The Future of the BBC

[french frank]

whilst I applaud your sentiment I would require more details of this 45% - eg if it was measured during Wodger's demolition of evening concert period when CFM offers R3-like concert in the evening then this might well explain it.

But that it the point, isn't it? It's demonstrating that RW was seeking to attract a CFM-type listener - which explains why the content became so CFM-like

But that actual measurement was in the last review (2010/11) - after the live concerts had been restored. [It was 42% - I've just worked it out again]. More likely to be the morning programmes which persuaded CFM listeners to cross over. R3 listeners would tend cross to CFM when the jazz, world or arts programmes were on.

[french frank]

The same trust report also points out elsewhere that there is close to no crossover between the music played on R1 and R2.
all of which proves.....what....?

That there is a crossover of R1's older listeners/R2's younger listeners? In the last Charter review, about 40% of Radio 1's audience was above the 15-29 target age; about 20% of R2's was below the 35+ target age.

[Russ]

Gordon - thanks for getting a good feel for the online costs per 'personhour'. As you noted, the 'Audio & Music' (='radio') component plus the full iPlayer cost was £22.8m. Personally, I would take the view that the 'radio' proportion of the full iPlayer cost should be about 20%, if only on the crude basis that about 20% of the licence fee goes toward radio. That would give online radio a cost of 11.7m + 2.2m = say £13.9m.

The total number of broadcast BBC radio hours last year (from RAJAR) was approx 4100m. From my RAJAR post, the proportion of radio being time-shifted is small - about 1.5% of total listening hours, or 2.8% of total listening hours if podcasts are taken into account, i.e. somewhere between say 61m and 115m hours. The number of radio time-shift requests in 2014 was (from iPlayer Performance pack info) approx 180m. However, that number is spread across the 4.2m adults reported to use listen again, so 4.2m is probably the better indicator of the number of 'persons'. That would indicate the number of 'personhours' to be 4.2m x 61m = say 250m (or 480m if podcasts are taken into account). The cost of time-shifted radio is therefore approx 5.6p per personhour, falling to 2.9p per personhour if podcasts are taken into account.

Russ

[Dave2002]

I"m a great fan of TA (though I wish they would kill off Peggy)

I'm not a great fan, and rather wish it would go the way that Tony Hancock suggested for a similar even more fictitious programme. However, I wish Peggy well, as I think in reality she lives in a village not far from here!

[antongould]

"Radios 1 and 2 are part of the national landscape - BBC" - Grauniad headline. Also didn't I read somewhere Witlessingdale's son is a massive fan of Radio 1 as the only station that showcases new bands ......???

[antongould]

"Radios 1 and 2 are part of the national landscape - BBC" - Grauniad headline. Also didn't I read somewhere Witlessingdale's son is a massive fan of Radio 1 as the only station that showcases new bands ......???

Same page has a spirited defence of R2 by the, IMVVHO, impressive Simon Mayo - will Tree Lawn be further in?

[MrGongGong]

"Radios 1 and 2 are part of the national landscape - BBC" - Grauniad headline. Also didn't I read somewhere Witlessingdale's son is a massive fan of Radio 1 as the only station that showcases new bands ......???

Many years ago R1 reinvented itself as a supporter of "new music" , smart move IMV and has gaining the respect and support of many young songwriters and composers.
Finding, playing and encouraging this is something that commercial stations simply wont bother with.

If only R3 would support new music in the same way

Last weekend I was at an event organised by Music for Youth aimed at encouraging young composers, it has only just struck me that if they were songwriters I would straight away suggest they should send their demos to R1. But for those writing chamber, orchestral or choral music I wouldn't even think that it was worth bothering with the cost of the stamp to send their music to R3.

[french frank]

If only R3 would support new music in the same way

In theory, I agree. The difference though is that there is a readier appetite among younger people for new music - in fact it's what they want. People tend to want 'older' music when it comes to 'classical' (which is what 'classical'implies).

They could merge 1 & 2, still keep 1Xtra, Asian Network and 6 Music, and save as much as they would if they axed Radio 3.

[Russ]

R1 and R2 are both hugely popular. The fact that there is a 'sizeable crossover' in their audiences seems somewhat beside the point to me (and a typically muddle-headed BBC Trust 'discovery'), because there are any number of crossover audiences for all sorts of BBC radio and TV stations. The attack on R1 and R2 is not founded on the crossover in its audiences, it is an ideological and juicy target by the commercial sector. What the BBC needs to demonstrate is that it can continue to deliver R1 and R1X by reducing costs. Does R1 really need 50 journalists, for example? And from which budget does the cost the hundreds of BBC employees sent to Glastonbury come from?

Russ

[antongould]

R1 and R2 are both hugely popular. The fact that there is a 'sizeable crossover' in their audiences seems somewhat beside the point to me (and a typically muddle-headed BBC Trust 'discovery'), because there are any number of crossover audiences for all sorts of BBC radio and TV stations. The attack on R1 and R2 is not founded on the crossover in its audiences, it is an ideological and juicy target by the commercial sector. What the BBC needs to demonstrate is that it can continue to deliver R1 and R1X by reducing costs. Does R1 really need 50 journalists, for example? And from which budget does the cost the hundreds of BBC employees sent to Glastonbury come from?

Russ

Totally agree Russ ..........

[teamsaint]

I pretty much agree with Russ, although I do think that as well as the commercial attack, there is an artistic angle to this, that, for example, does not value new , innovative or non chart "popular" music(s).
Much the same really as the drive to take R3 further and further into the commercial mainstream of "classical".

[french frank]

Figures for 2008:

Beijing Olympics - £15.565m
Euro 2008 - £8.682m
Wimbledon - £4.217m
BBC Proms - £3.712m
Glastonbury - £1.737m
Big Weekend - £888,000

The £3.7m must be roughly the cost from Radio 3's budget, but much of Glastonbury is covered by television so might come from those budgets - service budget or entire cost? But Glastonbury's 5 days or so seem expensive compared with the Proms 2 months (as does Wimbledon's 2 weeks). And Glastonbury (again 2008) had 277 staff, compared with the Proms 145. Radio 1's 'Big Weekend' also took 271 staff …

To me the questionable thing is not What they do but how much airtime/money is devoted to it. 6 Music, for example - to take team's point - is devoted to 'non chart "popular" music(s)' (that's not a criticism - just saying it gets its whack).

because there are any number of crossover audiences for all sorts of BBC radio and TV stations

Yes, but the other point is what they're doing - there's a big cross-over audience between Radio 3 and Radio 4, but given their remits there isn't much content similarity. Other than that Radio 4 seems to have pinched the music talks …

[aeolium]

To me the questionable thing is not What they do but how much airtime/money is devoted to it. 6 Music, for example - to take team's point - is devoted to 'non chart "popular" music(s)' (that's not a criticism - just saying it gets its whack).

Yes, the cost is important but surely there is a question, at the heart of the rationale for PSB, about what the BBC should do, what PSB is for. And that's why in one respect the Charter Review is of value, in forcing people to think about that, rather than allowing the BBC to be an all-purpose leviathan.

What I don't like is the process by which it is conducted. The terms of reference are set by the Secretary of State for DCMS, who has also as it were picked the jury, and presumably will ultimately act as the judge at the end of the process. It surely exposes the myth of the independence of the BBC that this is the way it is done (and it is not a party political point - the same thing happened under the Labour government in 2006). That is, if anyone still believes in that independence after the recent ultimatum that the BBC take on the cost of free licences for the over-75s, a cloak-and-daggers settlement without any parliamentary scrutiny or discussion within the higher echelons of the BBC.

I don't see how the BBC can be properly independent unless the control of its funding, and its governance, is taken away from the government. How that can be done I don't know.

[french frank]

Yes, the cost is important but surely there is a question, at the heart of the rationale for PSB, about what the BBC should do, what PSB is for. And that's why in one respect the Charter Review is of value, in forcing people to think about that, rather than allowing the BBC to be an all-purpose leviathan.

It's pure lack of courage on my part - or intellectual capacity - that I can't demolish the arguments that the ever-expanding universe of popular music has anything to do with PSB, whether it's new, innovative, 'discerning' or whatever; and that the BBC must cover it.

What I don't like is the process by which it is conducted. The terms of reference are set by the Secretary of State for DCMS, who has also as it were picked the jury, and presumably will ultimately act as the judge at the end of the process. It surely exposes the myth of the independence of the BBC that this is the way it is done (and it is not a party political point - the same thing happened under the Labour government in 2006). That is, if anyone still believes in that independence after the recent ultimatum that the BBC take on the cost of free licences for the over-75s, a cloak-and-daggers settlement without any parliamentary scrutiny or discussion within the higher echelons of the BBC.

I don't see how the BBC can be properly independent unless the control of its funding, and its governance, is taken away from the government. How that can be done I don't know.

I cannot disagree with a word of that. Some people imagine being on Desert Island Discs and talking about themselves and their favourite music. I imagine myself on a televised CMS select committee meeting and telling them what I think of them

[Quarky]

I don't see how the BBC can be properly independent unless the control of its funding, and its governance, is taken away from the government. How that can be done I don't know.

Well, I can't see how any government, of whatever political persuasion, would relinquish any degree of control of the Nation's most important mouthpiece.

The BBC may have a degree of independence, but my view is that it pretty much toes the line, particularly on news broadcasts.

The important issue in my view is that it should be independent of commercial pressures. The Green paper states "......this has not meant the ‘death’ of television or radio – instead we have seen the range of options increasing – with new services complementing rather than usurping the old. Just because lots of people are using the internet to access video on demand, to stream music and
to find out the latest news, does not change the fact that today most people still want to watch television when it is broadcast, still rely on radio and still
want to read newspapers."

However many of the new options in terms of broadcast radio or TV, rely on advertisements and commercial funding, so that paradoxically, there is a restriction of choice, with all those different stations all producing more or less the same spam, in order to attract a sufficient number of listeners/ viewers.

My main interest is Radio, and in particular Radio 3. I welcome the approach of the new Controller, and hope he will be permitted to distance R3 further from CFM, Jazz FM, etc.