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Is the development of an app part of 'journalism, art or literature' ? Here's bits of an FOI request by one Sean Brawley to the BBC about BBC Sounds....

Q. Please provide:
- the total expenditure to date by the corporation on BBC Sounds
- total number of downloads to date of BBC Sounds
- the total number of  current active users of BBC Sounds at present

A. The information you have requested is excluded from the Act because it is held for the purposes
of ‘journalism, art or literature.’ The BBC is therefore not obliged to provide this information to
you and will not be doing so on this occasion.

Follow-up Q. I accept that it is likely that the usage data of the established BBC Sounds app is likely to be used in editorial decision making. As such I would like to withdraw points 2 and 3 in my request. I would like to request an internal review of your decision on the first part of my request.

BBC Sounds is an app for end users to access already produced content, and is comparable to (by way of example) physical infrastructure for old analogue transmission services. It cannot reasonably be claimed that, regardless of its advertising in programmes, that it is in and of itself editorial or programming nor did its development budget have any direct link to this. It merely provides access to these.

There is no clear direct link between the net spending on development of the BBC Sounds app and production of journalism, art or literature per se, and it is incumbent on the BBC to demonstrate rather than assert such a link. The development of the BBC sounds app is not an editorial or journalistic act, and the development spend before the app was rolled out cannot be said to be anything other than a technical exercise. The budget total for the BBC sounds app is not held for a journalistic purpose used in production of editorial content.

Follow-up A. Thank you for your further correspondence.

As advised in our response, the BBC does not offer an internal review when the information requested is not covered by the Act.