The BBC is opening the doors to its archives and releasing some of the news reports over the past 40 years.
In a pilot scheme, the BBC has released 80 news clips under the Creative Archive Licence.
The clips cover many of the iconic moments in British and international history over the past 40 years including the aftermath of 9/11 in New York, the demolition of the Berlin Wall, the 1980s miners strike and, inevitably, coverage of the 1966 World cup final.
The CLA allows people within the UK to watch, download and edit the clips and programming for non-commercial purposes. This not only means that they can be used as study tools by anyone interested in the history of the 20th and early 21st century but also anyone wishing to create something new with them.
In fact, the BBC says it wants to know how the content is being used. Paul Gerhardt, Project Director of the Creative Archive Licence Group, says: 'The BBC's telling of those stories is part of our heritage, and now that the UK public have the chance to share and keep them we're keen to know how they will be used. Whatever you do, let us know - and help to shape the future of the Creative Archive.'
The BBC says that the video will be made available in QuickTime, Windows Media, MPEG1 and MP3 formats. The corporation says that once the project has bedded down, it hopes to add many more clips to the News Archive in the coming months.
The clips are available at the new BBC Open News Archive site
http://www.bbc.co.uk/calc/news/
Topic: BBC opens its news archives online (Read 1354 times)