"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Serge Auckland wrote:
Unfortunately local radio tends to descend pretty rapidly into either
a jukebox or the direst of phone-ins - the only options they can ever
afford. You got out of that the best way you could, I think.

d

That may be true of local Commercial radio, but you're forgetting about
Community Radio. These stations are staffed largely by volunteers, with
paid employees kept to a minimum, possibly no more than one or two.
They are often Registered Charities, and can get things done that would
be impossible to a Commercial station that would have to pay for the
programme content, whether through salaries or by purchase from
independent producers.

My own Hospital Radio station has just been awarded a Community license
by Ofcom, and we see CR being what Local Commercial Radio should have
been, i.e. local, producing programmes of local interest by and for
locals, not networked jukeboxes. Community Radio is relatively new, and
perhaps it will take time to settle down, but if any CR becomes a
jukebox or just a phone-in channel for whingers, then they won't meet
their Promise of Performance, and Ofcom will shut them down.

Not knocking it - but just how large an audience does it get? And
volunteers are fine - until the supply dries up. As it will.

--
*Hard work pays off in the future. Laziness pays off now *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

We've been going for 35 years, producing 50 hours a week of live programming
with volunteers. Broadcasting on AM for the past 10 years to the local town,
although we can't acknowledge listeners outside the Hospital. That was the
motivation for applying to become the CR for Bury St Edmunds, as we have
more listeners in the town than in the Hospital. Our PoP states we'll be
increasing that to 100 hours per week within two years, and we're adding
volunteers pretty much as fast as we can train them. Time will of course
tell if that dries up, but we've not seen any sign of it.

The Govt have been making lots of noise about how they want to expand
Community Radio, to provide a proper local station now that all Commercial
stations are networked jukeboxes...remember when it was called Independent
Local Radio? Hardly Independent or Local any more.....

S.
--
http://audiopages.googlepages.com