Client
RAI Product Innovation Department

Scheduled
Video-participation format broadcast from December 2005 onwards, every day from 11.00 am to 12 noon on RAI 1

Goals
To revolutionise audience interaction methods 

Target
“Occhio alla Spesa” audience

Project
Presented by Alessandro di Pietro, the video-participation version of Occhio alla Spesa allows five television viewers to participate in the transmission by video-connecting with a mobile videophone from the main Italian cities in order to report on the prices of products on sale.
Any viewer can become the main market trend surveyor, actively participating live in the transmission, using their own mobile videophones. This is an example of revolutionary citizen journalism, allowing several people to simultaneously survey the fluctuation of prices in the main Italian municipal markets (Rome, Milan, Florence, Naples and Palermo) live, whilst interacting with presenter Alessandro Di Pietro.
Participating in the programme is very easy: all viewers need to do is contact the editorial team and a moderator will verify the necessary technical requirements to take part in the show.
After having accepted the disclaimer, viewers access a neutral area, where it is possible to manage and coordinate the audio/video characteristics of video-participation. As soon as the presenter requests the connection, the user appears live on the show, interacting directly with the studio.
Occhio alla spesa represents a new way to “make” television, making live participation of viewers possible in a television broadcast. The format was created through the use of the video-participation platform MyCast 2.0, developed by Digital Magics.
The platform simplifies interaction and the process of involving viewers, both for users and broadcasters, as it reduces all the problems related to privacy, legal disclaimers, support, multi-moderation and audio-video management to one easy step.