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<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Hype or not, the article seemed pretty well accurate.
It said clearly that the Lords said that FM would become 'local and
community only' which *is* the current plan. The Digital Economy bill also
provides for it to happen on a region-by-region basis. </FONT><FONT
face=Arial>So the plan is that for BBC and larger commercial stations there
*will be* an FM switch off progressively throughout the UK.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I guess this underlines the Lords' point - that there is still a lot of
confusion over all this!</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I think DAB expansion is about to create a lot of annoyance in
our region - the BBC is extending DAB coverage up the north-west coast and
Western Isles, but because it is sticking to DAB, rather than DAB+, there will
be no spacefor two of the national channels currently carried across
the north on FM, BBC Radio Scotland and BBC Radio nan Gaidheal - the very
two most likely to be wanted locally.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>North-west scotland woudl have made an excellent region to start the
inevitable introduction of DAB+ - there is no installed base of old DAB-only
sets here, but there are 6 BBC national channels and 6 community-based
ILRs.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>We also have digitial TV switchover coming in 3 months with a similar
defficiency. Because of poor strategic design of the network it won't be able to
carry one of the channels that would be most popular here - BBC Alba (yet there
will be room for BBC Parliament, several '+1' channels and two 'adult' channels
among others).</DIV>
<DIV><BR>Alex</DIV>
<DIV>Two Lochs Radio</FONT></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="FONT: 10pt arial; BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=transplanfm@hotmail.com href="mailto:transplanfm@hotmail.com">Ian
Hickling</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=cma-l@commedia.org.uk
href="mailto:cma-l@commedia.org.uk">cma-l</A> ; <A
title=comradio-l@commedia.org.uk
href="mailto:comradio-l@commedia.org.uk">comradio-l@commedia.org.uk</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Monday, March 29, 2010 12:14
PM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> [comradio-l] Digital switchover
needs greater clarity</DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT><BR></DIV> <BR>Hasn't Jacqui recently
reminded us all that Ofcom has said publicly that there are no plans at all
for the cessation of FM broadcasting in the UK?<BR> <BR>So what is all
this about?<BR> <BR>Yet more uninformed media hype?<BR> <BR>Ian
Hickling<BR>Partner<BR>transplan UK<BR> <BR></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>