THE CONVERGENCE PROCESS IN PUBLIC AUDIOVISUAL GROUPS The case of Basque public radio television (EITB)

The digitization and diversification prompted by the development of Web divisions has situated media groups at a decisive point, requiring strategies of adaptation that necessarily involve multimedia convergence. This key term for understanding communication today alludes to a gradual process which has the integration of newsrooms as its goal and is making itself felt in different interrelated fields. In Europe, public audiovisual corporations such as the BBC (United Kingdom), SVT (Sweden), NRK (Norway), DR (Denmark) or YLE (Finland) have provided some relevant cases of convergence to date. In Spain, such adaptation is still moderate and it is the regional media that are showing a particular predisposition to change. In this context, this essay analyses the experience of one of the pioneering public groups in the Spanish state, the public radio television of the Basque Autonomous Community, Euskal Irrati Telebista (EITB). In line with other studies with similar characteristics, it employs a mixed methodology incorporating quantitative and qualitative procedures. The results make it possible to argue that EITB is slowly advancing towards convergence, setting out from strategies typical of the initial phases of this process, such as grouping newsrooms together in the same physical space, cross-media promotion, taking advantage of synergies of multiplatform distribution or basic editorial coordination, which places this group midway between digitization and convergence.