Public Service Media 2.0 Lab

The Public Service Media 2.0 Lab researched how the constitutional Public Service Media mandate is changing in the digital age. “Grundversorgung” – the provision of essential, universally available audio-visual information, education and entertainment – stands at a crossroads between broadcasting and Internet, public and private organization, cultural and economic good, federal, national and European regulation, public sphere and echo chamber and between the generations and their media cultures. The project‘s hypothesis was that Public Service Media need to follow the digital generation into the internet in order to continue to fulfil its functions for society.

On the research side, the project addressed the changing public sphere and the role of Public Service Media in serving democracy and society. In particular, the project focused on new forms of a networked public sphere and on evolving methods for Internet-based media research, for knowledge management and new practices such as data journalism. Between 2012 and 2015, the Public Service Media 2.0 Lab created spaces for debate and experimentation. What Public Service Media offers on the Internet can look like was turned into prototypes that could be experienced and was developed further in discussions with producers and audiences. The project rested on three pillars:

Research

Researchers at the Public Service Media 2.0 Lab were coming from media and film studies, sociology, political science, informatics, law and design. The research projects were clustered around the themes public sphere, peer-structures and knowledge technologies. They included:

• No Signal – A media diary on Greek Public Broadcasting in transition
• Political Communication on Twitter
• Digital Democracy
• Media and Communications Policy, Politics and Regulation
• Media Uselab
• Methodenwerkstatt
• User Research Lab

Debate

The deliberations on the future of Public Service Media concern all citizens and not merely a narrow circle of specialists. The project strove to widen and facilitate these debates by means of an initial set of Theses on the Future of Public Service Media Provisions in the Internet Age (German only), by publications and blog posts, regular colloquia with invited speakers and events like conferences, among others:

• Conference Medienwandel – Was heißt das für Medienschaffende in der Region? (20. March 2014, part of event series ANALOG)
• Conference Medienfreiheit und Public Value im Internet (16. May 2014)
• Conference Neueste Nachrichten. Journalismus in der digitalen Medienkultur (09. und 10. October 2014)

Experiment

Imagining and debating alternatives does have its limits. Therefore, the Public Service Media 2.0 Lab conducted practical experiments, testing novel concepts, making them tangible and putting them up for discussion. These included ideas for reaching young audiences, for gleaning insights from social media interactions, for editorial curation, transmediality, navigation and interaction. Projects included: 

• Videos for Wikipedia articles
• Twitter-Monitor (Beta Version)
• Hyperbole TV Videonetwork
• WikiVision
• Eine Stimme

Hyperbole TV is a video network for the “digital generation”. 2015, Hyperbole TV was awarded with the Grim­me On­line Award, one of the most pres­ti­gious awards in on­line pu­blis­hing. hyperbole.de

Twitter Monitor is a tool for the analysis of the political communication on Twitter in Germany. whizzle.de/monitor

Edited by members of the Public Service Media 2.0 Lab, the aim of the book series “Media, Democracy & Political Process” is to address the impacts of digitization on politics, culture and society. more

Read more about the Public Service Media 2.0 Lab, its publications, projects, and team members on the project blog:

digitale-grundversorgung.de

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