The BBC White Spectrum

The BBC White Spectrum is a visual way to present the BBC news (Have Your Say) debate on the indigenous working class in England. This is done by random moving circles on the screen. The website visitor is able to cluster and to filter separate contributions on emotion, geographical origin and similarity.

The chosen format is attractive, because of the dynamic visual approach. The contrast with normal textual presentation of contributions is high, and with this approach, the accessibility of the discussion is significantly increased. Because of the visual and interactive approach, the website is quite intuitive. The chosen dynamics appeal for trial and error behaviour. Reward comes as an accessible presentation of discussion results. The website has a high degree of unpredictability; behind each circle is a distinct contribution to the debate. Moreover, each time the site is loaded, another (random) set of debate contributions is loaded. A playful example indeed! (see figure below).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/white/spectrum.shtml

Maurice Berix