BBC Shelve FM Switch Off.

[HamishBoxer]

The Daily Mail reports the BBC has cancelled plans to switch-off FM radio broadcasts and force millions of listeners to tune into digital transmissions

The corporation is set to announce FM will remain as part of a 'hybrid' future that will operate alongside DAB and the internet.

'We all once thought that DAB was the only digital future of radio, but audiences want choice,' BBC Director Bob Shennan will tell a radio industry conference in Vienna.

Read the full story at
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...-FM-radio.html

Courtesy of SouthGate Amateur Radio News.

[PsychMan]

Great news for me as I continue restoring my Bush SRG86, I can enjoy FM for years to come

I like that they are offering the choice of analogue, I don't know many people who have DAB radios and I believe FM is still the choice for many drivers. The only people I know who use DAB have receivers in new cars, but to my knowledge not all new vehicles are equipped with DAB receivers.

In my view DAB will soon be dead as internet radio on the move becomes more viable. Its infinitely more flexible and more diverse in content.

[turretslug]

Interesting development- probably many of us suspected that this was happening in effect, but to see it as official policy is something of an about-turn on the previous party line. Running parallel FM/DAB transmission infrastructure can't please the bean-counters and is something of a loss of face for policy-makers. The capital-intensive parts of the FM network- senders and masts- must be quite elderly now, so presumably this implies commitment to future investment?

[Nuvistor]

Does anyone know the age of the BBC VHF FM transmitters? It may require looking at again when large capital costs for replacements are due. Appreciate they rent the equipment but Arqiva will want a return in the long run so costs will be born by the BBC and eventually the licence payer with increased fee or poorer programming.

There is a paragraph on AM broadcasting in the UK on this url. Abosolute Radio has applied to switch off some of its AM transmitters, they will lose 5% audience but save 50% of their transmission costs.
Ignore the part about switching off FM, that has been superseded by yesterday’s BBC announcement.

https://www.radioinfo.com.au/news/uk...-ready-turn-fm


Edit, just noticed turretslugs comment about equipment age.

[paulsherwin]

FM switchoff has always been very unpopular within the BBC because it would mean a large reduction in their audience share (which is why the commercial groups want it, of course). I get the impression that the government has lost interest in the issue and sees FM switchoff as an unnecessary vote loser.

[Dai Corner]

Link to the full text of Bob Shennan's speech
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/spe...name=corporate

It's interesting (but perhaps not surprising) to note that he doesn't mention AM.

Date: 19.03.2018 Last updated: 19.03.2018 at 12.17
Category: Radio; Corporate
Speech by Bob Shennan, Director of Radio and Music to the Radiodays Europe conference in Vienna on Monday 19 March 2018.
Check against delivery

Today I want to talk about three things.

I want to talk about how radically our audio world is changing
I want to explain what we at the BBC are doing about
And I want to ask how we can all secure Radio’s future by working better together
Radio. The word that binds us. The habit that has captivated audiences for a century. But it’s a habit under attack.

Listening meanwhile has probably never been stronger. All around us people are listening. Headphone sales are exponential! The consumption of audio is phenomenal.

But it’s not always to Radio.

In the past five years, music streams in the UK have increased by nearly 1000 percent. And while in the UK nine out of every 10 adults still tune in to Radio every single week, the global media giants are closing in: our most recent audience figures show fewer 15 to 24 year olds listening than ever since records began. Spotify has announced that radio is in its sights. Podcasts are booming. The internet is both a lively enemy… and a considerable friend.

For traditional broadcasters, like the BBC, re-invention has never more necessary. So we are changing what we do and how we do it.

Over the past 18 months we’ve concentrated the developments of our linear stations on serving the needs of under 45s, upgrading the programmes we make and the talent we develop. Our youth service, Radio 1, is tearing up the rule book with new presenters and new formats - we’ve launched a ground-breaking night time entertainment show which is already attracting a cult following. Our linear listening is up.

And we’re building all our brands in dynamic, eye-catching ways: Radio 1 leads the radio world on YouTube with more than 4.5m subscribers. The Live Lounge sets have had half a billion views in the last year alone. Our speech services are generating mass consumption through articles, animations, short form and podcasts. All critical to building our brands.

These days we are also regularly commissioning programmes which aren’t first for a linear schedule. Our heart-stopping drama Tracks reached thousands of new and younger listeners before it appeared on Radio 4. 5live’s Flintoff, Savage and The Ping Pong Guy has won a slew of top awards and brought a different kind of conversation to the network. Our radio stations remain the best way to meet the needs of our listeners - they offer audiences company, personality, allow them to feel part of wider communities. But there are other audience needs - lean forward, highly engaged needs which technology allows us to meet on demand.

In 2017 240 million BBC podcasts were downloaded, an increase of 12% in a year. Our podcasts top the charts, win the prizes and are some of the most popular in the world. And yet, there are nearly 2 million podcast listeners in the UK who don’t consume any BBC Radio.

So we are commissioning digital first content aimed at serving younger audiences. We’re about to announce the appointment of a new Podcast Commissioner who’ll nurture the development of content outside of our station brands.

Last month we passed the 1 million mark for unique requests for our BBC Audio Voice app and the BBC will be launching news, food and children’s skills in the coming months.

And later this year, we will bring all this activity together in a revitalised audio product from the BBC. We aim to combine all our linear radio stations, an audio streaming offer and our on-demand content in a personalised product, building relevant easy-to-access content onto our deep archive. With new consumers in mind we want to create a new listening habit.

I want to say something here about the BBC and DAB. We all once thought DAB was the only digital future for Radio. But audiences want choice. We now know DAB is very important but as a part of the story, along with FM and IP. We need to do more before we consider a switchover in the UK, and for that to be genuinely audience-led.

We are fully committed to digital and we believe we should review the landscape again in a few years’ time. Great progress has been made but switchover now would be premature. For now we believe audiences are best served by a mixed economy. Radio is better served by a mixed economy.

It’s worth remembering that new content is one of the great legacies of DAB. Look at the ingenious commercial radio brand extensions, whether Kiss, Absolute, Talk, Capital or Heart. Look at the emergence of our own 6 Music, a unique editorial offer, now attracting 2.5 million weekly listeners, and growing hours quarter on quarter. Listening buoyed by new content, as well as a new distribution network. The two go hand in hand.

Of course we are all in the same boat. Established broadcasters, coming to terms with the challenges of the internet age. I remain convinced we can prosper in this hybrid future, but we will more likely do so if we join forces like never before.

Great Radio is about truth telling. It helps us understand each other.

At the BBC our output creates an honest dialogue and shared experience. It is worth fighting for. Our mission is enhance the lives of UK citizens, not mine every ounce of personal data from them to drive profits.

In radio we create content as an end in itself. We are not doing it to sell hardware. New digital technology such as 5G and voice has the potential to transform radio again. How can radio make the most of this technology? Or more pressing still, how can we protect the critical radio space in cars, where we need to work with suppliers to ensure that radio thrives as part of the connected dashboard?

For many years we’ve gathered as allies and rivals - public radio versus commercial and commercial versus commercial - but today its really time for us to come together as one united radio industry to secure our future.

We should go faster and further in identifying our shared goals. We must fight for radio as a force for good. We must fight for our audiences. We must defend the broadcasting values that mean so much to all of us. I’m not sure that can happen unless we do it together.

Thank you.

[russell_w_b]

Originally Posted by Nuvistor

Does anyone know the age of the BBC VHF FM transmitters?

On main stations, the last big VHF FM re-engineering project that I remember was in 1987 / 1988 when Radio 1 started on VHF and - at Sandale, anyway - the old ST&C transmitters were replaced with Marconi transmitters. So they'll be coming on thirty years old now. Some new FM relay stations, like at Keswick Forest, up the Whinlatter road, were installed in the 1990s.

Someone from Arqiva will have more info, likely. I don't know what happened after '97.

[Nuvistor]

I don’t read that as cancelled the planned FM switch off, more like a postponement which of course could be never, the word cancelled is not there.
Para. 13.

[Ted Kendall]

At last the light dawns! Having just stuck my neck out on an FM stereo generator, I'm now feeling a little smug...but in any case it's a darned good system, with years if not decades left in it. I wonder whether we'll end up with internet and FM, whilst DAB sinks slowly into the dustbin of history.

[Sideband]

Personally I think that inevitably, FM will be switched off but that is now much farther into the future. Hopefully FM will stay for the foreseeable future and will probably see many of us 'oldies' out! At least it means I can continue to use my superb Leak Troughline for some considerable time.

[paulsherwin]

BBC managers have to be very circumspect in their public pronouncements, as the Beeb is required to promote digital radio (effectively DAB) as part of its charter. That's why it runs those infuriating 'DAB is wonderful' ad campaigns periodically.

I read this statement as the BBC taking a stand against switching off its national FM networks simply to force people to use DAB. That doesn't exclude the possibility of a future switchoff if it becomes appropriate.

[Nuvistor]

I can see all the terrestrial stations going in the future and it all left to IP, it will be after my time but reading that speech you can see where the emphasis is.
At least there is a reprieve for FM, how permanent time will tell.

My children don’t listen to VHF/DAB only internet radio of some kind, sometimes just a music stream, even in the car it’s usualy pre recorded music CD or MP3 not the radio.

[russell_w_b]

Originally Posted by paulsherwin

I get the impression that the government has lost interest in the issue and sees FM switchoff as an unnecessary vote loser.

Perhaps the BBC has looked at what's happening in Norway, decided they didn't like the reaction of the populace to the withdrawal of FM, and felt it prudent to hold off commitment to DAB for an indeterminate period to avert the same consequences here?

[Dai Corner]

There's also the fact that there is no pressure to vacate the VHF bands as unlike UHF nobody else wants to use them.

[G8HQP Dave]

If the BBC disenfranchises a significant lump of its audience by switching off FM then it weakens its own case for a universal licence fee. Maybe someone high up has just realised this.

It may be that bookies are now taking bets on which will be switched off first: DAB or AM. FM could outlast one or both of them. A high sound quality DAB+ SFN for national stations could one day see FM left for regional and local stations, but I am not holding my breath.

[Studio263]

Good. Time to put some new batteries in the Beolit and take the biggest hammer I have to the first Pure Evoke I can find.

[brunel]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-43458695

[Nickthedentist]

Yes, see here:
https://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/....php?p=1027501

Common sense prevailing at last.

Nick

[stevehertz]

Brilliant news for any wireless or radio enthusiast.

[stevehertz]

Originally Posted by Nuvistor

I don’t read that as cancelled the planned FM switch off, more like a postponement which of course could be never, the word cancelled is not there.
Para. 13.

Well nothing is forever, I'm sure DAB will close one day. If you're only going to be satiated by the inclusion of the word 'cancelled', then dream on. This is great news in my opinion!