Last week my emloyer Dutch Open Projects launched a new site for the Dutch broadcaster NCRV, manbijthond.nl. Trying to explain the Public Broadcasting system in the Netherlands is impossible but lets just say that from the dozens of channels we have in the Netherlands, three are from 20+ the Public Broadcasters that share these channels with each other. And one of these broadcasters, the NCRV, standardises all marketing and program sites on Drupal.

Man Bijt Hond (Man Bites Dog, an old journalist joke about the definition of news) is a program format that started in Belgium, just like Drupal. The TV program attracts a broad audience and is on early prime time watched by more then half a million people every day. It features sketches but mostly odd news from all over the Netherlands. So the site reflect this, it is a mash-up of elements of the TV program of the last 10 years on a (google) map. Using Drupal for all the views, content types and videos meant we did not have to code lots of complex modules although there is always some custom code to be written. The design is not groundbreaking but clean an mimics the TV program.

The fact that (nearly) all sites of the NCRV (and more Dutch broadcasters will join :-) ) standardises on Drupal might not be big news compared to Sony using Drupal but in the Low Countries it helps to 'sell' Drupal to a broader audience. Go NCRV!