Dedicated researchers in the rec.radio.shortwave newsgroup have discovered the real reasons the World Service is shutting down transmissions to North America and the Pacific. You have to read the whole report to truly understand, but it involves the BBC redefining its target audience as, variously, "hard-core FM DXers who are willing to try to pursue these hard-to-hear broadcasts", "hacker geeks who don't have anything better to do with $1000+ computers than make them replace $100 radios", and "long haul lorry drivers, the only people who spend enough time behind the wheel to make [satellite radio] services worthwhile".

Posted 14:20 UTC

Radio Canada International web site hacked! This may be up all weekend, given that virtually nobody works at the station on weekends any more. Or they may call some poor net.slave in to restore the site or even to shut it down until someone can figure out what hole in Microsoft's web server software the hacker used to wipe the site.

Good thing news never happens on weekends in Canada any more.

Posted 00:40 UTC

I apologize for the lack of posts here lately, but most of my efforts lately are devoted to the Coalition to Save the BBC World Service web site. There's a blog there, and I intended to post stuff there and here, but it hasn't quite worked out that way. So go look at what's over there. If I come across non-BBC stuff, I'll post it here.

Posted 02:58 UTC

Tech Talk: Don't Kill the BBC World Service (Time magazine, Asia edition, Eric Ellis): "Even if streaming access is open and up to scratch, the BBC website's capacity is reportedly such that it can support just 20,000 simultaneous listener-users. That means mega-buffering, the signal fading out and always at the crucial moment, kind of like those high camp, B-grade Hollywood films when the dying man pops off before fessing up the name of the villain. To fix the problem, the BBC would have to spend money cranking up capacity, the money presumably saved by dropping the radio transmission. Makes a lot of sense.

"Call me old-fashioned. Don't kill the shortwave."

Posted 02:56 UTC

Satellite Radio Rivals Picking Up Static: Beaming broadcasts from space to cars is proving to be financially and technically challenging. (L.A. Times): "Once the laggard in a two-horse race because of launch delays, XM is poised to be the first to broadcast radio via satellite, the first innovation in radio technology since the FM band started showing up in car audio systems about 30 years ago. But XM and its New York City-based rival, Sirius Satellite Radio Inc., which was considered the leader as recently as April, face hurdles that have hammered their stock prices and caused Wall Street to scale back subscription and revenue projections. XM was delayed in launching its two satellites; Sirius is facing a shortage from its supplier of the microchips that receive the satellite broadcasts, delaying its start of service until the end of the year." (Thanks to Kim Elliott for posting about this in swprograms.)

Posted 13:55 UTC

Drip, drip, drip: Two more letters published in today's Daily Telegraph, both from Coalition members. The first, from Sheldon Harvey, talks about the spotty nature of FM rebroadcasts, and the second from Ralph Brandi (hey, I know that name) points out that some programs are not aired on the Internet feed due to rights problems.

Posted 13:03 UTC

Regarding Ed Mayberry's report, never mind, unless you live near Houston. KUHF's streaming is down. No, I don't understand irony here, so I won't make any further comment.

Posted 21:26 UTC

Ed Mayberry, proprietor of the International Listener news site, is also a reporter at an NPR station in Houston, Texas. He's been working on a radio feature on the BBC World Service shortwave cutback, and that feature runs this afternoon--either 2130 or 2230 UTC--and tomorrow--either at 1030 and 1230 UTC OR 1130 and 1330 UTC--on Houston's NPR affiliate KUHF.  KUHF's Real Player stream is testing at http://bnetradio.com/audioedge/kuhf.ram.

Posted 21:14 UTC

BBC's Brave New World: "If you are particularly interested in news items about a country in the Asia-Pacific region, you will be able to customise your stored news bulletins. And one day I think it is possible that the content will be directly delivered into data store - the broadcaster has become a content provider. The emphasis is no longer on 'broad' casting, but on 'narrow' casting. With one exception, I think, and that is news programming. [T]here are times when we all we want is to press a button and receive the latest news - while we do something else. These are times when we don't want to be interactive, when the broadcaster is, and I think will remain, just companion during certain periods."

This quote, from a presentation by the Controller of Technology and Resources of the World Service to the Asian Broadcasting Union in 1997, contains some important insights into how the World Service views the future. Apparently, to the BBC, this future from 1997 is reality in 2001. The emphasis on news over feature programming is interesting, and explains the actions of emphasizing news programs via local placement, and the view that news is the only interesting "companion" is odd, to say the least. Personally, I find that the BBC fills its "companion" function best with a wide range of programming, not just news.

Interestingly enough, this forum also contains a presentation by Robert O'Reilly, the Executive Director of Radio Canada International, another currently-beleaguered station. That presentation contains the following nugget which may prove useful in seeing how these professional international broadcasters view their audience:

"As long as Government seek investment, International communication is essential. You will note I did not say radio, because I think that here we are trying to get to the business leaders, and they are either more likely to get their information from the Internet or from a video source. Regardless, the International radio broadcaster has the experience necessary to produce those messages, and will be the key to their formulation and dissemination for some time, in my humble estimation."

(Thanks Pete Costello for finding this link and passing it along.)

Posted 15:06 UTC

Sheldon Harvey tells me that RCI's Wojtek Gwiazda will be the guest this week on the program he and Bill Westenhaver do every Sunday morning at 10:30 EDT (1430 UTC), International Radio Report. Streaming audio available from www.ckut.ca.

Posted 06:35 UTC

Just on the off chance that there's an e-mail list that Ed Mayberry doesn't notify when he publishes a new issue, his International Listener for June is devoted entirely to the BBC World Service ending service to North America and Australia. It includes an interview with Jerry Timmins, who says that the cessation is "a done deal".

We'll see.

Posted 05:47 UTC