An RTS London event last month heard that the BBC TV archive – the largest broadcast archive in the world – contains more than half a million unique programmes and that 85% have been digitised.

Claire Coss, head of product, library and curatorial services, BBC Archives Technology & Services, is based at the BBC Archive Centre in Perivale, west London. She explained that for many years BBC archive teams have helped content-makers “to reuse and reimagine the content we hold”.

The pandemic, though, gave a real impetus to work to digitise the BBC’s content. Two virtual Glastonbury festivals were produced, drawing on performances archived over the years. “iPlayer has more box sets than ever before,” Coss added.

The success of the BBC’s centenary year was due, in part, to its digitised archive. Using Archive Search – which gives access to 90% of the corporation’s archive – BBC Creative made the promo, This Is Our BBC. By searching for the words “we’re in it together”, for example, it came up with a clip of EastEnders icon Pat Butcher saying the phrase in her own inimitable style.

Now, Coss continued: “Our aim is to make our collections even more accessible for our content-makers, but also our audiences.”

The archive has been made available to the public, with more than 33,000 clips of stories from around the UK, dating back to the late 1940s, uploaded to BBC Rewind, which was launched last July. One clip from BBC Look North, about the sport of putting ferrets down trousers, was seen 3 million times in just one month, Coss revealed.

This year, the archive’s 15 million physical items are being moved from Perivale to a storage facility in Kent.

“Our role is really evolving now, from custodians of the physical assets on the shelves to the curators of the digital content,” said Coss. Coming up, she continued, is the 60th anniversary of Doctor Who, which will have a strong archive input.

Executive product manager, BBC AT&S, Lynne Dent explained the digitisation process and Mark Glanville, senior architect, BBC, AT&S, outlined how the BBC is moving its archive into the Cloud.

“Unlocking the BBC archive” was held at the Everyman King’s Cross. It was chaired by Brendan Mallon, head of product and services, BBC AT&S and produced by Carol Owens.