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BBC Video Search Engine

Friday, October 13, 2006, posted by Tom Weiss
TV Genius announces the launch of a new search engine, searchbbcvideo.com - a service that enables users to retrieve BBC videos held within the corporation’s massive archives from one source.

Former head of the BBC’s news website team, Bob Eggington, has developed the search engine using systems built by his company TV Genius. It works by trawling the BBC’s Web presence and listing all the video items currently held on databases across the corporation’s various web sites. The free service will enable users to search for any online video uniquely from one place. This includes the thousands of items which currently have no links to them and cannot be found using the BBC’s own search facility.

Bob Eggington says:

“I’ve been frustrated for years now about the fact that there’s no way of finding the immense amount of online video that the BBC posts on its various Web sites. It’s much too rich an asset to lie unused and there is great demand for it. In my view the BBC has taken too long to create a way of letting users see the material. After all, the users paid for it.”

During tests carried out by the development team at TV Genius the new search engine, www.searchbbcvideo.com, has already found more than 27,000 items of BBC video online.

Bob Eggington added:

“I’m amazed at the total – and it’s growing every day. Our TV Genius editorial team checks the various BBC sites every night, updates the links and prioritises them, so that users will get the best results.

“One day the BBC will index its own video and make it searchable. Then I’ll be happy to close my site down. I’m not trying to monetise it – I’m just offering it as a public service that lets people find material that was previously inaccessible.”

Previous posts

  1. PVR Programming Beta Monday, September 04, 2006
  2. What's On TV Mobile Thursday, August 17, 2006
  3. Will there be global TV brands on the web? Monday, August 07, 2006
  4. New website and blog Tuesday, June 27, 2006
  5. TV Genius launches Internet Video Database Monday, April 17, 2006
  6. Lost without Lost? Ask TV Genius! Thursday, March 09, 2006
  7. TV Genius Launches Mobile Suite Wednesday, January 18, 2006
  8. TV Genius Passes One Million User Mark Thursday, December 01, 2005
  9. TV Genius Starts Celebrity SMS Services Thursday, November 17, 2005
  10. TV Genius Launches Internet TV Trial Monday, October 31, 2005