[cma-l] Local radio stations frozen out.
Marilyn Hyndman
marilyn at northernvisions.org
Thu Jan 14 10:04:32 GMT 2010
perhaps we could include community television in the road map too...
On 14 Jan 2010, at 09:34, Jaqui Devereux wrote:
> Dear all
>
> Alex has hit all the nails on the head! What we really need is a
> commitment to a "roadmap" for community radio (and prob small
> commercial
> stations too) for the future of FM (including increased power/range
> for
> stations currently on AM) and for those of you who would like to go
> digital.
>
> We are a long way off from migration even for the national stations
> (DAB
> coverage, multiplex capacity etc). The CMA wants to campaign for the
> migration to go ahead SO LONG AS there is overt commitment to the
> future
> of our sector, whatever the platform.
>
> Best wishes
>
> Jaqui
>
>
>
> Two Lochs Radio wrote:
>>> Subject: [cma-l] Local radio stations frozen out of digital
>>> switchover debate, says MP
>>>
>>> Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jan/13/local-radio-digital-switchover
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: Ian Hickling, transplan UK
>>
>> This is yet another example of the uninformed misleading the
>> unaware.
>> There is no "Digital Switchover" for radio.
>> There is no need for "Digital Switchover" for radio.
>> There is little demand from smaller operators for "Digital
>> Switchover" for radio.
>>
>> Why don't these people talk to those in the know before they sound
>> off?
>>
>> Well, that strikes me as a remarkably simplistic and complacent
>> stance. I for one think Mr Carmichael was right on the ball, and
>> that as typical newspaper reporting goes, the Guardian piece was a
>> pretty fair and reasonably accurate summing up of the situation.
>>
>> All MPs have been bombarded by radio groups and the RadioCentre
>> with communications about the Digital Economy Bill's provisions for
>> radio, and the voice of community radio and small independent
>> commercial licencees (such as ourselves) are in danger of going
>> completely unheard. But it is no good ignoring it - if the
>> 'players' get their way, it will have a long term impact on small
>> stations, and not necessarily a positive one. As one of the unique
>> band of Highlands & Islands stations with a foot in each camp
>> (community and commercial), we have protested vigorously to
>> RadioCentre about aspects of the lobbying of MPs that they have
>> been doing ostensibly on our behalf as members, and the impression
>> they have sought to give that a majority of RadioCentre members
>> support a rapid migration to DAB.
>>
>> There may be no current switchover date or timetable set, but make
>> no mistake, a key purpose of the Bill's provisions is to put in
>> place the framework for just such a switchover timetable by the
>> issue of regulations and orders, and to allow significant
>> deregulation of local radio for commercial benefit, with no further
>> primary legislation being required.
>>
>> The largest radio groups would still like to see the process start
>> in 2015, but even if they don't have it their way (it seems
>> unlikely), there is still a very strong drive to a phased
>> changeover as soon as possible based on minimal criteria for
>> digital listening and penetration of DAB radios that will leave
>> hundreds of thousands of listeners and small radio stations
>> disenfranchised.
>>
>> About the only positive aspects of this are that there should be
>> more spectrum and power available for the stations remaining on
>> Band II (though this will be trimmed back), and Ofcom will have the
>> power to award longer licences.
>>
>> The huge negative possibility, which could creep up on you much
>> faster than you think, is that there will be highly publicized and
>> promoted digital switchover, and the listening public will rapidly
>> come to regard FM as an inconvenient 'uncool' backwater not worth
>> the bother of tuning in. We have the lesson of AM history in this:
>> first with short-wave and then with long-wave and now pretty much
>> with medium wave. AM is already perceived by many (at least many of
>> those who are aware of it!) as a second-class service to be avoided
>> when possible. By and large only those with no alternative, and
>> willing to tolerate poorer quality reception/awkward tuning, to get
>> the service they want will use AM. (And please don't base an
>> argument against this on the few exception cases - it's manifestly
>> true in general terms).
>>
>> When digital switchover comes, as it will for the larger stations
>> and most populated areas, FM will be on the same slippery slope,
>> putting up yet another barrier for community and small-scale FM
>> stations. Ask Celtic Music Radio in Glasgow what it means to them
>> to be on AM, or Forest of Dean Radio what it meant to them.
>>
>> A lot will depend on how the criteria for digital switchover are
>> set and measured. Simply measuring the number of DAB sets sold is
>> not a very useful guide, nor even the fact that they are being used
>> for, say, 50% of listening by time. To achieve a switchover even in
>> heavily DAB covered areas with a high level of DAB listening within
>> the next decade there will still have to be a mass disenfranchising
>> of owners of millions of small cheap radios and embedded tuners (in
>> hi-fis, cars, radio alarm clocks, mobile phones, MP3 players...).
>>
>> If Ofcom and the industry had been serious about a smooth migration
>> to a mixed digital/analogue radio future, as they profess, then
>> they should have mandated DAB/FM radio chipsets that gave the same
>> main facilties to FM reception as to DAB - eg tuning by name, track
>> names and Internet links, live pause and rewind as a minimum. There
>> is no technical difficulty in doing this, the RDS system already
>> provides the bulk of the support needed for the tuning information,
>> and the chipset needs only a simple encoder included to allow live
>> pause and replay. Indeed several cheapy old MP3 players and the
>> latest iPod already offer live pause and rewind on FM.
>>
>> To release real digital benefit for the UK economy the should also
>> have set up a common carrier, not-for-profit transmission network,
>> rather than allowing very profit-driven corporations to become
>> monopoly digital gatekeepers. Or, if that were unpalatable in the
>> modern 'market knows best' climate, we could at least have
>> introduced a regulatory requirement as per the USA's SHVA
>> regulations for satellite TV networks, which require the big
>> carriers to relay any local services existing in the areas to which
>> they are bring shining new, potentially exclusive, broadcasting
>> technology. Not the sort of state intervention you would expect of
>> the USA unless it was seen as vital to facilitating a healthy
>> market, and it's not too late for this to go into the Digital
>> Economy Bill, but I doubt any influential group has written to MPs
>> suggesting it!
>>
>> DAB was not designed for local broadcasting, and will never be
>> optimal for it. Indeed in the early days of its development some in
>> the BBC referred to it as their 'ILR killer'. DAB+ has the
>> potential to be much more appropriate to our geographical and radio
>> landscape, but only if the economics of entry and carriage are
>> sorted out. Ofcom and the 'industry' seem desperately keen to avoid
>> DAB+ until the investment in DAB has been milked for all it can be.
>> The Highlands & Islands of Scotland would of course be a strong
>> candidate for phased UK introduction of DAB+ as there is zero
>> installed base of old DAB accross a huge geographical area.
>>
>> Of course the national and big local players are mostly in favour
>> of DAB - it is technically far better suited to their coverage
>> aspirations, and it raises higher barriers against entry and
>> participation by pesky and independent-minded and non-profit-driven
>> small players. They are even more in favour of the local radio
>> deregulation promised by the bill, which will allow Ofcom to give
>> commercial radio stations the freedom to move in directions that
>> are mostly an anathema to the objectives of community and non-
>> profit local stations.
>>
>> <hobbyhorse:mount>
>> I'd be quite happy to have a DAB receiver or two if there were any
>> service in this region (there isn't) but I would not want to lose
>> the flexibility and convenience of the array of current receivers
>> in use by the family either. A quick count round the house and
>> phones found 15 FM tuners in my house, 13 of which are in at least
>> weekly, mostly daily, use. I'm not too keen to have external dongle
>> tuners plugged into the hi-fis, nor, irony of ironies, little FM
>> transmitters plugged into DAB receivers' earphone sockets to relay
>> them onto old FM receivers, as I have seen suggested! Does Apple
>> plan to include DAB as well as FM in the next iPod? I doubt it.
>> <hobbyhorse:dismount>
>>
>> Better stop there. I made my main point in the first few paragraphs!
>>
>> Alex
>> Two Lochs Radio
>> Gairloch, Wester Ross
>>
>> (The UK's smallest commercial radio station!)
>>
>> cc Highlands & Islands MPs/MSPs
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
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>
> --
> Jaqui Devereux
>
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Marilyn Hyndman
Northern Visions/NvTv
23 Donegall Street
Belfast
BT1 2FF
Tel: 028 9024 5495 ext 207
Fax: 028 9032 6608
NvTv
Belfast Community Television
Free-to-Air on Channel 62/Freq:799.276MHz
Live on line: www.nvtv.co.uk
www.northernvisions.org
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