The BBC may not be the master of interactivity. It’s hard for visitors to the site to do much of anything except choose their content and read at their leisure. There are very few obvious polls, maps, and other interactive elements, all of which all seem necessary in today’s Web 2.0 environment.
There are a few exceptions.
With major events, the BBC is usually quick to throw a map up on the website.
For example, I remember during the beginning of the swine flu scare, the BBC (like most other major news organizations) had an interactive map where readers could hover over various cities and countries around the globe to learn about the infection statistics in each one. There was also a time line where viewers could work their way through the development of the swine flu. I actually just discovered that they still have this map up and hidden away in the depths of the BBC, though it was only last updated in January and is not as extensive as it once was.
This may not have won the BBC any creativity awards, but it allowed readers to interact with the contact rather than just read.
Currently, the BBC is concentrating all its interactive powers on the upcoming election in the UK. In one section, the BBC provides a timeline where readers can select years (and even different polling organizations) to watch the UK’s major parties rise to and fall from favor over more than 25 years.
Another element called the election seat calculator is “interactive,” but only good for about one minute of interaction, as there are only a few options to view how various pools and past elections have affected and will affect seats in the House of Commons.
But overall, such elements as these are rare. Most others that are on the site are impossible to locate, extremely out-of-date, or not actually interactive by any stretch of the imagination.
The BBC absolutely needs to work on its interactive elements. There not only need to be more of them, but they also need to be easier to find, with more than just links to election coverage from the main news page. From the BBC, I expect more.
