Over a decade of television and radio programming at your fingertips

We’re always excited to highlight new additions to our collections, but from a personal perspective this is one I have been keen for us to get since I first arrived at Durham. If you’re:

• a student wanting free access to over a decade of archived tv and radio content (whether that’s a Panorama documentary you recall watching that would be useful to recap for your current essay, the entire first season of Bake-off, one of the film’s of the “Grandmother of the French New Wave”, Agnès Varda… or the latest edition of Hollyoaks Omnibus);
• a member of academic teaching staff, looking to expand module reading lists or ensure students have access to a recent news programme, documentary or film for discussion at an upcoming seminar;
• a researcher who engages with the media, and wants to keep track of when and where your appearances on the news or at a recent Parliamentary Select Committee were broadcast…

… read on.

Durham University now has access to Box of Broadcasts – an ‘on demand’ TV and radio service for education, provided by the British Universities Film & Video Council’s ‘Learning on Screen’ services. It allows staff and students at Durham University (through our ERA licence) to stream and record programmes from over 65 free-to-air channels and to search an archive of over 2 million broadcasts (made up of content requested by other UK academic users over the past decade and beyond).

Access and register for Box of Broadcasts here.

What can I do with it?:

• Search the archive for content across 65 free-to-view channels, including:
  • BBC Channels (National and regional), Channel 4, ITV, Channel 5
  • Aljazeera, CNN, Dave, Sky News
  • BBC Radio, LBC
  • 10 foreign language channels, including Italian, French and German programming
  • Content from the BBC Shakespeare Archive.
• Request forthcoming (up to a week in advance) and recently broadcast content is recorded and added to the archive for subsequent viewing.
• Create ‘playlists’ of programmes:
  • Playlists can be made available to all users of BoB (not just Durham users), which means you can search for and access playlists created by students & academics from other institutions.
• Create clips from programmes:
  • Take a relevant 90-second interview from a 1-hour news broadcast and create a custom clip to add to a playlist or to share as a discussion point in a module on DUO.
• Embed programmes and clips in DUO (and easily embed hyperlinked screenshots in powerpoint/prezi etc.) so that other Durham staff and students can view at their leisure.

Playlists: Not sure what we mean by a playlist? We’ve created one showcasing all Durham University appearances on University Challenge back to 2007, which you can access here once registered. 

What can I not do?:

All video and text material must only be accessed by registered students and staff who are members of Durham University. So you can’t;

• Embed and stream content on public facing web pages
• Download or make copies of the content
• View content when outside of the UK – under the terms of our ERA licence, content is only accessible within the UK.

Potential uses:

Many of us have access to digital streaming services and set-top boxes to stream, record and archive television content – but Box of Broadcasts provides access to content not available elsewhere, and in a format that can be used for teaching and other educational purposes in line with our ERA licence.

You may have your own ideas about how you might make use of this service, but for starters we’ve outlined a few possible uses below:

• Including media content in reading lists or seminar material for students and staff.
• Identifying, collecting and sharing (internally) media appearances by Durham students and academics;
  • • Professor Clare McGlynn on “The Big Questions” (Series 10, Episode 9, Sunday 5th March 2017). [CLIP – link for Durham staff and students only]
    • Professor Carlos Frenk on “Free Thinking: Time, Space and Science” (Tuesday, 11 Apr 2017). [link for Durham staff and students only]
    • Dr Craig Barclay and the Durham Oriental Museum on “Antiques Road Trip” (Tuesday 14 Jan 2014). [CLIP – link for Durham staff and students only]
• Identifying evidence to support REF Impact Case Studies or other Impact activity (e.g. when appearances from Durham researchers were, and on what channels, what was said, and to whom).
• Relaxing on a Sunday afternoon, catching up on the greatest hits of your favorite MPs of yesteryear in a gloriously raucous 2008 installment of “Today in Parliament”.

Some of our Library Colleagues are also creating a playlist for episodes of the Great British Sewing Bee – no Library stereotypes to be seen here!

Need help:

• Contact your Faculty Librarian.
• Check the Training Booking System for forthcoming training.
• Video tutorials available at: http://bufvc.ac.uk/tvandradio/bob/bob-video-tutorials
• Case studies: http://bufvc.ac.uk/tvandradio/bob/bob-case-studies
• Guides for BoB can be found here (including ‘How to Register’ and ‘How to Embed a BoB Programme in a DUO course’.

Let us know what you think!