Record online audience for Newsnight

Posted by Caitlin Pike on 10 February 2006 at 16:44
Tags: BBC, Muhammad cartoons, Online

The BBC’s Newsnight programme has enjoyed record traffic to its web site as a result of the cartoon controversy.

In the latest edition of his weekly column for fans of the programme, Newsnight editor Peter Barron also heralded the growth in the number of people watching the programme via broadband, providing further evidence that convergence is well and truely underway:

While the numbers on old-fashioned TV were up, so were those of people watching Newsnight via broadband.

We’ve only been doing this for a few months, but already thousands are choosing to watch the programme on demand, and this week the figures shot up.

More than 20,000 people downloaded the video of Monday night’s debate and a further 20,000 watched Fergal Keane’s film about corruption within the Kenyan government.

Still small numbers compared with TV proper, but it’s growing at an amazing rate, and new developments are happening almost daily.

Barron plugged a new broadband “web space” launched by BBC TWO which his programme will be involved in.

A “refresh” the Newsnight site will also be launched in the next couple of weeks. Barron said it will have “less clutter and easier navigation” and that shortly the best bits of Newsnight will be available in a podcast each week.

Tags: BBC, Muhammad cartoons, Online