By Michael Burns
The menace to media creatives from AI, the rise of TikTok and the dominance of YouTube are all acquainted themes to the worldwide TV manufacturing neighborhood. And so they every acquired an airing — and generally forensic dissection — eventually week’s Edinburgh TV Pageant.
YouTube panel: (L-R) Martin Trickey, Mairi Brewis, Sacha Khari
The annual pilgrimage of British tv’s largely London-based movers and shakers to Scotland’s capital is a spot the place offers are struck, codecs are conceived and soiled washing is aired in public. Nevertheless it’s additionally a helpful barometer of what the TV trade is desirous about. Thus, when confronted with a selection between a BBC highlight, a Huge Brother retrospective and an EastEnders script read-through, delegates voted with their toes: An enormous queue for the session “YouTube: The Future or the Finish of TV As We Know It?” snaked by way of the middle of the constructing.
For these fortunate sufficient to be within the room, Channel 4’s Sacha Khari set the tone, likening YouTube’s defining algorithm to a mirror, not a gatekeeper. “Success comes from understanding the principles of the platform,” he argued, including that Channel 4 bucked standard knowledge by thriving with long-form episodes on YouTube regardless of widespread insistence that solely bite-sized content material might develop.
The dialogue lined the rise of creators as ministudios, with Rebecca Dowell of Three Six Zero describing a brand new breed of digital expertise overseeing its personal manufacturing groups and producing multi-title slates. The economics stay riskier than linear ad-funded TV, with filmmaker and viral innovator Oobah Butler bluntly stating that if you happen to’re spending community TV cash on a YouTube present, you’re unlikely to make it again. Nevertheless, he additionally highlighted substantial rewards in cultural influence, resulting in inventive alternatives and eventual commissions from linear and streaming platforms.
YouTube panel: (L-R) Rebecca Dowell and Oobah Butler.
The query of whether or not creators even want broadcasters remained open, although Khari argued that strategic broadcaster partnerships stay important for long-term viability: “Whereas platform-independence provides inventive freedom, the monetary dangers are excessive.” The panel concluded that integration is the longer term, with broadcasters and creators set to see success in co-developing new codecs and communities.
An equally packed session explored TikTok’s rise as tv’s new fan enviornment. The short-form (initially) video platform now straight influences scores and renewal selections, serving as each a inventive incubator and an viewers engine for the trade.
TikTok’s Stephen Naughton shared some eye-opening numbers. The platform’s first main UK meta-analysis of TV campaigns revealed that promoting on TikTok boosts the variety of viewers tuning in to a present by 44%. This determine rises to 49% for established manufacturers and skyrockets to 70% for juggernauts like Love Island: All Stars. Critically, these results are strongest amongst “gentle” and “medium” TV viewers, the elusive audiences each community covets for natural progress. However the actual alchemy, panelists agreed, isn’t just in attain however in reworking passive viewership right into a participatory tradition.
BBC Studios’ Jasmine Dawson, whose workforce achieved the UK’s prime TikTok engagement fee in 2024, views fandom as “not the tip objective; it’s the start line.” That philosophy has turned informal viewers into superfans and superfans into content material communities that drive each cultural buzz and business outcomes. Aardman Animation MD Sean Clarke supplied residing proof, describing how a decades-old Creature Comforts animation spiked in relevance after going viral on TikTok. He additionally used the session to launch a participatory contest with TikTok for creators to look within the subsequent Shaun the Sheep film.
TikTok panel: (L-R) Jasmine Dawson, Sean Clarke, Vanessa Craft, Hannah Townsend, Stephen Naughton
For creators and types alike, authenticity is essential, with panelists suggesting the much less tightly scripted the strategy, the upper the influence. Freedom for influencers to interpret IP in their very own fashion is crucial; something much less is “sniffed out” by savvy viewers. Panelists additionally painted TikTok as a “inventive lab and launchpad.” Showrunners use the platform to pilot concepts, measure actual viewers sentiment and iterate in actual time, a suggestions loop reshaping commissioning methods at main networks. As commissioning threat will increase, TikTok information has turn out to be a necessary proof-of-demand instrument, stated the panel, enabling profitable inexperienced lights based mostly on viewers proof.
One other competition session noticed broadcasters and content material creators discover the challenges and methods for adapting TV mental property (IP) into gaming experiences and collaborating with platforms resembling Roblox. For instance, moderator and TV presenter Elle Osili Wooden identified that Disney “simply paid $1.5 billion to put money into Epic Video games, the developer of Fortnite, as a result of they wish to create expansive universes for his or her IP.”
Osili Wooden emphasised the necessity to meet audiences the place they’re and adapt storytelling to suit the gaming house. She referred to this style as “efficiency storytelling,” saying it was “one thing that the BBC has at all times been identified for, robust innovation within the storytelling house and actually transcending life expertise with alternate actuality video games.”
She added that video games have turn out to be a “third house” for younger folks. “58% of younger folks underneath 16 stated they really feel most like themselves inside the sport, greater than they do in actual life. They spend twice as a lot time with their pals in a recreation than assembly them in the actual world,” she stated.
From IP to XP panel: (L-R) Sarah Richards, Rory Newton Dunn, Mariel Capisciolto,Tom O’Brien
Sarah Richards, inventive and artwork director at Karta, famous that the latest era needs to create in addition to eat. “They don’t simply wish to play; they wish to amplify what they’re doing. Minecraft is an ideal instance of that,” she stated. “It’s not simply ingesting content material; they’re making it themselves,” including that monetization within the type of digital merchandise could be a byproduct of neighborhood engagement. “Shortage is massive,” she stated. “We have to plan fastidiously reward gamers whereas monitoring what they really need.”
Tom O’Brien, MD of Bare TV, recalled a failed try to adapt a cooking present right into a restaurant simulator. “They mainly didn’t match the TV IP to the proper neighborhood,” he stated. “There was no underlying recreation or viewers. It was horrible and so boring.”
Mariel Capisciolto, head of digital improvement on the BBC, agreed that straightforward transfers don’t work. “Generally the IP may really feel proper, but when it’s a elevate and shift, that doesn’t essentially work,” she stated. “You need to know your viewers, get the DNA of your imaginative and prescient and translate that right into a related recreation right now.” She pointed to BBC initiatives like Rock Sport and Surprise Chase, which rely upon frequent updates and user-generated content material, and cited a Eurovision Roblox activation, the numerous success of which was measured by high quality engagement somewhat than attain.
O’Brien careworn the worth of video games in sustaining fandom between seasons. “What’s taking place within the low season? Nothing. However with video games, they’re omnipresent, playable anytime. Fortnite drops new content material each 4 weeks. The very best factor a few recreation for us is that, when the present is completed, there’s nonetheless a touchpoint.” He added that TV creators should study to surrender management. “The entire level about video games is it is advisable hand the world over to folks and allow them to do no matter they need. That may include adverse press tales or unbelievable particular person tales. IP homeowners should get comfy with that.”
Darkish Humor and Know-how
This yr’s TV Pageant — the fiftieth — additionally feted TV celeb, internet hosting an viewers with Welsh actor and man of the folks Michael Sheen; author, producer and performer Tina Fey chummily interviewed by Graham Norton; and comedian Ed Gamble probing the ideas of Black Mirror creator Charlie Brooker.
L-R: Ed Gamble and Black Mirror’s Charlie Brooker
Lengthy fascinated by the intersection of expertise and storytelling, Brooker traced his path from satirical comedian strips to ironic web sites and TV criticism for The Guardian, which led to on-screen work with Screenwipe and 10 O’Clock Dwell, after which to scripted collection resembling Lifeless Set and Black Mirror. Now returned for an additional collection on Netflix, Black Mirror and its anthology format permit Brooker to inform totally different tales with out serial constraints, unified by a satirical give attention to expertise’s intrusion. One recurring theme is Cory Doctorow’s idea of “enshittification” – society’s relentless degradation by way of limitless progress, from in-car subscription fashions to countless DLC monetization. He recalled one story concept of a deceased partner resurrected on a subscription foundation and stricken by advertisements.
He was skeptical that automation might substitute the improvisational points of TV manufacturing. Recalling early work on Screenwipe and dwell TV exhibits, he described a inventive setting sharpened by immediacy: deadlines, dwell audiences and the unpredictability of human response. “You’re pushed by uncooked animal concern that you simply’re going to fuck up in a couple of hours,” he notes. And whereas acknowledging AI’s capability to assist brainstorm concepts and analyze and generate “what if” eventualities, Brooker warned towards its potential to dilute the human perception basic to storytelling.
“I’ve to consider audiences need people speaking with them, not only a machine or a tool. You’ll at all times need the messy human within the combine. However one other author not too long ago steered to me that we, as scriptwriters, may find yourself getting notes based mostly on AI-generated animatics of our scripts. An exec might take a script, feed it right into a system, watch a tough video preview after which say, ‘Boring within the third act, undecided about that.’ That felt believable to me, and it worries me; the script itself turns into the immediate, and also you get notes earlier than it even goes by way of the conventional course of. However then once more, execs love their jobs, so I don’t assume they’ll truly wish to try this. I feel there’s nonetheless a job in maintaining keyboards heat with flesh.”
Michael Burns, who is predicated in Scotland, covers manufacturing and put up manufacturing for quite a lot of worldwide publications.
