another way of doing things

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another way of doing things

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February 21, 2005 at 10:39 pm

#687872
1

globalloon

@globalloon

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in france you can set up something which makes a small amount of money, enough to pay one or two people, say, and if you can think of a way that it has a cultural benefit, you can get away without a lot of the infamous french buraucracy by calling it association culturel

and in this way what is in essence and spirit a pirate can be heard without harassment>>> L’Eko de Garrugues (recommended for peel fans)

😎
February 22, 2005 at 4:31 pm

#852784
6

General Lighting

@general-lighting

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Unfortunately for us, despite bureaucracy the French communications ministry now manages Band II (the VHF/FM radio broadcast band from 88-108MHz) in a far more equitable manner than in Britain.

In Britain, Ofcom often say “there are not enough frequencies” and when they do give out some for community broadcasting they cannot even say where they are and there is a lengthy competitive applications process with a £600 non-refundable application fee

Although they’ve tried to revamp it recently it still is clearly not reaching the people it is supposed to be aimed at – the costs of running community stations mean they end up as poor clones of the already extant “corporate media chain” networks, or are 28 day stations only

Worse still both countries started out with the same basic problem – they allocated a large chunk of one end of the FM broadcast band to their national public broadcasters, and the other end to comms for the blue light services (and then warned their citizens not to listen in as this was naughty! :D).

It was not until the 1980s the blue light services upgraded their radio systems and moved frequency – France did so first but the UK did not until the mid 1990s! This freed up a lot of spare frequencies, but in the UK the BBC still have whole chunks of the band. Until Ofcom stands up to them and re-allocates the services, or people start migrating to digital radio (analogue FM broadcasting will be switched off in the next 10-15 years!) this is always going to be a problem for would-be broadcasters in Britain.
February 22, 2005 at 5:40 pm

#852783
[deleted]

@[deleted]

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as far as i can work out, when digital radio becomes the norm this will be sorted! is digital radio the same as internet? this seems the way forward..wap connection on ur fone at fixed rate, any station u want! squatjuice, cheekyhalf, etc.

this may sort out the main problem of all the stations aspiring to the same ideals and therefore just offering different versions of the same station. 1Xtra has been quite impressive, i have to say.

personally i cant wait…analogue radio is shite.
February 22, 2005 at 6:00 pm

#852786
1

globalloon

@globalloon

Member
unfortunately the local underground radio station (yep, ther only be one round theez parrts, bey) just felt the force of the laws on community broadcasting 😡

i think it’s cos the council had just issued a 28 day license to a promoter that is broadcasting to compliment a season of concerts (carleen anderson, norman jay etc ££) and the frequency they licensed clashed with Heavenfm, conveniently for the local council, who knew about the independant, but couldn’t justify the resources to track em and close em down

after all, they weren’t causing any problems :rolleyes: until now… maybe i’m just cynical,

but beyond radio, the french concept of an association culturel is one i like and extends to pretty much anything artistic you can think of… as long as you have some members to prove that someone is benefitting ‘culturally’ from your activities, you can make a bit of money for your efforts and by-pass a whole aspect of bureaucracy (ie. being a commercial enterprise)

i think it encourages people to get involved in some DIY creativity in a way that writing a funding application to an Arts Council in this country doesn’t

it’s a model worth considering, or proposing, if such be your thing
February 22, 2005 at 6:30 pm

#852785
6

General Lighting

@general-lighting

Moderator
Staff
globalloon wrote:

unfortunately the local underground radio station (yep, ther only be one round theez parrts, bey) just felt the force of the laws on community broadcasting 😡

i think it’s cos the council had just issued a 28 day license to a promoter that is broadcasting to compliment a season of concerts (carleen anderson, norman jay etc ££) and the frequency they licensed clashed with Heavenfm, conveniently for the local council, who knew about the independant, but couldn’t justify the resources to track em and close em down

after all, they weren’t causing any problems :rolleyes: until now… maybe i’m just cynical,

Quote:

the local council have no jurisdiction whatsoever on radio broadcasting – apart from in some cases approval of a site for a tranmission mast.

Ofcom in London regulate all aspects of communications (apart from miltary comms) throughout the UK – wireless comms, TV and radio, telephone (fixed and mobile) and internet – they were formed out of many different agencies as the Government realised all forms of communication are converging due to new technology.

As for busting the local pirate (even though it wasn’t “causing problems”) hats their policy if another organiser succesfully bids for an RSL.

Ofcoms argument will be “well, they went through the proper channels (no pun intended) to get on air”.

They are actually fairly lenient TBH, particularly considering the shit that hapens amongst some of the London stations (who nick each others equipment using violence and use crackhouses for studios). I can understand why they don’t like it (even as an ex-pirate broadcaster) – you can interfere with planes comms and other services if you set up an FM transmitter badly.

What annoys me more is the community licensing process appears to have been made deliberately complicated and unfriendly because the commercial radio sector has whinged.

Ofcom are a public service so they don’t even make a profit from the £600 fee or even commercial or business radio broadcast licenses (the Treasury gets all the money!)
February 22, 2005 at 6:39 pm

#852787
1

globalloon

@globalloon

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General Lighting wrote:

the local council have no jurisdiction whatsoever on radio broadcasting – apart from in some cases approval of a site for a tranmission mast.

sorry, should have made that clearer… they underwrote the ‘festival’… hence their vested interest
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