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SCR refugee station (Part 2)
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- Admin Edit: This thread is a continuation of SCR refugee station
Surrey Lizzy wrote: »Well, I do listen to SCR (Surrey/Sussex) regularly.Every Sunday morning,
Even though I'm not keen on gardening programmes. At 12 mid day I tune back to Radio Kent.:D
That's one day a week..
not every day .I can't think of a single reason why I would tune in every day, never mind for the all important 5 minutes...perish the thought.
On the positive side.. John Lees (if he is still there is the fount of all knowledge sportswise..) I would listen to him anytime, but that's nullified by the idea of having to tune into the presenter, so lets forget that..
The mid morning show.. Never does any subject any justice.. The antiques slot for example was too short and too full of uninteresting stuff,(lack of research???) sadly was (probably still is) full of celeb book plugs.so we pass on that too.
The Afternoon show.. Lets pass on that before one types something one might regret but remember one is ignored if you are male. Do they still have the jukebox on your way home from the school run request slot.. if they do .. Oh dear.. (think by comparison tea at three and Bill Buckley asking local people to talk about their area...)
Drive.. Well it drives you to any other station but....
So.... I am not and will NEVER listen in the morning, have no inclination mid morning, the afternoon show its awful, (if you are male(giggly girls just doesn't do it for me)..Drive is if of no interest whatsoever and the jukebox is madness..
What can we conclude from this...
No interest, in fact a positive refusal to listen to the breakfast show, from which everything stems.. and it doesn't get any better during the day. Each programme is poor/awful in its own "distinct" way.
So when we come to the evening stuff, it never occurs one to to tune in, nor at the weekend..
If the management want their listeners back, they are going to have to think long and hard about it, if of course it isnt too late already.
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Comments
Hmm, yes
Well, I firstly agree with Liz, the Canon Dr Rev Gavin Ashenden's show early on a Sun a.m. is real quality. DigIt after that is also good, IMHO because they more or less just put calls thru to real gardening experts.
As for every day, ah, there you have me. Can I (seriously, actually) offer:
- traffic 'news'
- the weather
Er, sorry, Ginger, that's all that makes me tune in every day:sleep::sleep:
Oh yes, its been over for a while. But theres something satisfying about being the mosquito in the room. The itch that cant be scratched, the buzzing that wont go away... and the best bit is they know we are right as all the quarterly RAJAR figures have shown since April 2006.
Howeer, I suspect your analysis of the management is spot on.
Sorry BS. mate but your schadenfreude has very little reward. Even if SCR died tomorrow, like all Pyrrhic victories the cost is not worth it. The stupid people who run the shabby little SCR exercise cannot even notice the itch..they go home to their houses, and their hubbies/missus and kids, and as long as they get their pension, maternity leave, and fiddle their expenses, without even listening to the radio station they are supposed to run, they will sleep well, although it is a slumber tinged with a guilt they cannot admit to. Off now to the beach to chase off a dog that is really getting on my nerves.
- 'one willing volunteer is worth a hudred pressed men',
-'truly repenting sinner...', a turnaround of someone who's really gone 'off the rails' (such as someone with a severe addiction to alcohol etc.) only really starts to turn around when they genuinely recognise the problem themselves
etc.
A genuine mea culpa and clear efforts to do better would be a real start?
Well, IMHO, SCR is already dead. I dont just mean the name change either. It was stabbed in the back by the person charged with running it. Its dead.
1) the 7.57 am weather on R4 is all thats required.
2) TP if you need to..
and then.........
Yes, well, one can use the phrase "tune in" loosely of course:D:)
I seem to recall that the 2 'Changes' threads on the Beeb board got to a combined total of almost 7200 (anyone care to submit the correct combined total on a postcard to the usual and statutory address?).
Odds anyone on the current feeble output of the public service broadcaster for Sussex, Surrey and a smidgeon of NE Hampshire being significantly improved before a further c. 2600 gripes are posted?
I suspect the answer is zero. Was there anything in the BBC plan for the future that mentioned local radio. I seem to remember that they were going to put 600 million into better programming.....
perhaps they could spend some of it on removing certain presenters from the airwaves and giving others a chance... perhaps those with a proven record of success for a change.
Its nearly 5 yrs of dreadful programming..will it ever end.....................
No!
Not if the current regime have anything to say about it.
On the other hand ... I have four fingers and a thumb.
Hi H
As you seem to have a "mole" close to RS&S, do you have any intelligence on the station's next srategy to <<<avoid closure >>>, sorry, gain more listeners? Given the track record to date, the beginning of April seems to be the favoured timeline for hurtling headlong into the next ill-conceived "initiative".
Chops
(PS. love to know who the "nutter" was;)
Cannot name the nutter, but insiders know. Future strategy will be non-existent because English regions run the show, and fears are that local radio will be part of the DG's plans to placate government. Local radio was an experiment that was not clearly thought out, got itself a bad name early on, and the BBC never showed any confidence in it from day one. Clues to it's future can be seen in the plans for Salford.
Couldn't agree with you more BS.
One album in my cd collection is John Barry's score to the 1980 film "Raise The Titanic" which I was listening to earlier on when the footie was on. Wasn't the best of films, but the music touches my soul and has some haunting melodies. Anyway, the analogy between this radio station and the ill-fated Titanic has been made from time to time.
Seven warnings she received from other ships and her crew that solid ice lay ahead but Titanic plowed on at a rate of knots without taking the precautionary measure of reducing her speed which may have avoided total devastation. Interestingly, no one person was held responsible for the disaster, but it was noted that no meetings took place between the officers to consider the warnings she'd received and no extra look-outs were posted. The lack of a pair of binoculars would have assisted someone seeing the berg sooner, but they didn't have any. The binoculars were locked in a cupboard and the key wasn't on board.
RAJAR gives a station an indication as to how it's fairing. If it's consistently bad, shouldn't someone in management start LISTENING to begin to understand what's wrong or is everyone so complacent they neither realise nor care. The listeners know what's wrong and have offered solutions, but nothing changes.
I don't know whether BBC SAS is an accident, a tragedy or both but under the current leadership it's not going anywhere.
CQD
Hear Hear Foxhollow, What an interesting analogy. I agree with you in the entirety. Now for the vitriol from 'H'
No vitriol...I agree.
It got me to thinking. Perhaps if listeners were allowed a red button their radios and when enough listeners had pressed their buttons the presenters would be given a shock. I wonder how many of the current SCR incumbents would survive their shows.?
Would get me retuning to the station again :-)
Now that's vitriol :eek:
at least they would know for certain how many listeners they actually had.. They could measure the voltage spike
er, don't believe everything. Fred's reason was the cover, as in Ghastley's case, they always give the " he has moved on to other things and we wish him well" Astely doesn't do kicking and screaming, he was dumped when his contract was up
A rare visit from me, and an even rarer post:)
Just a couple of things. Firstly, thanks to Horrendous for his musings (above). I may well know Horrendous personally. Who knows? I certainly don't. Such is the nature of internet nicks. Who's to say I am Fred Marden? I am actually, but just a thought...
As to Horrendous's ramblings on my departure, quite wrong. Applying for and getting a job running the Radio department at one of the UK's leading universities for radio and media, then dividing my time for more than a year working both there and within a commercial radio group in the south, then while in the north east launching a new radio station and running it, then continuing to work in media education elsewhere, then filling some more time doing other things connected with the radio industry, then... Well, that would be a pretty elaborate cover story. If it were a cover story, I'm pretty sure I'd have given up peddling it by now and merely roasted my old BBC paymasters on this or some other web forum by now.
In fact I had a great three years at BBC Surrey (BBC Southern Counties Radio as was at the time), and, if it were indeed the case that I was bundled out of the door against my will, well - who could blame them after morning upon morning of me blasting on about quarries in rural Surrey, the absurdity that is the 2012 Olympics budget, and why we should all have flown Concorde before it was too late:) The other day, one of the Morris dancing community that I merrily poked fun at tracked me back down to commercial radio and wildly shook his bells at me. It is a fate I deserve.
I love the BBC, and BBC Surrey within it. I applaud the work of the entire team there, to garner an audience in what is (never forget this) one of the most competitive radio markets in the UK, and indeed the world.
For some people (they can be numbered here on Digital Spy on the fingers of just two or three hands), life stopped in April 2006. For 220,000 people (RAJAR Q4 2009), life with BBC Surrey and Sussex goes on. If, say, 100 people were regularly deriding BBC Surrey and Sussex on this forum, that would carry some weight in statistical terms. (It would still lack statistical validity due to the fact that it would be an unstructured as opposed to a stratified sample.) I will watch with interest to see the other 90 turn up.
I now hold my breath for those who will bleat on about period to period comparisons and the like. Such exercises would hold more weight if the people undertaking them demonstrated a basic grasp. For instance, taking percentages (reach/share) and then extrapolating changes in them in to percentage changes themselves shows a lack of basic understanding. When a percentage is expressed, that has already been done; a percentage moves up or down on a scale of fractions expressed as one of one hundred. This will not stop the bleaters of course - they have the bit between their teeth, and a point they will seek to prove until it is ripped from 'their cold, dead hands'. (Mr Heston is, of course, dead, so it does come to that for all of us one day.)
More significantly, a couple of thoughts...
Those who eulogise about times before April 2006 conveniently ignore, or more likely don't know, that BBC Southern Counties was always a significantly under-performing station from its inception. In relative BBC local radio audience terms certainly; in overall local radio audience terms, catastrophically. The BBC took, and continues to take action, to address that inescapable fact. Whether or not that is bearing fruit, it is absurd to try and suggest that, prior to April 2006, there was something that was not broken, so no need to fix it. It was broken, badly. There has never been a golden age of BBC local radio in Surrey and Sussex.
On the up side, any astute radio programmer would kill for the level of engagement that listeners (or self declared non-listeners) express in this forum. It is quite extraordinary - personally I'd choose to get out more - but can be the foundation of great things to come for this station, if properly and constructively embraced.
Fred
Glad to hear things are going well for you.
The RAJAR Q4 figures for Dec 2009 were the lowest December figures recorded by the station. Any way you want to express percentages its the lowest. It narrowly misses out on being the lowest ever which was recorded a year or two back.
At its peak SCR pulled in over 300,000 listeners. Now thats a drop of about 30%. Even immediately prior to April 2006 it was recording close to those figures.
If it was underperforming before, what is it doing now?
I really cant comment on how the Surrey section has fared and compares in comparison to what went before. When I lived in Surrey, Giles Dilnot was presenting the morning show and handed over to Ed Douglas just as I moved down to the South Coast.
If we accept your premise that it was broken before, whatever action the BBC has taken to "fix" the problem has and continues to be in the wrong direction. Its patently obvious from the recorded figures. They're getting worse not better.
Yes, your right. There is only a few of us who continue to post. We could just disappear into the night and let SCR sink slowly into the west. Its the miracles of modern technology that allow us to continue to make pithy comments on a public forum rather than discussing it over a beer in the local pub. The point is though, whatever we post or dont post, whether we are here or not, SCR is losing audience, its failing to improve, and its certainly not convincing any of us that the radio station is anything like the service we used to have. If the figures are anything to go by, its not convincing other people either.
Yes, I do have a basic grasp of the figures. I usually post a summary of the percentage changes on here ever quarter. I also made the point way back in April 2006 that I'd stop posting any comments when and if the audience figures for the new regime surpassed those recorded before April 2006. They never have. I dont think you can argue that replacing and underperforming station with an even less well performing station was a good idea. Yes, it may have been reasonable for the BBC to try and improve the performance but it was pretty obvious it wasnt going to work and we started to say so in December 2005. Why so? Because no matter what business you are in, to improve your business you don't get rid of the people who are performing best. Whomever you might think that was, getting rid of everybody was a sure fire way to include the best with the worst. Starting with aclean sheet and a "relaunch" may have seemed like a good idea but the history of such things is not good. (you're probably too young to remember the "night of the long knives" which almost certainly contributed to the loss of the general election in 1960) (come to that, I'm almost too young ;-) )
Your right though , we should probably get out more and stop worrying about it. Its only a radio station. Its still sad to compare what went before with what is on offer now. I certainly wont be retuning anytime soon and as long the BBC continues along the path its set itself, more of its present audince are likely to do likewise.