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The Essential: BBC Trending: Cash For Catastrophes?

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Cash For Catastrophes?

29/08/2016 GMT

BBC Trending: Cash For Catastrophes?

BBC World Service - The Essential, BBC Trending: Cash For Catastrophes?

Meet the people who buy and sell viral videos of news events for thousands of dollars.

Capturing news events on your smartphone - accidents, crashes, even death - can make serious money if they go viral. But is it right to profit if you’re a witness to tragedy?

Meet Kim O’Connor, the woman who filmed a boy fall into a gorilla enclosure at the Cincinnati Zoo – moments before the animal was shot dead. Kim had no intention of making a profit at the time, but three months later she has made tens of thousands of dollars by licensing the clip to a specialist agency.

We delve into the world of viral video trading, speaking to the people who acquire and sell viral footage – some of it entertaining, some of it tragic – as well as the news organisations (the BBC included) that buy it.

Photo caption: Aftermath of the Shoreham Airshow Crash / Photo credit: Peter Macdiarmid, Getty.

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