If, like me, you were too busy watching the second episode of Spooks on BBC Three last night because you just. Couldn’t. Wait. to see it on BBC1 tonight, you’ll have missed the first edition in a new series of the jewel in ITV1’s cultural crown, The South Bank Show.
The good news is that, from today, you’ll be able to download a special podcast version of the show, carrying extended interviews with the week’s guests. Starting with last night’s subject, J G Ballard, we can also expect to see profiles of Robbie Coltrane, Victoria Wood, George Michael, Irvine Welsh, Nick Park, Damien Hirst, and Sue Townsend.
The ITV press office are keen to establish that this podcast isn’t a trial, although they’ll clearly be analysing its performance closely to see how well the podcasting model can be applied to other sections of its programming schedules. Like the channel’s previous foray into podcasting, its Tour de France coverage (which hit the iTunes Top Ten), the South Bank Show podcast is currently free from advertising — a step which, I would imagine, ITV would be reluctant to extend to its more mass-market products. When its full broadband service launches in 2007, expect to see a much more revenue-focussed attitude, with on-site adverts, ads in the video streams, and some subscription services.
As I write this, the first episode of the podcast hasn’t been made available yet. But it’s certainly a welcome move. The BBC’s open-ended podcast trial, which has been going on for ages now and thankfully shows no sign of ever ending, attracted some criticism from commercial quarters when it first launched. Without it, though, it’s questionable whether commercial broadcasters including Virgin Radio and Channel 4, which both offer a number of podcast services would ever have seen the light of day.
