Public service broadcasting in converging media modalities: practices and reflections from the Netherlands

his contribution makes a case for the convergence between technologies as a basis for public access to digital cultural heritage in an age where citizens increasingly seek alternative sources of information and have the power to choose, compare, and publish opinions of their own online. The stage on which European public broadcasters perform nowadays is being thoroughly transformed, and although the preconditions for multimedia strategies seem to be much more advantageous than just a few years ago, public broadcasters will need to decide to extend their portfolio of platforms and channels if they want to reach out to all generations, including the young ones. The Dutch public broadcaster seems to adopt an active strategy in the digital domain, however, this strategy is still expressed in technological and economical terms and takes insufficient account of the viewers' present and future media use. This touches on another angle from which to view the link between public broadcasting and ICT: the necessity for PSB to capture new user groups with innovative content, consistently clustered, and in line with the public service mandate.