Radio 4 to embrace online future by unlocking its past

[Guest]

BBC Radio 4 aims to 'break out of schedule' by making historic content available on demand – starting with 920 episodes of Alistair Cooke's Letter from America

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/oct/13/radio-4-online-unlocking-past

This will join the recent release of the Desert Island Disc archive, as highlighted by Caliban elsewhere on Platform 3.

Is it too much to hope that BBC Radio 3 might follow suit by digging deep into its Proms archive, for instance, or maybe its BBC orchestral archives? How far will repeat fees/intellectual copyright get in the way? Are there really any insuperable obstacles (beyond 'we've wiped the tapes, guv')?

Here's hoping there are not.

[aeolium]

Is it too much to hope that BBC Radio 3 might follow suit by digging deep into its Proms archive, for instance, or maybe its BBC orchestral archives? How far will repeat fees/intellectual copyright get in the way? Are there really any insuperable obstacles (beyond 'we've wiped the tapes, guv')?

I very much hope so, am51 - and especially R3's drama and talks archive. I think 'wiping the tapes' might be a real problem as I believe quite a lot of Third Programme material was erased (or, where transmitted live, not recorded). It'd be interesting to hear from someone with inside knowledge about the archive issues as to what material is available and could realistically be provided on demand.

[umslopogaas]

[Apologies if, as I think is likely, I have posted about this before] Some of R3's live transmissions certainly exist, because I own copies. They are LPs produced by the BBC Transcription Service, so that the overseas studios of the BBC could re-transmit the London recordings of live concerts.

Eg: I cant find the date of the actual performance, but the LP label says "Expiry Date 31.12.72" Very high quality vinyl with white, green and yellow labels. Never intended for sale to the general public, plain yellow sleeves with typewritten notes stapled on. I found these copies in a second-hand shop, probably they once belonged to a BBC engineer. A typical example:

73rd season of HW Prom Concerts, Continuity Sheet. [IMPORTANT. To reproduce in Mono, it is essential to use a STEREO pickup. ??? what on earth is that about?] Side 1 (of 3) begins: Humphrey Burton: This is Humphrey Burton speaking to you from a box at the Royal Albert Hall ... etc.

The programme was:

Malcolm Arnold concerto for two violins (soloists Loveday and Mason, cond. Arnold)
Dvorak, symph 8, (cond. Arnold)
(then, with an introduction from Alexander Goehr)
Byrd, motets
Varese, Ecuatorial
Varese, Deserts (both Varese items cond. Prausnitz)

Arnold, Goehr and Prausnitz, all introduced by Burton. Quite a record.

[Don Petter]

[IMPORTANT. To reproduce in Mono, it is essential to use a STEREO pickup. ??? what on earth is that about?]

They are stereo recordings, so will have vertical variations in the grooves as the two signals vary. A normal mono pickup is designed to only respond to lateral variations, and has no verical compliance, so it would damage the grooves by not being able to respond to the vertical component.

To play them safely in mono, a stereo pickup should be used, with the outputs wired in parallel to give a mono signal. (A special mono pickup which does have vertical compliance could be used, but they were undoubtedly being safe for wherever they might end up being played.)

[DracoM]

So, sort of R4X all over again? Or am I being too cynical.

[Petrushka]

[Apologies if, as I think is likely, I have posted about this before] Some of R3's live transmissions certainly exist, because I own copies. They are LPs produced by the BBC Transcription Service, so that the overseas studios of the BBC could re-transmit the London recordings of live concerts.

Eg: I cant find the date of the actual performance, but the LP label says "Expiry Date 31.12.72" Very high quality vinyl with white, green and yellow labels. Never intended for sale to the general public, plain yellow sleeves with typewritten notes stapled on. I found these copies in a second-hand shop, probably they once belonged to a BBC engineer. A typical example:

73rd season of HW Prom Concerts, Continuity Sheet. [IMPORTANT. To reproduce in Mono, it is essential to use a STEREO pickup. ??? what on earth is that about?] Side 1 (of 3) begins: Humphrey Burton: This is Humphrey Burton speaking to you from a box at the Royal Albert Hall ... etc.

The programme was:

Malcolm Arnold concerto for two violins (soloists Loveday and Mason, cond. Arnold)
Dvorak, symph 8, (cond. Arnold)
(then, with an introduction from Alexander Goehr)
Byrd, motets
Varese, Ecuatorial
Varese, Deserts (both Varese items cond. Prausnitz)

Arnold, Goehr and Prausnitz, all introduced by Burton. Quite a record.

According to the Proms Archive these are from the 1966 Proms. The Arnold and Dvorak works were given on August 5 while the Varese items date from July 28. The Byrd items would therefore appear to be from July 26.

[Russ]

So, sort of R4X all over again? Or am I being too cynical.

Yes and no. As one who was regularly exhorting Mark Damazer to make available more of the archive and to adopt a more flexible stance toward 'the schedule', even to the extent of introducing a new 'mini-channel' for archive material, I welcome the general principle of what is now being proposed. The overall strategy is still not clear though, and is complicated by potential commercial interests, which seem far from resolved. In March, the BBC announced the start of 'Project Barcelona', which is or was to be based on licence fee payers paying extra for downloaded archive programmes. The primary focus of Project Barcelona was of course TV, and the scope of the payment principle to cover the cinderella area of radio was not addressed. (The matter was discussed briefly here on the forum.) Roly Keating's subsequent departure from the BBC may have left Project Barcelona in a state of abeyance.

Thorny rights issues continue to complicate what can be made available on R4X, and are also likely to complicate any efforts of R3 in the area of drama and talks.

In June, the BBC proudly announced it had archived 300k radio programmes. When challenged to publish the list of those programmes, there was a deafening silence. The main reason would appear to be an editorial one, namely 'who chooses?', and I think we can already see the choice of what is to be offered will not be ours. In the Radio 4 case, the choice is to be made "by Radio 4 editors". There is as yet no indication the BBC will consult users over the matter. That said, I think our stance should be to urge Radio 3 to start following Radio 4's lead, whilst continuing to object to any extra payments being required for radio archive downloads. (It might help to praise Tim Davie so much that he gets promoted out of harm's way.)

[umslopogaas]

Ah, thanks Don Petter (#4). I have the SME arm with detachable headshells and versions with both mono and stereo styli, so its a simple matter to switch.

[Don Petter]

Ah, thanks Don Petter (#4). I have the SME arm with detachable headshells and versions with both mono and stereo styli, so its a simple matter to switch.

Oops! What I said was correct, and I was talking about the physical characteristics of the cartridge. But I overlooked to mention the other obvious thing that the stereo groove requires a smaller stylus than the mono groove anyway. (Though again there were so-called compatible mono styli, which were somewhat suspect.)

So the discs would seem to be stereo, and to be played as such. The label was trying to prevent someone in a remote outpost, who was only broadcasting a mono signal, to plough through the discs with a coventional mono cartridge and stylus, because 'that was all they wanted'.

[umslopogaas]

I certainly find that mono discs play better with a mono stylus, because, as I understand it, a mono stylus doesnt bump around in all the rubbish that may have accumulated in the bottom of the groove, whereas although you can play mono discs with a stereo stylus, the pops and crackles are more audible. What I've always been told is that you definitely mustnt play stereo discs with a mono stylus, it damages them. I remember compatible styli, but never owned one, I also recall they didnt have a good reputation.

I've got a dozen or so of these BBC Transcription Service discs, most are stereo and labelled as such, a few are not and are presumably mono. Yes, you've got it, the warning is on the stereo ones, to ensure that even if the broadcast was to be in mono only, the equipment must have a stereo stylus.

[gingerjon]

Is it too much to hope that BBC Radio 3 might follow suit by digging deep into its Proms archive, for instance, or maybe its BBC orchestral archives? How far will repeat fees/intellectual copyright get in the way? Are there really any insuperable obstacles (beyond 'we've wiped the tapes, guv')?

One obstacle that might apply dates from when the BBC first started getting into Listen Again and podcasting. If I recall correctly they had to remove most of what they had planned to make available from Radio 3 for download not because of copyright but because the rest of the classical music industry successfully objected that making classical content available for free distorted the market.

[aeolium]

One obstacle that might apply dates from when the BBC first started getting into Listen Again and podcasting. If I recall correctly they had to remove most of what they had planned to make available from Radio 3 for download not because of copyright but because the rest of the classical music industry successfully objected that making classical content available for free distorted the market.

That might well be the case for the classical music archive within R3 (and of course the BBC has marketed and sold its own archive material, e.g. within the BBC Legends series). But would it also be the case for radio drama, or talks - for a lot of material here there simply will not be any existing competitive market at all?

[Russ]

But would it also be the case for radio drama, or talks - for a lot of material here there simply will not be any existing competitive market at all?

That's precisely why Tim Davie thinks he can make money from that area!

Russ