BBC Is Dabbling In Generative AI, With ‘Doctor Who’ Leading The Charge

Illustration 291526032 © Attila Denes | Dreamstime.com

The BBC’s mainstay sci-fi series Doctor Who is known for its intergalactic adventures, but its latest journey might be a little closer to home: it’s the world of artificial intelligence. The corporation has announced that it’s dipping its toes into generative AI to create marketing materials for the show.

The process will go like this: the network’s human staff will write the initial marketing copy, but an AI companion (its preferred one hasn’t been specified, but it’s certainly not K9 with a thesaurus) then suggests variations. These AI-assisted tweaks are then passed through a marketing team before hitting viewers’ inboxes and screens.

AI will be employed to help craft email subject lines, push notifications, and even descriptions for BBC Search results, as part of an experiment to see how the broadcaster’s digital marketing strategy could be streamlined. The goal is to get the word out about new content in a way that resonates with audiences, with automation aiding in churning out more marketing assets and allowing for more A/B testing to see what clicks best.

“Experimentation is at the heart of how we approach marketing at the BBC. Testing and learning on how we let audiences know what BBC content is most relevant to them and we know they might love underpins our digital marketing strategy,” shared David Housden, head of media inventory at the BBC, in a (now-deleted) post.

“However, experimentation in marketing typically requires more time spent on the creative work to make extra assets,” Housden added. “Generative AI offers a great opportunity to speed up making the extra assets to get more experiments live for more content that we are trying to promote.”

So, why Doctor Who? There are two reasons. First, the BBC has complete control over the project since it both broadcasts and produces the show. Second, the whole time travel, alien encounter, and (sometimes) AI themes of Doctor Who make it a fitting testing ground for this AI pilot program. 

“We’re going to take it one step a time, starting simple and learning as we go,” Housden noted. “We have chosen to start with Doctor Who, as it is a joint content priority for both BBC Public Service UK and BBC Studios marketing teams. There’s a rich variety of content in the Whoniverse collection on iPlayer to test and learn with, and Doctor Who thematically lends itself to AI which is a bonus.”

The success of this techy experiment will be measured by industry standards—including click and open rates—to see if the new marketing materials actually get people to watch Doctor Who. For transparency, the BBC says it will clearly label any AI-generated content to let viewers know it might have had a little robotic help.

The network has also hinted at the potential for using generative AI in the future for creating different kinds of content.

[via Decrypt and Radio Times, cover illustration 291526032 © Attila Denes | Dreamstime.com]