Dictionary of Media and Communication Studies, 8th edition

British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB)

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in 1912 to approve fi lms for public showing. Th e

right of local authorities to ban fi lms had been

granted in the Cinematography Act of 1909, and

resulted in a chaos of contradictory judgments.

Th e Cinematograph Exhibitors Association and

the main production companies set up their own

vetting offi ce – the BBFC. Th e Board consists of

a president and a secretary, both appointed by

the fi lm industry.

Like most censorship bodies, the Board lagged

behind public tastes for decades and was suscep-

tible to influence by government. Under the

more liberal regime of John Trevelyan (1958–71)

it acquired a new image, casting off its earlier

reputation for over-cautiousness. Since then the

general trend of the Board’s activity has been

towards greater toleration while at the same

time maintaining a protective attitude towards

children.

British Broadcasting Company/British

Broadcasting Corporation See bbc (british

broadcasting corporation): origins.

British Film Institute (BFI) An outcome of the

Report of the Commission on Educational and

Cultural Films, fi nanced chiefl y by the Carnegie

trustees (1929–32), the BFI was set up in 1933 to

foster the use of fi lm for educational purposes to

preserve the cultural heritage of commercial fi lm

in the vaults of the National Film Library. Today

the BFI’s services to fi lm in the UK are consid-

erable. Th ey include: the national fi lm archive;

the National Film Th eatre on London’s South

Bank; the fi nancing of fi lms by British directors;

widening commitments to fi lm education; and

the publication of works on cinema.

British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB) Part of the

media empire of Rupert Murdoch (see news

corp), BSkyB was launched in 1990 having

merged with a rival, British Satellite Broadcast-

ing (BSB). It supplies by satellite-transmission,

programmes of sporting events, films and

entertainment to over ten million susbscribers in

Britain and Ireland.

The organization has proved a formidable

contender in the competitive market of non-PSB

television provision. Its key policy features have

been growth and dominance of the market. In

November 2006 BSkyB bought a stake in ITV

plc, heading off a bid by NTL for an ITV-NTL

merger. Th is led to a complaint by NTL to the

UK Offi ce of Fair Trading, which took no action.

An HD (High Defi nition) TV service was on

off er by May 2006 and 3D television broadcast-

ing in 2010, shortly followed by the acquisition of

Virgin Media Television (MVtv), renamed Living

TV Group, the public hi-fi network Th e Cloud

brand is defi ned as a name, term, design, symbol
or any other feature that identifi es one seller’s
good or service as distinct from those of other
sellers. A brand name may identify one item, a
family of items or all items of that seller.’ Brand
attributes are both tangible and intangible and
they have both a functional and a psychological
purpose. To be successful a brand needs to have
a strong, distinctive identity and personality that
resonates with consumers and generates brand
loyalty. Th us the process of branding a product
requires a well-considered communication strat-
egy, particularly with regard to advertising.
As Yeshin argues, ‘advertising exists to commu-
nicate information about and promote brands’.
Examples of well-known brands include Nike,
Coca Cola, McDonald’s, apple macintosh and
Virgin.
▶Celia Lury, Brands: Th e Logos of the Global Economy
(Routledge, 2004); Peter Cheverton, Understanding
Brands (Kogan Page, 2006); Laura Hill, ed., Super-
brands Annual 2011: An Insight into Some of Britain’s
Strongest Brands (Superbrands, 2011).
Breakup model of audience fragmentation
See audience: fragmentation of.
Bricolage Term derived from anthropology,
referring to the construction of meaning through
an improvised combination of communicative
elements originating prior to their current
creative use. According to John Clarke in ‘Style’,
published in Resistance Th rough Rituals: Youth
Subcultures in Post-War Britain (Hutchinson,
1976), edited by Stuart Hall and Tom Jeff erson,
bricolage is a ‘reordering and recontextualiza-
tion of objects to communicate fresh meanings’.
Perhaps the most famous ‘bricoleurs’ were
the Surrealists, who took familiar images and
objects out of their traditional contexts and rear-
ranged them in juxtapositions that startled and
initiated new discourses. As Dick Hebdige states
in Subculture: the Meaning of Style (Methuen,
1979; reissue, Routledge, 2002), ‘the teddy boy’s
theft and transformation of the Edwardian style
revived in the early 1950s by Savile Row for
wealthy young men about town can be construed
as an act of bricolage’. With the advent of new
media the term has been used to describe the
nature of message-assembly, of the recombina-
tion of communicative elements characteristic of
digital-age online interactivity. See mediation.
▶Mark Deuze, ‘Participation, remediation, bricolage:
Considering principal components of digital culture’,
Th e Information Society, 22 (2), 2006.
British Black English See communication:
intercultural communication; ethnic.
British Board of Film Censors (BBFC) Set up