{"id":245483,"date":"2025-11-05T15:00:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T15:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/245483\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T15:00:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T15:00:14","slug":"bbc-must-change-or-be-a-titanic-says-manager-of-the-sidemen-youtubers-bbc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/245483\/","title":{"rendered":"BBC must change or be \u2018a Titanic\u2019, says manager of the Sidemen YouTubers | BBC"},"content":{"rendered":"

The BBC risks becoming the Titanic of the media world and culturally irrelevant to gen Z unless it embraces a \u201cradical shift\u201d towards reaching young audiences, the manager of one of the most successful YouTube<\/a> collectives has warned.<\/p>\n

Jordan Schwarzenberger, the manager of the Sidemen<\/a>, who have well over 100 million subscribers between them, said he believed the corporation produced \u201cgreat entertainment\u201d and wanted it to succeed.<\/p>\n

However, he said the BBC<\/a> and other main broadcasters were showing a \u201cdefeatist mentality\u201d by demanding new rules forcing digital platforms such as YouTube to give their content prominence.<\/p>\n

In an interview with the Guardian, he said the BBC\u2019s cultural connection with older audiences was not shared by younger audiences, who increasingly spurn traditional channels and streamers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a Titanic,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s not to say that it\u2019s going to crash today, but it\u2019s so big and it\u2019s so unfit for purpose in relation to these big changes that are far bigger than them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way that consumption habits have shifted over the last five years is almost more drastic than it was in the previous 50 years. You have a pre-TikTok and post-TikTok split in the way that consumption was felt and experienced by people.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat existential question is a big one, because I don\u2019t think it\u2019s going to be an answer that the BBC likes, with a young audience that simply doesn\u2019t see it. They see a global competitive market of content and options. Why am I forced to pay?\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sidemen have well over 100 million subscribers between them. <\/p>\n

The Sidemen<\/a>, who include the creator, rapper and occasional boxer KSI, are one of Europe\u2019s most successful YouTube collectives. Schwarzenberger, 28, said he was intervening out of concern that no one was being \u201cbrutally honest\u201d about gen Z\u2019s relative lack of connection with the BBC.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re not coming back until those assumptions shift for this new world, which is very different,\u201d he said. \u201cMy sense is that they do know that this is happening and they do understand it, but it\u2019s so seismic, it\u2019s so existential. Is it the Sidemen or the BBC who has more relevance amongst gen Z? It\u2019s the Sidemen all day, every day \u2013 and they\u2019re just one creator.\u201d<\/p>\n

The BBC and other leading broadcasters are pushing to have enforced prominence on platforms such as YouTube, pointing to the quality, cultural relevance and trustworthiness of the content they produce.<\/p>\n

Schwarzenberger was, in part, reacting to remarks by Patricia Hidalgo, the director of children and education at the BBC, who told the Guardian<\/a> that the amount of American content children consumed on YouTube<\/a> risked weakening their connection to British culture and language.<\/p>\n

She said YouTube\u2019s algorithm was pushing US content, such as the children\u2019s creators Ms Rachel and Blippi, towards British children.<\/p>\n

Schwarzenberger said the answer was not to \u201ccheat and bend the rules\u201d, but to act as an investor in the next generation of up-and-coming content creators.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cIt\u2019s actually about leaning in to the distribution kids today want, and the type of content they want in the places they want it, in the format that they\u2019re liking and enjoying. That might look and feel different to Blue Peter or look and feel different to the rules that we\u2019re used to.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy frustration is that it\u2019s this defeatist mentality which exists in a lot of big institutional broadcasters, which is that we\u2019re up against this all-consuming behemoth of global US and Chinese technology that we\u2019re never going to beat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schwarzenberger said there was a disconnect between the types of content watched by younger people and the media consumed by BBC executives.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people I speak to aren\u2019t actually active,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s a disconnect between where attention is moving and where the executives who are running the industry are themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The BBC risks becoming the Titanic of the media world and culturally irrelevant to gen Z unless it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":245484,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-245483","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}