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Premier Radio and D1
Colin_London
Posts: 12,716 Forum Member
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Things sound like they are going downhill rapidly for Premier Radio in their battle to stay on D1. On Tuesday Radio Today was reporting that they had negotiated a temporary contract extension from 20/12/14 to 31/3/15, but yesterday it appears this wasn't in fact the case. The fact they are now resorting to getting Ed Milliband to plead for them is also indicative that things have broken down.
If Arqiva are prepared to refuse money in favour of unused capacity for 3 months it must be bad! (Or else they are fearful that the special pleading may come to something).
As UCB will still be on D1 I don't see why Premier should have any particular right to stay especially as IIRC there is no obligation for D1 to carry religious stations.
Heart Extra may be a dubious replacement but Global seem prepared to stump up the cash for the capacity.
If Arqiva are prepared to refuse money in favour of unused capacity for 3 months it must be bad! (Or else they are fearful that the special pleading may come to something).
As UCB will still be on D1 I don't see why Premier should have any particular right to stay especially as IIRC there is no obligation for D1 to carry religious stations.
Heart Extra may be a dubious replacement but Global seem prepared to stump up the cash for the capacity.
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Quite apart from changes in the New Year, replacing Premier could let two existing 80kbit/s stations (or one 64kbit/s) to go stereo. Best of all would be the launch of a new 64kbit/s DAB+ stereo station, which would give a much-needed boost and help to stem the decline in the sales of digital radios.
Bring it on !
Just a shame it has to be another Heart station taking over. Ministry of Sound, Boystown Live, or Chill would be great on D1
I have their IP stream to my radio - so that's covered...
Radio shouldn't be about money. It should be about communication. Heart Extra will communicate nothing to me. It will just play music I can hear elsewhere. Premier provides a sense of community to Christians all over the country. Much of their programming may not appeal to me, but at least they are engaging their audience with thought-provoking programming and covering topics from a different angle to most stations. All Heart Extra will do is play music, the same music over and over again. Any speech content will be about celebrities.
But none of this matters. All that matters is who has the most money. Cash over content. Commercial over independent. Mindless robotic repetition over thought provoking, informative community radio.
This isn't about Christianity versus atheism. Even the atheist Ed Miliband is defending Premier against this profiteering.
When there were like 3 test streams, that is when D1 was looking tired.
Now think about any other special interest group. A political party, a charity, a pressure group. Maybe funded by a small group of individuals who want to buy influence via a media outlet. You wouldn't give them special terms compared to a commercially funded outfit. So why a station pushing a Christian agenda?
A quick look at their website indicates to me that there is a bit of a political influence agenda at this station - praying for the general election, looking at next years political outlook etc. certainly not a balanced PSB.
As long as you're OK then, stuff everybody else.
Maybe I've just been unlucky with when I've tuned in, but to emphasise the point it's been many years since I saw a poster or a leaflet for Premier in a church porch. It doesn't surprise me that they're struggling a bit. By contrast, UCB seems to have taken over the baton, and easily connects with the average Christian. The editorial angle of their news in particular is the perfect antidote to the pro-gay, anti-religion diatribe punted by the Beeb and other secular outlets.
The statement on Radio today is confusing where Arqiva is under pressure from Global to get Heart extra on air, but Premier has had the slot for the last 5 years and was willing to pay the current rate, but Global seem to have come with more money?
http://radiotoday.co.uk/2014/12/premier-christian-radio-to-make-way-for-heart-extra/ Does not say what the alternative solutions are but could be:
Heart extra gets 64k standand DAB (to get the maximum number of listeners) and space is found for a DAB+ mono slot (say24 or 32k) for Premier but will mean some of Premier's listeners buying new sets?
Going on local DAB, but to go go on all muxes could be expensive so will have to get less coverage than present.
As expat says buying Gold's AM network, as they did with UKRD's Eagle extra's frequency, but an AM network will be more expensive to run than DAB, have less coverage and AM listening is declining?
Or Heart extra launches as low bit rate DAB+, but Global does not seem keen.
That's funny.
The irony is that Premier's listeners within their former core coverage area already own MW sets to listen, but prospective new listeners outside London may not, so why not go DAB+ for a few pounds extra outlay per listener? New MW set (with decent audio) about 20 quid, new DAB+ set about 30 quid, with the disclaimer that I can't face the Argos website at Christmas and this is a totally unscientific guess.
Ed Miliband was spot on, we really need more homophobic redneck Christian radio stations !
Anyone for Radio BNP, Golden Dawn Radio, Voice of the Taliban... ?
[/sarcasm]
You mean the types of stations that don't get much of a look in on FM in many areas?
I'd rather have that than 50 versions of Absolute, Crapital or yet another Heart
Premier Radio's schedule includes some American evangelists who some do regard as right wing and homophobic, Chuck Swindoll and James Dobson for example.
But either way, the thing with Premier is that they try and serve the Christian community (rightly or wrongly) from many different angles during off-peak times: some seen to be more controversial than others, and others which they, the station, may not even entirely agree with. Thankfully, as mentioned, these are usually only on during off-peak times.
But what can be applauded is that, firstly, just before each external programme they broadcast has the disclaimer that there may be differences in (Christian) listeners' views to issues. Secondly, they acknowledge this and they offer a "right to reply" to all listeners, where feedback and comments are covered in a special programme.
Their peak-time programming is clearly catered for all and is far from being potentially offensive. I would confidently say this is more the stance in which the station (and all its associated media) takes.
A gay Christian disagrees, see "Why Church Pissed Me Off Today And Why I Believe in Gay Rights (Other than the obvious)", can't find a way of directly linking to the post.
https://www.tumblr.com/search/Chuck+Swindoll
I did think that they had a disclaimer message.
Does anyone know if these American evangelists pay for their airtime, like they did on the offshore stations?
Perhaps not but if you broadcast a 30 minute programme by an evangelist on your radio station you are effectively publicising their website, associated literature, public meetings etc. I'm assuming Premier are paid to take these programmes as I know that's the funding model of many US private shortwave broadcasters that take religious programmes.
I see your point, but I guess it's not too different to LBC taking on Nigel Farage for his phone-in programme.
I expect so. In America, "paid programming" of a religious nature is quite common on TV and radio. Thankfully over here it's usually confined to dedicated religious channels.
Those behind TV/radio preaching seem to make a nice living out of it:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/9163677/Lavish-spending-of-Americas-first-family-of-televangelism-revealed-in-bitter-legal-feud.html
No politician would be allowed to buy half an hour's advertising time to spout unchallenged and uninterrupted political or religious propaganda on LBC.