Millennialise The Way We Televise!

There's one great thing about all of this talk about the much-desired Millennial workforce and that is, that I am one!

theodysseyonline.com

Born in 1992, I am supposedly among the 30% of millennials who declare themselves to have no religion. We have on average, the highest number of Facebook friends and send a median of 50 texts a day. We are selfie-taking, sexting, self-promoting and self-sufficient bright young things - we are human version 2.0... and everybody wants us - or so they say.

I LOVE working in Television, as it means that all of my Millennialist skills are called upon every day in a fast-moving and content-hungry industry that stimulates and satisfies me.

The bad thing, is that TV can't help but wrap itself into a hedgehog shaped ball when someone mentions Netflix or the word 'multi-platform'. For most production companies, that just means 'Dorothy throw in a twitter hashtag and be done with it', but it's wayyyy more than that! We Millennials are not only hungry to absorb information, we're hungry to create it. And we do both of those things, tens, sometimes hundreds of times a day. We text, we snapchat, we blog, we vlog, we gram and regram, we Facebook, we tweet and we retweet. Youtube, news updates, TV in the form of video, image, text and live events...the list goes on! I thrive on being thrown into a new job every few months, exploring new places and busying my evenings with a variety of activities to stimulate my body and mind. To some it sounds exhausting, but to me - I live for it. And this seemingly chaotic and exhausting under-web lifestyle informs every aspect of a Millennial's daily existence!

salesforce.com

We are home-grown content-creators and although this might scare longer-serving TV professionals, who schedule boardroom meetings to brainstorm Bake-Off, the synapses of ultra-social Millennials are firing on all cannons as they build their brand and their content, wherever, whenever, and 10 times at once. Millennials and their closest genetic descendants Centennials, no longer enjoy television in the traditional way. TV to us is a World Wide Web of giving and receiving, of content-absorbing and content-creating. It exists in the moments between our chaotic social engagements, during the glimpses at the Metro news in between our tube stops, and the breaths in between the sips of my caramel frapp.

divx.com

We're heading in the right direction, but is it fast enough? On Demand services should now be the norm. We want everything we've ever seen before, and every bit of new content available in a central location - and we want it at a time that suits us, not the schedulers. So digitising archives needs to happen NOW, the development of storage solutions for HUGE amounts of content needs to happen NOW. The hiring of Millennials - needs to happen NOW.

We ourselves are a diverse brand, and we push that brand every single day on social media. We champion individuality, don't like to be defined by traditional terms or binary social systems and naturally immerse ourselves in the world around us both physically and mentally. We absorb, we ideate, we create. It's in our nature. We're adaptable, tolerant of change and welcoming of difference, and we want TV to be too. We're ready and waiting to be asked!

unikaz.asia

Netflix has proven that new and exciting platforms CAN still be 'thunk-up' and we don't need the confidence of a grammatically correct blurb to make it successful (no seriously, Netflix blurbs are awful) - but it's about originality and adaptability - it's about Millennialism. Netflix might be ahead of the game, but there's plenty more to come. We need platforms, we need infrastructure, we need ideas. We need a new auto-updating World Wide Web of Television, with machine learning capabilities and an inter-disciplinary collaborative remit. The multi-talented and multi-tasking Millennials are waiting to immerse themselves in rich cultural experiences and the time has come to work WITH them and deliver the best they've ever had.

So whether you are media professionals, mathematicians, retail reps or stay-at-home parents - the time has come to Millennialise the way we televise!


Follow Me!
Twitter: @KatMace11
Insta: KatMace1103
Website: www.katmace.co.uk

The Privatisation of Channel 4

Television has been the backbone of British culture right from the UK's first public service broadcast in 1932. It’s connected us with others worldwide and now, with privatisation on the agenda, its unique position and reputation is under threat. Channel 4 is at risk of being hijacked.

The biggest challenge is that C4’s remit of taking risks, will now be at risk. Although Lord Burns is preparing proposals to allow C4 to continue providing distinctive and diverse public service programming, I’m not convinced. The challenge in becoming private, is that C4 is less likely to take risks, in order to secure financial gain for private investors. This will only ever come at the expense of new talent, as recruiting reputable programme makers will take precedence over younger, less experienced talent, in the quest for greater financial return. Say goodbye to talent schemes and diversity then – isn’t that what C4’s all about?

centennials - standard.co.uk

Perhaps there’s an opportunity here then. With a £1billion pound sale, C4 could devote funds to the talent schemes that privatisation threatens. The future and quality of Channel 4 programming and television in general, depends upon the social representation of its workforce. We cannot freeze out talent, by jeopardising internships, talent schemes and opportunities, on and off-screen, for those who may otherwise never get the chance.

It seems Channel 4 is in danger of losing its identity, damaging the culture it stands a part of. In the current social climate, where we at the bottom are already feeling neglected, it’s an insult to sell the TV channel we believe in, to the people that we don’t.

It’d be unfair to assume that every avenue will lead to disaster. There’s an opportunity here to invest in new, future-proof digital platforms, encouraging private owners with digital expertise, to apply their own product innovations to C4. C4 could offer more to Millennials and Centennials via second and third screens, subsidising its long-form broadcast content and All4 platform.

My main fear though, is that quality alternative programming will be neglected in favour of cutting costs, that private companies will have editorial judgement over content and the value of programmes and their unique standpoint, will be undermined. Substantial profits will vanish from production budgets into the bonus packets of private owners - it’s the banking crisis coming for culture. Despite small glimmers of hope, my view remains that the only real ‘public value’ that the Dept. of Business stands to gain, I fear, is a financial one.

Royal Navy School

bbc.co.uk

With my older brother being a marine who trained at Victory about 12yrs ago, I was excited for C4s Royal Navy School to see what he and his mates really got up to at basic training. Episode 1 offered an inside look at Raleigh in Cornwall but was a little more dull then I'd expected, and fails to really explain much about the training process either. The production assumed that audiences knew and understood some of the navy lingo my brother would come home confusing me with. 'I ate some dodgy skran from the NAAFI and had to run to the wets'

He's never said that sentence - but you get the point. (It did make me feel like a bit of an expert when I was able to explain these words to my confused boyfriend).

When following squad leader Ronan's story, particularly towards the end, phrases like 'passing out' came with another meaning. Ronan discovers during training that his heart beats irregularly and has to leave and undergo surgery. It is perhaps the only moment we really witness the friendship of the lads first-hand as they say goodbye to a man they've all looked up to as a father figure. Although it's not long later and he's back with new recruits being awarded the role of squad leader once again. 

telegraph.co.uk

We could have done with more backstory to the three boys we focussed on really. With the exception of father-figure Ronan we didn't really care much about them as characters. We saw Hugh Harland throw a hissy fit over his ironing, then again at the end when he'd learnt to no longer answer back to his superiors - but we saw no evidence of the journey in between to suggest how this was possible. There just wasn't enough fly-on-the-wall action to get us into the bromances and friendships formed in the dorm. I wanted to see those friendships form, I wanted to watch them grow not just hear about it. Where were the pranks I've heard so much about? The sabotage of kit? Where was the banter?

Though if it's entertainment you're after then look no further than the COD!

Next week it's onto Cornwall's newest recruits - so maybe we'll find some more banter in ep2! An OK start to a series that hasn't really started yet - onwards and upwards. Will we see them all pass out? Who knows. 

Kid Criminals

As Channel 4 titles go, 'Kid Criminals' is a relatively loose term. It is certainly better than the Daily Mail's headline of 'Inside the Prison for Teenage Paedophiles', which is almost completely detrimental to the message portrayed by the programme.

channel4sales.com

'Kid Criminals' is all about rehabilitation in an Indiana prison, it's about erasing an action that may otherwise, destroy these kid's futures. Although, perhaps that in itself is a bit of an oxymoron, as deleting a prison sentence on paper, certainly doesn't hold up against this televised admittance of their crimes.

dailymail.co.uk

Despite the confused ethics of the programme itself, it was well-made, with the young contributors proving extremely self-aware throughout. 'Kid Criminals' learned to play on our morals more than once. We learned to sympathise with the kids, learned how teaching over punishment is favourable and how, in most cases, it works. The show provides the figure of 10% as the rate of re-offence, whereas in the UK, where the scheme is to punish rather than to rehabilitate, the rate is at almost 80%. So is this the way forward? Should we aim to understand those we call monsters, and work with them, rather than against them? According to the evidence here, yes, we should.

entertainment.ie

After episode 1 focused solely on the kids detained for sexual crimes, I expected there to be a thematic transition into episode 2. In ep. 2 however, I feel the programme took a nose dive. They could have separated girls and boys, they could have carried on with themed offences, but instead they only bothered to draw differences between 'kids who fight' and 'cho-mo's which I feel is not helpful for the kids on either programme and is not empathetic to the range of crimes from offenders in episode 2 either.

It felt a little rushed, and there were so many stories crammed in to Episode 2 that it was a little hard to keep up. We had no time to really connect with any of them. Episode 1 was far better than episode 2 because we were given the time to understand our characters and explore the way they came to terms with their crimes. We learned to like them.

channel4.com

For example, we meet Clutter - who is halfway through his rehab programme that has helped him to leave behind ordeals like being shut in a washing machine by his father. He is clearly smart and often takes up the role of advisor to other inmates. We learn to like him quickly, as we watch him smile at his mother's encouragement, which makes it difficult to comprehend his crime. 

We also meet McNair, also 14yrs old and Clutter's cellmate. We watch as he finds it difficult to share with others what he has done. He finds it hard to forgive himself, and progress in dealing with his feelings. We watch him as he seems to vanish in his thoughts and we will him to complete his programme and wipe his slate clean - is this the future of rehabilitation, do we really take on the Indiana state initiative and 'forgive those who trespass against us'?

indianapublicmedia.org

I liked the idea of the two-part series, but in practice, themes were an issue and the structure of the two programmes could have been better. It is a really interesting approach to rehabilitation and I think we could have stretched to more air-time to really reflect the success of the prison programme. It did go further than ITV's 'Kids Behind Bars' though, in showing us something we DIDN'T know. I just wanted more.

You can watch the programme for yourself at 4oD: http://www.channel4.com/programmes/kid-criminals