do is to understand the new requests from the young people, who search new formats, “and we can give that to them”, he said making reference to university televisions.
Interview: Educational televisition users.
Alejandro Piscitelli (Universidad de Buenos Aires)
Piscitelli describes in a provocative manner the educational sistem as a “gross and absurd inefficiency”, because people cannot work in their academic field. He ensured that it goes against happiness, and against the competencies acquired during their formative period. Therefore, he bet on a digital education with all that this implies regarding the practices and attitudes transformation, mainly on the part of teachers.
The teacher claims that he is not referring to the separation of “digital natives” from those who are not. That is not where the problem lies. In fact, asserted Piscitelli, it is untrue that “digital natives” are highly skilled because they have a lack of many other knowledge and abilities. There is another category, the “digital settlers”, who have learnt to use new technologies as a second language and participate in this new way of understanding the teaching. From his position, the term “digital natives” has been used as a provocation, because it has caused a stir, in a decision that is motivated by commercial interest, in the functioning of the capitalist system. It tries to colonise the educational market by introducing technology in the schools, much more that strictly cultural, pedagogical and educational motivations. For Piscitelli, we need another kind of education because system is inefficient, regardless if the technology. The system has a low performance due to the public policies implemented not because it is a difference between digital natives and who are not. There is no need to create polarization between students, that are great, and teachers, that are a disaster. The introduction of technology in the school did not improve academic achievement directly. Professor assured that we all need another pedagogy.
Piscitelli affirmed that boredom at school has ancient origins. The difference is that, prior to this, student showed this boredom digressing and not playing with the smartphone. Neurology has prove that we cannot pay attention for a long time, 10 minutes maximum, he persisted. That is why “teachers have to learn how to communicate in a more efficient and effective manner than now. Steve Jobs is a clear example of a good communicator. This is basically due to the fact that the teacher have no longer the monopoly of the information. Nowadays, children and young people know much more and that is thanks to new technologies. In fact, YouTube is considered as a “life school”, where a huge amount of content inhabits. In this scenario, teacher cannot control the media ecology, but competes with it. That is why teachers should know and learn tools such as the Cloud, Wikipedia, Social Networks, etc., and how to apply them as far as possible. In other words, the teacher will not succeed if he does not move away from traditional methods. However, teacher must learn how to communicate in this new scenario.
This change is not going to be easy, by no means. For experts, “pedagogical clinics” are needed to redesign and ensuring the best professionals. Teacher’s formation has to be changed. Lessons have to be reconfigured. Teachers need to learn another way of teaching. Accordingly, it is not about studying for many years, but to be guided by other experts. Teachers do what they can so far. What we need is someone who observes the teacher in order to improve and learn from their own experience.
Piscitelli bet on hacking the system, an integral redesign of the educative system. “Hacking the educative system is possible”, he added. To this end we need to hack space, time, curriculum and assessment. As a start, master classes (with a theoretical background) should be changed to another kind of classes. We are talking about reinventing classes: working on projects to understand and participate in this phenomenon, so that students could be collaborators doing a work of emancipation. We need to change the concept of 40 minutes classes adopting a new approach to knowledge. A great example is the one that he carried out in Universidad de Buenos Aires in 2009 on a recent developing phenomenon: Facebook. Results can be seen in its book El proyecto de Facebook y la post-universidad (Facebook project and post-university), in which students work in small groups to learn how this new tool works. From that moment, he exposed that working every year in a different project is a required obligation. It is not about studying, it is about allowing students to be designers of this experience, accomplishing an individual monitoring.
According to Pisctelli, “culture maker”, that is abandoned during centuries and it is recovered thanks to 2.0 web, must be discussed in greater depth. We only need a device to create a maker space and develop the media lab where new technologies could be used as a learning tool. Moreover, there is no need to be obsess with curriculum. He said that, obviously, engineers and doctors should have great knowledge but in communication it is very different. Sometimes curriculum makes sense but we must be flexible. A good example of this are the notable groups around Digital Humanities where is intended to combine power of the arts with science to design new patterns of cultural creation. The same happens with the assessment. It should give up its conventional forms.
Also new learning architectures need to be designed in which learning spaces can be modified. More colourful, loft type apartments as in Denmark and Sweden, which encourage creativity and the development of each one of the students. We have to force University to make changes according to the students necessities. To transfer the kindergarten structures -the ones in best conditions- to primary school, high school and university. There are good teachers and good experiences. What we have to do, he said, is to copy them. We need to be modest: “To teach lessons with our mouth closed”, that is, we have to speak less and pay attention to what students say. Not everything is acceptable, but we need to adapt ourselves.
Therefore, we need to bet on new competences, new abilities and new ways of integration. Cooperation and integration is basic, as it is showed by innovative schools, projects and initiatives like this. Piscitelli outlined the case of Minerva’s School, university created in San Francisco, which offers a virtual campus. During the first semester students live in San Francisco with no face to face teaching while the rest of the semester they have to travel outside the country and experience new realities.
Pitching session: Presentation of new audiovisual formats
TVMorfosis/CONTD ended up, as usual in CONTD conferences, with a pitching session where the students of the Universitat de València Master’s degree in Audiovisual Contents and Formats presented their projects facing a number of representatives from Spanish and Ibero-American televisions and producers. Its main aim is to encourage their professional background in a future. On this occasion, the professionals that evaluated the projects of the students were: Samuel Martí, from TVE; Joan González, from Docs Barcelona; Albert Sagalés, from Diagonal TV; Kiko Martínez, from Nadie es Perfecto and Germán Pérez, from Canal Zoom, Colombia.
The Master’s Degree Final Projects of this edition were: “AmerIndia”, a docusoap about the process of integration of the Latin-American indigenous population through a different approximation; “Territorios de frontera”, a docutainment that shows the strong ties between people that live in separate areas. “Intubados”, a comedy show that take place in a hospital, with many diverse characters. “+ Vida”, a documentary film about the necessity of organ donation. “Pato Ratón”, a cartoon series about three dinosaurs that have created a Youtube channel. “Civil 80” , a large-scale project which offers telefilms, documentaries and debates about the Spanish Civil War in the 80th anniversary of its beginning, that will be commemorated in 2016. Professionals valued very positively the projects. Students showed their talent, creativity, innovation and effort, and also demonstrated that they were ready to face the professional world.
On the other hand, during the TVMorfosis/CONTD an induction session that was moderated by professors Àlvar Peris and Germán Llorca, from Universitat de València -as usual in CONTD conferences- took place. The important points of the seminar will be published and collected in a later publication.
TVMORFOSIS/CONTD closing ceremony
Participants in the closing ceremony: Antonio Ariño, vice chancellor of Culture and Equality of the Universitat de València; Gabriel Torres, director of Canal 44 of the University of Guadalajara; Alberto García Ferrer, secretary of ATEI and Miquel Francés, director of Taller d’Audiovisuals of the Universitat de València.
The first one that spoke was Miquel Francés, who thanked all participants, collaborators, executives from the universities, speakers and the technical staff of the programme from Spain and Mexico. He also thanked the creativity and effort of the students who participated in the previous pitching session. And finally, he also expressed his wish of maintaining this new format with the collaboration of both universities.
Alberto García Ferrer also thanked the organization and the vice chancellors for their kindness and effort in the event. He also emphasized in the idea that these conferences are a product of collaboration, which could be hazardous and uncertain but they were the proof that “if we don’t risk we can’t progress”.
Gabriel Torres expressed his gratitude and also explained some of the conclusions deduced from three intense days of debates and talks. Among them we can find the reality of the multiplatform contents, that can be watched via mobile device, tablet, computer, etc. This has created a trans media storytelling that adds new situations and characters, that form a continuous and interconnected narrative. Moreover, Torres remembered that users prefer to interact with the audiovisual contents, since they can be shared, commented and discussed. To sum up, the consumer has become a prosumer.
Finally, Antonio Ariño emphasized the necessity of collaboration between the universities and professionals of the information, since “it is vital in order to contribute and promote open windows and opportunities of future”, he explained. Moreover, he defined the current television culture as a culture in continuous transformation. He exposed that nowadays universities must include talent and research into their outlines. To conclude, he said that the future challenge is that we must fight for an equal world, a challenge that, in his opinion, had been reached during the TVMorfosis/CONTD 2015 conferences, encouraging the attendants to carry out more editions.
Information prepared by Àlvar Peris, Sumaya Barber, Liliana Lozano, Lorena Cano and Laura Argilés. TVMORFOSIS/CONTD Organization. Valencia, June 2015.
