If SCA turn off Ten in regional areas I hope to be honest the government do not relax the existing laws. What advantages do you have watching Ten in say Orange NSW vs watching it from Ten Play? Maybe some waste of time noodle updates and local ads that’s about it. Not worth it for most viewers. SCA brought this upon themselves by not providing a difference in service from the metro stations. Sure Ten may lose some revenue losing Canberra, Wollongong and Newcastle but i doubt it would be that significant. They would gain quite a lot by people moving to watching on Ten Play. Regional areas with NBN and Starlink have pretty decent internet nowadays.
Local ads
Local news
No risk of buffering or drop outs.
so you would be fine with local companies in a regional market losing a way to advertise?
To be fair, one could argue the same thing about say Sydney, if there’s a localised feed on 10 Play for Sydneysiders, why should they bother with the terrestrial broadcast?
10 Play is not a bad platform, but it far from a perfect substitute for terrestrial TV.
Regardless of location, terrestrial FTA has the benefit of being far more reliable and resilient than any internet based technology, especially one such as the NBN which is not exactly renowned for it’s reliability. You also don’t need to log in to anything to watch terrestrial FTA, just turn on and go. 10 Play on the other hand, along with the other FTA apps, really does themselves a disservice with the need to log in to start watching. People watch TV, and FTA TV in particular, often for convenience, the more hurdles you put in place the less viewers you get.
Starlink is good but very expensive, I would not be using it as a justification for withdrawing services at this point in time just yet- a lot of people in remote areas still subsist on NBN Sky Muster Satellite simply because they can’t afford Starlink.
NBN is better than it used to be in regional areas but it is still not exactly reliable in most cases, certainly from my experience and talking with people I know dropouts remain infuriatingly frequent.
Sure but to have a reduced number of voices if for example WIN brought the Ten regional stations I’d prefer they didn’t have that opportunity or if they did there should be enforcement of certain conditions for example for 5 years at least WIN cannot axe any local news services anywhere an existing bulletin exists for one and they need to retain the existing locally based sales staff. Otherwise it might be better that the spectrum be used for something else. The Ten regionals are a waste of spectrum as it is.
I see what you mean. I’d respectfully disagree in that I feel it’s better to have fewer ‘voices’ (such as if as you say WIN were to buy out SCA’s 10 stations) it means keeping 10 Regional alive for a few more years at least, rather than seeing the rules remain as is and revert down to two broadcasters only in regional areas as a result of the market not being able to sustain three competing networks.
But that’s my view and being someone in a regional area I will freely admit to being a tad biased.
If it is an exception for Channel Ten regional sure but if it means more capital city or regional radio consolidation then no I’d prefer Ten just went black in regional areas.
NZ is missing the ABC and community radio to the same extent as Australia. To me having ABC just there with sport is good. The sports coverage is a bit all over the place in NZ (esp after the demise of radio sports). I use to think having more commercial talk options here was also an advantage (only zb) but now 2ue is finished that is not so much of a difference. Not much competition either. Happy for the kiwi folk to set me straight here if I am wrong.
Having said this, yes so many radio music formats on FM and AM is an attractive proposition to me. Community radio does introduce an extra dimension to radio that could be missing to the same extent as Australia.
And Smooth Vintage.

In terms of quality playlists on DAB that is very subjective and I disagree there is any quality there - just 80s and 90s loops mostly.
You obviously don’t listen to DAB, but you love to complain about it!
The good thing with NZ in comparison to DAB the audio is in FM stereo (so better sounding) unless you are in a spot with multipath.
Anyway off topic there is no way I see the Australian market being like NZ. No extra commercial FM music radio stations will exist to the same extent they do in NZ. Just won’t, for better or worse we have DAB and the apps will be the only way extra stations will exist .

The Ten regionals are a waste of spectrum as it is.
doesnt mean that the viewers should be removed of choice - even though it is available on SVOD, some people find it easier to go through their EPG and find what they’re looking for.
Terrestrial still has its benefits over SVOD.
Tenplay never buffers for me. Works great for my few shows on 10 I enjoy. Such as HYBPA and Cheap Seats. Plus the pluto tv stuff
Theres not usually much local advertsing is there
I take offense to that, some of my contracts have good sounding dab, within limits if course
10 is a waste of bandwidth… really… they actually have some good stuff… may not be your cup of tea but dont go calling an entire channel a waste of bandwidth
Actually, DAB sounds better than FM in many cases : ABC Classic, Triple J, Nova, Smooth and of course 2UE, Magic, 4BH, 3MP in stereo, compared to mono on AM.
Really? I think it sounds worse whenever I compare them.
Digital has better depth, bass and stereo for Nova and Smooth. ABC Classic at 120 kbps is pretty close to CD quality level as is ABC Jazz at 88 kbps.
It’s kinda been an ongoing debate online, including the MediaSpy of yesteryear.
I recently asked a friend for his opinion, playing the same FM and DAB+ station/s back and forth, keeping the levels as identical as possible. He described DAB+ as sounding “flat but tinny”, and FM as sounding “more full”, and easily preferred the sound of FM over DAB+ any day.
Personally, I can’t listen for any meaningful length without serious ear fatigue from the metallic-sounding treble. That said, there are some clear advantages with digital audio in general, but overall, DAB+ falls short. These days, however, if someone disagrees, I just accept that’s what their ears opt for.
Anyway, that’s probably more a topic for one of the digital radio threads, although I guess it’s briefly relevant here as part of the discussion of how bandwidth should be allocated.