Ker-ching

There's a sniff of slightly synthetic outrage in The Independent's coverage of BBC News objectives this morning. They have a memo from Global News boss Peter Horrocks, with staff objective No 2 for 2012/13 listed as "Income – exploit new commercial opportunities; maximise the value we create with our journalism......These objectives apply to all parts of Global News: editorial and non-editorial as no matter where you work, you can help meet these objectives."

This discovery provokes three separate stories, calling in the wrath of John Tusa, Michelle Stanistreet of the NUJ and Professor Stephen Barnett, and a leader column: "For an organisation prized, above all, for its independence, it would be difficult to set a more wrong-headed course."

I'm afraid I'm with John Humphrys on this one: "We make programmes and we flog programmes and we enter into agreements with other broadcasters. That is what we do. So this is not new."

The "monetise" objective seems to be across the BBC. I failed to report similar outrage from Broadcasting House last month, where some senior producers were first concerned that it was not a real verb, and then duly scandalised, before retreating into moans about all their work going to indies.

Meanwhile, at the saintly Independent, staff are being encouraged to work from home to save money spent on office rent, and thus increase the company's income. That's the sort of objective many at the BBC would prefer.