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The European Broadcasting Union has unveiled an online initiative that is says will enable public service media to transcend language barriers and offer their audiences “trusted news” content produced by counterparts from across Europe.
EBU explains this multilingual content will provide a pan-European perspective on issues of key interest to national audiences such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and migration. And adds that it’ll “Also act as an effective counterbalance to disinformation and divisive rhetoric propagated via social media platforms.”
Under the new project, participating broadcasters will contribute news content to a digital hub where it will be automatically translated into multiple languages using innovative new tools and workflows. Editors will then select the items that are most relevant to their audiences and publish them through a recommendation box featured on their website.
This move follows a pilot phase, where 14 broadcasters shared more than 120,000 articles over a period of eight months. The project has received an EU grant, which EBU says, will enable technical tools to be fully developed and editorial collaboration between newsrooms to be strengthened.
Public broadcasters from Belgium, RTBF; Finland, YLE; France, France Télévisions ; Germany, BR-ARD; Ireland, RTÉ; Italy, RAI; Portugal, RTP, Spain, RTVE; Switzerland, SWI swissinfo.ch; and Franco-German, ARTE will host the recommendation box, slated for launch in July 2021. The EBU anticipates that more broadcasters will sign up to the service as it gains momentum, adding new languages to the overall content offer.
“Digital collaboration in news sharing is the next significant step for media innovation in Europe. Collectively, public service media comprise Europe’s largest newsroom spending €5.5 billion a year and employing over 40,000 journalists to deliver accurate news content through trusted digital platforms,” the EBU said in a statement. “This initiative will tap into these vast resources and unlock their potential to contribute to a European public sphere based on common values and shared interests.”
Noel Curran, Director General of the EBU, commented, “Trustworthy, fact-based news and information are even more important at a time when disinformation and populism are threatening democracies. It is exciting that we will work with cutting-edge technology to open up this wealth of high-quality content to our audiences, breaking geographic and language barriers. This initiative will revolutionize news sharing in Europe.”
