Media dinosaur learning from Facebook

The Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR) has set up a group on Facebook, where they invite users to join and provide input to the creative development of shows on radio, TV or web. So far only about 30 people have registered, but I don’t doubt many more will join when this get known.

It’s an exciting initiative especially considering that DR is quite often perceived to be almost impossible to reach and engage in a dialogue with. This shows that to be totally untrue. But there is still one thing about this that’s nagging me.

The thing that worries me is what kind of people, DR gets to inspire it? It’s commonly known from the social networking world that you get the most valuable insights and inspiration from people who are not too much like yourself and who may not have more than a thin relation to you. It’s typically in the third degree of separation this happens.

How does that come into play with this DR case? Well, the question is that if DR surrounds itself with an equal measure of mega fans and die hard critics - and DR is rich on both - it misses the middle: The more balanced view which may be providing the insight that proves to be truly valuable to all and thus important to foster wide adoption and success for the shows resulting from the input.

DR is quick to emphasize that they will still be looking to get input from other channels as well, and that I think is a great idea. It will be interesting to observe this project develop.