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Michael Wimmer, Office Manager of the Director General #93 What is the workshop for? Public service media are challenged more than ever. The global attention industry is differentiating itself in the so-called "long tail" and thus, in addition to broadcasts, programs and contributions that are relevant for many, content that focuses on diverse groups of people is also becoming significant. Even more diversity than before! And this concerns the makers, the content, the formats and the cooperations. Consequently, ORF will not only have to play a supporting and cooperative role in Austria; in addition to diversity outside, it must also promote diversity within. It is necessary to ground digital workshops and cooperation at least with the digitally relevant parts of the third education sector in several ways: There needs to be a kind of "one-stop store" in the company, a central point of contact that manages the collaborations, networks the digital natives of ORF with the innovators on the outside. A place of flat hierarchies and steep ideas. A place from which new digital paths can be taken, where projects are financed and which allows some ideas to fail. Because only where mistakes are possible can experiments be dared. Only those who are allowed to fail will find the new. And there is a lot and variety to be found: From Insta-stories for special groups to the gamification of serious content (arte is leading the way here!) to experimental web soaps; from public-law backgrounded online channels to TikTok news to curated content spaces that show what people in Austria have to offer in terms of videos and audios. Many things are conceivable in such a digital workshop. It is not yet permitted. But we can look forward with confidence to the necessary changes in ORF law.
„Public media could become voices of rationality and use digitization in particular to ensure that they are also perceived with corresponding strength. They can make a decisive contribution to restoring the basic trust that is so crucial for a humanistic society by permanently anchoring respect for fundamental values and strengthening democracy in their content. Morally sour? Not at all, if passion, vision, courage and truthfulness are involved. ORF could be such a lighthouse, if only it wanted to be..."
Kurt Brazda,  Austrian director, cinematographer and photo artist