Manx Radio = White Elephant?

[scrumptious]

I can't agree with that. The station would be unlikely to cost more to run - the BBC would run it with two local journalists a few DJ's and would bring programming in from elsewhere. They would not have local operating costs anywhere near MR as they wouldn't need the staff, and anyway the license fee is already being paid by local residents and at the moment its spent on nothing so even if the Manx taxpayer paid £500,000 a year as a subsidy / set up cost in the early stages it would be a bargain.

 

I can see where you're coming from - but they just wouldn't run it with two journalists and a few DJ's. If you look at any other BBC Local radio station in the UK and particularly, Channel Islands (as it's the closest comparison) they would run it as a proper service.

 

In BBC terms that's at least five weekday daytime presenters, a staffed newsroom from 5am until around midnight producing local speech packages for the very speech heavy breakfast show. They'd have a newsroom of at least 12, an engineer, Manager, an online team of at least three, a producer/researcher for each programme and they'd also want to do TV too. It's how the BBC work. You don't get to be the worlds most respected broadcaster by making cheap radio - which is what most commercial stations do. They'd simulcast evenings from somewhere like Lancashire, and run five live or radio two overnight.

 

A mate spent a few months at the BBC in Jersey a while back. They have well over 40 staff, with full Radio, TV and online facilities. It's a fairly large operation spread over two neighbouring buildings. If the BBC were to take over, they'd do it properly as there's no way they'd risk their reputation as a serious news organisation.

 

I absolutely agree that having a BBC radio station locally, paid for by the licence fee, would be far better value for the taxpayer, and we'd have a "national broadcaster" worthy of the title, providing high quality journalism, programming and training. They just absolutely wouldn't do it the commercial radio way - i.e. cheaply!

[thesultanofsheight]

A mate spent a few months at the BBC in Jersey a while back. They have well over 40 staff, with full Radio, TV and online facilities. It's a fairly large operation spread over two neighbouring buildings. If the BBC were to take over, they'd do it properly as there's no way they'd risk their reputation as a serious news organisation.

 

I absolutely agree that having a BBC radio station locally, paid for by the licence fee, would be far better value for the taxpayer, and we'd have a "national broadcaster" worthy of the title, providing high quality journalism, programming and training. They just absolutely wouldn't do it the commercial radio way - i.e. cheaply!

 

Not sold on the numbers. Jersey maybe a poor example - no doubt there are big VAT savings by dumping certain services out of there. There is no way you could justify a staff of over 40 on any other basis for a population of 100,000.

 

Looking at the *front end* programming and presenters not much different to MR

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/jersey/bbc_in_jersey/shows/index.shtml

 

The web page is not that much better than the BBC / IOM one so what all those web enginers are doing is anyones guess.

 

I still firmly believe its the better option. Let someone else pay for it - BBC licencebuyers not not manx taxpayers.

[Roger Smelly]

Well i know that people are saying that Manx radio is an asset but in this day and age government spending is getting tight.

 

Eddie Teare MHK has just came out with a statement saying that over spends must stop and that government money now has to be watched.

 

To me i think it is pointless paying the BBC money for Nil service, then paying out again for something that should be paid for by the BBC its pure madness.

 

Yeah i know some jobs will go in the sales part of manx radio but like someone said the other stations will pick up that extra trade from it so everyone is on a winner.

 

Also with it being a local station they will have to do local programs, anyone in the UK will tell you how well the local BBC stations are thought of and listened too.

 

I don't want to see the end of Manx Radio i just want value for money, why pay twice for the same thing ?

[Grumble]

You're confusing the fact that the BBC licence fee is an unfair tax on the Manx people.

 

What we need (and what most Manx people seem to want) is a strong MANX Radio...not another watered down BBC English regional identity controlled by and for the benefit of 'the mainland'.

 

Also, the fact that Manx Radio is owned by the Manx people and administered by the Manx Government means that - unlike the other two local stations - it's run for the community rather than for shareholders. If MR stopped taking adverts and was completely state-funded it would risk losing its impartiality, and the other stations would be under NO obligation to do more local programming.

 

The BBC would probably need far more staff to do the same job that MR does now - the only difference is that the whole tone of the station would be UK-centric, but it wouldn't be costing people an extra 3p a day to have a truly Manx identity.

[Albert Tatlock]

Radio stations will always come and go. It's up to us to give our feedback and make sure MR stays in tune with it's listeners, represents the island, and what islanders want to hear, and puts across the right message to the outside world.

 

I think MR should introduce a better comment/feedback system thorugh its website and put the odd questionnaire in the local papers to allow people to comment/feeback i.e. be a little more proactive (and not just when seeking funds). Everyone would feel a bit more involved and a little more represented then.

 

All this talk about BBC involvement is actually irrelevant. If the Beeb gave two hoots about the Island we would hear more about it on all of the other channels we receive here. But there again, who here knows much about Harrogate that has around the same population?

[Tempus Fugit]

When Chief Minister Richard Corkill was involved with 'top level' talks with the BBC basically asking what we were getting for our £3 million. The thrust seemed to be why the Isle of Man wasn't mentioned more. I suppose we get a few more hours of BBC time now. Probably works out at £1million an hour.

 

Bargain!

 

The Corkill family seem to have managed to make sure the Isle of Man got more mention on the BBC

[Princess Incognito]

http://www.manxradio.com/readItem.aspx?ID=...mp;cate=General

[Lonan3]

So that’s:

 

£78 each for the bus services.

£62 each for Manx National Heritage

£22 each for the TT

£13 each for swimming pools outside of Douglas

£11 each for Manx Radio

£5 each for the Wildlife Park

 

Personally, I think the two at the top of that list warrant more comment than the others.

[Tugger]

I am all in favour of subsidising the buses (I'm not sure how well the money is spent of course, but I mean in principle), but that is a lot of money for MNH

[Princess Incognito]

So that’s:

 

£78 each for the bus services.

£62 each for Manx National Heritage

£22 each for the TT

£13 each for swimming pools outside of Douglas

£11 each for Manx Radio

£5 each for the Wildlife Park

 

Personally, I think the two at the top of that list warrant more comment than the others.

 

 

I agree. Especially for Manx National Heritage. I have no problem with £11 a year for what we get from MR.

[Albert Tatlock]

£5 each for the Wildlife Park

2p for a Penguin sounds a bargain to me.

[hboy]

So that’s:

 

£78 each for the bus services.

£62 each for Manx National Heritage

£22 each for the TT

£13 each for swimming pools outside of Douglas

£11 each for Manx Radio

£5 each for the Wildlife Park

 

Personally, I think the two at the top of that list warrant more comment than the others.

 

You've got to say though that with MR the operating costs are largely staff costs. With the buses you've got big operating costs for fleet (a new bus must be £180,000 +), fuel, maintenence, insurance etc, and with MNH there is a big cost in terms of upkeep of many buildings (the museum, mannannan etc) and other features that are very high maintenence.

 

With Manx Radio there is capital expenditure in terms of updating equipment but the bulk is staff costs.

 

I don't believe the £22 figure for TT myself. I'd love to see how that is broken down.

[stookie]

With the BBC they provide many different radio stations that appeal to people of different tastes. I'm not suggesting that we have Manx Radio 1 to 5, but possibly a second station that would appeal to a younger audience. Many of the resources could easily be shared between the two sister channels (news, sales, equipment)./quote]

 

MR already has two services because it uses different transmissions (AM/FM) to broadcast different things at the same time, so that's not really new.

 

However, what the BBC does have which MR doesn't by a mile is decent quality broadcast standards, to be heard clear as a bell without interference, little or no compression, capable of sounding quite special. MR's broadcasts sound rubbish and compressed and are almost incapable of good technical quality and as for AM programming with its extremely limited quality, we deserve better in this day and age - or has everyone developed cloth ears?

 

BTW, I agree £22 sounds wrong on the cost per taxpayer of the TT - there's no question it's a lot more than that!

[Albert Tatlock]

So that’s:

 

£78 each for the bus services.

£62 each for Manx National Heritage

£22 each for the TT

£13 each for swimming pools outside of Douglas

£11 each for Manx Radio

£5 each for the Wildlife Park

I wonder is that a per person calculation - based on a population of 80,000 people (including those not paying tax)? If so, per tax-payer would be a very different picture.

[Deejay Denzel]

Compression is not the word, Processing is more the correct term when talking about final output of a broadcast.

 

Some BBC stations use processing, the BBC stations that are mainly speech Don't use processing for the simple fact that a processor would bring up background noise hurrendously, so much so you would think they were live from the runway at Heathrow.

 

Compressors are in now way a bad thing, a good one which is what you would expect most stations to have looks at five different bands of it's input whether it be analogue or digital and optimizes the whole graphic range to whatever shape you desire by equalization, stereo enhancement, multiband compression, Automatic gain control, low-intermod peak limiting, composite limiting and stereo encoding.

 

It all depends what type of station you are, a 50/50 music-speech mix would generally have very light processing with a preset tailored to country music.