"Like the Creative Archive, for data"
The BBC has launched a new site, backstage.bbc.co.uk that actively encourages people to mash up, remix, and re-invent the BBC's content. This is awesome, not least because my very own wikiproxy gets a mention :), but because it seems to me to mark the point at which the BBC are finally starting to really get the recombinatorial properties of the new web.
'Use our stuff to build your stuff'. Quite. Although as a licence payer, I might argue that this should be 'Use your stuff to build more of your stuff', but hey, I know how long it took to get even here.
This could be the point at which the BBC stops being a merely a broadcaster, stops being merely a publisher, and starts being a tool and a resource for all of us to use.
This could also be the point at which the BBC starts to differentiate itself from the commercial alternatives, by being a proper public service, rather than a publicly funded competitor.
Now, what have they got that we can use on theyworkforyou?
The launch of a load of RSS News Online feeds, under tight licences, would have been an exciting development a few years ago, but frankly now only merits at best a 'you, too, huh?' or possibly even 'Why did it take you so long?', but this could be as powerful as the BBC Model B was to a generation of kids who founded the British games industry.
Enough gushing. Well done, Tom and everyone.