BBC to cull radio stations, halve websites in painful biz review

Just the start

This is the BBC trying to take a pre-emptive strike before the Tories get in. Cameron used to work for the company that took ITV to its knees, Carlton. And Shadow Culture Minister Jeremy Hunt is so far up the backside of the big media owners he can see what they had for breakfast.

Hunt is the most dangerous man there, mark my words.

Commercial radio TV and Radio are screwed and its of their own doing. The owners have bought pressure to bear on the Tories. The Beeb is the easiest scapegoat I'm afraid.

Save 6Music!

A fantastic radio station, it would be a crime against real music to scrap it.

Save 6music!

How can the BBC expect anyone take up DAB when they cull the only thing they've put on there worth listening to? I got a Pure Highway for Christmas so I could listen to 6music in the car. That will go in the boot never to be used again if 6music goes.

Fingers crossed that 6music will be axed and the whole station renamed to Radio 1 and put on FM. Everyone associated with the current pile of twaddle that is Radio 1 should have no trouble getting a show on Another Generic Commercial Radio Station.

I like the Friday Rock Show

It is on Freeview and Freesat, I record on a PVR, then stick it on a Minidisc, or burn to CD to listen to later.

AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Get rid of R1 or one of those funny stations noone listens to

Every time I get in to my car...

I feel the overwhelming urge to turn on my radio. Then I remember, it's shit!

The music's OK, but the crap spoken by the program hosts (DJs) is pure bollox, and it get worse when the let twats from the real world phone-in. Fuck me, they should be killed at birth. I'm not the least bit interested in anything you have to say, including...

"Can I just say hello to anyone who knows me?" NO, FUCK OFF click, bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Kill all radio stations, even the commercial ones.

Another thought...

So another thought I had - do these stations need to be running all night and all day? Could the BBC not save by chopping a bunch of stations from midnight to 6am? Where does this idea that every station needs to be playing constantly come from?

Please save 6 Music

6 Music is great .. please keep it, it costs < Jonathon Ross.

Higher quality broadcasting

Ahahahahahaahahhahahahaahahhaha

Well that cheered up a dreary Friday afternoon.

Cheers

@graham

One problem with your arguement.

"For the price of Chris Moyles and his team for one show, you could fund the salaries of everyone on 6Music."

Yup, but his show draws over 10x more listeners than the entire radio6 output. So going by your point, Radio6 must die.

"BBC 6 Music

Audience data for September 2009 to December 2009

TSA: This radio station broadcasts to a survey area of 51,280,000,000 adults (aged 15+).

Reach: It is listened to by 695,000 people (1%) each week"

Chris Moyles

...... "Chris Moyles show, which had 7.72 million listeners each week, up slightly from 7.7 million last quarter. "

God, you lot....

... are a bunch of old fogies, aren't you? I like both Moyles & the evening Radio 1 shows. Though I agree, real-world twats are all idiots. 'Stupid Street' is every street.

Isn't Steve Lamacq on 6Music? And I think I've seen Bruce Dickinson in the schedule too. Not quite to my tastes but not too far off.

Let's get rid of Switch, tweens already influence the media way too much...

Radio 6, only one of BBC worth lsitening too

Pity

Radio 6 on the DAB is one of three channels worth listening too in the home counties- rest are just so much crap or untunable

Radio? What's that? Online Radio?

Radio - I used to listen to Radio *all* the time from the mid 80's till the late 90's then slowly tailed off listening as the content became more and more shit.

I don't bother anymore.

There's plenty of sites where you can get the lastest music news, sample tracks.

There's social media to share information on new bands.

If you do need a 'radio fix', there's numerous net radio stations you can stream.

Traditional Radio is heading the same was as the DODO.

If I were 6music, I'd shift to an online streaming service - but first, of course, they need financial backing...

Re: Radio 6

To be honest, I've all but given up on conventional music radio, and while Radio 6* seems like the best of a bad bunch, its still really not *that* great. Instead I opt for a range of internet based radio stations while at work, and Radio 4 at home. I stopped listening to Radio 1 shortly after the late, great John Peel passed away (rest his soul etc.) and the way his slot was cannibalized by people that had little knowledge for music, or at best a very narrow minded view. I had hoped that Annie Nightingale would replace him, but instead we got the insipid Lemacq and a load of no-names. Fortunately internet radio has grown to fill the gap.

* A quick scan of the schedule revealed the usual Indie selection plus a dance and a metal show. I'd love a decent New Wave show, or a show that for the darker side of electronic and industrial music. Oh, and a dodgy old goth show. /hides

One more for 6 Music

Just to add my support for 6 Music, not that it's worth anything. Especially now that Lamb has been shoved into a corner slot it is a superb station playing a great variety of interesting music which is generally somewhat out of the main stream. It's worth it for Stuart Maconie's Freak zone alone. Surely this is the kind of thing that the BBC should support? Indeed, though it pains me to say this, if the BBC is not supporting this kind of station what point does the BBC have?

@Gary F

The BBC is not state funded.

I, for one, think the license fee is bloody cheap for what you get. I don't subscribe to Sky, as I couldn't imagine paying a subscription fee AND having more than 50% of airtime as adverts. Shudder. But I hear people at work complaining about the license fee, but quite happy to pay 30 to 40 pounds a month for adverts. ???

Same Problem down here

The Radio stations in NZ , are painful to listen to, and the commercial stations have a lot of ads that see to be aimed at 3 year olds.

I haven't listened to any Radio for about a year.

It may seem strange to you but the television available from Sky is superior to the local ones.

News on the Government run TVNZ , is at the same level as the private one TV3-suitable for teenagers or below.

Plenty of variety on Sky and the BBC news seems to actually be aimed at adults.

What Sky gives us , has a lot less than 50%, and much less than the local lot which does seem to

be about 50%.

Risk assessment sees US ties cut

I think that the Beeb would be better off relying on the stable import business that CH4 and Five have implimented and solely rely on US imports. Let's be honest here, the UK has failed to create a high quality export... ever? I can't think of one, and Dr Who most certainly does not count, you cannot equate it to the high calibre being outputted by HBO for example.

This culling is understandable, the cost of BBC as a whole is immense and the realisation that nobody actually uses the local news sites, its many portals and subs, means that web content must go to favour the iPlayer services.

It's not about the lack of an advertising platform that allows the beeb to suffer, it's that it is far to big an organisation to take risk on new talent, big budgets and the export game.