The BBC has struck a partnership deal with IBM to develop "web 3.0" technology, starting with a video search system for CBeebies and CBBC programmes, MediaGuardian.co.uk can reveal.
Ashley Highfield, the BBC director of future media and techology, said harnessing new video search technology could be the "difference between success and failure" for the corporation's online operation.
"All current video search technology - on the likes of YouTube as well - only works using meta tags or key words added to the videos, not the content itself," he said
That is fine if everything is meta-tagged at a high level, otherwise you just won't find the video you are after."
The idea is that the system being developed with IBM, called Marvel, will deliver a mass of relevant images and videos when content is searched.
"It is particularly appropriate for children and CBBC as searches could bring back, say, lots more relevant images or videos of a particular animal," Mr Highfield said.
Currently searches of CBBC content, powered by Microsoft, yield only text-based results.
In addition, Mr Highfield identified the potential of IBM's technology to hugely simplify the mammoth task of digitising the 1.4m-plus hours of TV and audio content in the BBC archive.
"It is hugely important for us when we start to uncover our archive as we have none or just simple tags on much of the content," said Mr Highfield.
"There is no way to find many archived programmes and we want to see if we can shortcut this, so the archive doesn't have to be all manually tagged," he added.
"This is web 3.0 - semantic web - technology, technology that actually understands the value of content on the page rather than just a page of ones and noughts."
The BBC has previously used video search technology, called Virage, supplied by its partner Autonomy, in a limited way but not on this planned scale or with such advanced features as with the new IBM tie-up.
"We do have some rudimentary video search but everyone will admit that video search is currently a relatively clunky technology," said Mr Highfield.
Another area of early collaboration - on a very long list of long-term projects - will be using an IBM product called Media Hub.
This ties into the Digital Media Initiative that Mr Highfield last month described as "the most important project over the next year to get right".
The DMI is a behind-the-scenes project that aims to break down the BBC's content fiefdoms and create a single "digital repository" of information on a particular subject for use on multiple platforms.
IBM, working with the BBC's official technology partner Siemens, will deploy a pilot of its Media Hub that aims to facilitate this project.
Steve Canepa, the IBM vice-president for media and entertainment, said that the video and audio search project aimed to "provide compelling experiences for listeners and viewers".
Mr Highfield described the partnership with IBM as a way of trying to "keep our nose out there".
"There is of course the big question of whether it will all work. It is early days but effective video search could be the difference between success and failure," he said.
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