Have any ARN Regional stations ditched, “Better Music & More Of It” for, “Just Great Songs”?
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Expanded role for ARN Ballarat GM John Fitzgibbon
ARN Ballarat General Manager John Fitzgibbon has taken on an expanded role as Area Lead for both Victoria and New South Wales.
Fitzgibbon has been at the helm of local stations Power FM and 3BA FM as GM for nearly four years and was already Area Lead for Victoria.
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Shambolic.
ARN aren’t serious on proper revenue at their NSW stations.
John is a good GM but he’s not Father Christmas, can’t be present in so many markets often enough to influence a marked difference.
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From Launceston to Townsville for Adam Davison – Star 106.3 breakfast with Adam and Donny starts today
Townsville has a new addition to the breakfast menu with Get Up with Adam & Donny launching on Star 106.3 this morning.
Adam Davison joins Donny (Tom Watkin) from Launceston’s Chilli FM with plenty of experience and passion for creative, community-driven content. He replaces Archie Arenson who has joined the Sunshine Coast’s 92.7 MIX FM.
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Where is Barry Drinkwater these days? Last I heard he was workdays at River94.9 but got shifted elsewhere.
Is he now PD at River94.9 when Drew went to KIIS97.3?
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Just looking at the 2ST website, and it would appear that the station, along with all the other ARN Regional ‘classic hits’ stations, will be airing Jonesy & Amanda at 4-7pm weekdays, airing an hour behind the Gold metro stations. This will mirror the ARN Regional ‘Hot AC’ stations airing Will & Woody an hour behind the KIIS metro stations.
The website also mentions that The Christian O’Connell Show will air at 7pm weeknights on the regional ‘classic hits’ stations. I wonder what will happen to the 20/20 Retro Countdown? 
Other ARN Regional station’s websites have not yet updated the above information from what I can gather.
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The last 20/20 episode for 2025 from my Hot Tomato Gold stream rips was Friday 12th December (‘radio’ songs). Andrew said the next episode would be songs sung by Ste(ph/v)ens, but there’s been no episodes - new or repeats - since.
Best case scenario, it moves to 8pm to make space for Christian O’Connell. Otherwise, that might be it for 20/20. I guess we’ll find out by January 19th - although I notice that retrocountdown.com.au has also disappeared.
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What does this mean for River949 in Brisbane?
Will they take Christian an hour after Gold Brisbane does?
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Locally to me, 5RM (plus 5MU, CC and CS) all started on air advertising for J&A just before NY 2026. Interestingly enough also for 4PM, not 4:30PM which means this will be on delay for SA.
River1467 however have not had any adverts yet but would be safe to assume they will take J&A live.
Both websites still currently show the old programming layout including 20/20 Retro Countdown.
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Funny thing is that many people in my area are already familiar with Jonesy and Amanda via their former Breakfast Show on 101.7 Sydney which obviously can be received across the Southern Highlands. For us Highlanders, we have the choice on listening to it live on 101.7 or on an hours delay on 102.9. A bit like the Gold Brisbane/River 94.9 situation in SEQ.
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ARN can’t network live into their regional stations - hence the 4pm start (Jonesy & Amanda are on from 3pm in Sydney & Melbourne)
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Why couldn’t they network live into their regional stations? Technical limitations?
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That explains the delay for SA - I was not aware this is the case between Gold and regional
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There’s no infrastructure on the metro end to deliver programming over satellite, and no infrastructure on the regional end to receive programming over IP, which I suspect is why the SCA takeover was so appealing.
Any “networked” shows are recorded, carted and sent out (presumably by FTP?) - hence the one-hour delay. This is how Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth received network shows in the past; something that I believe has only recently changed with the rollout of Zetta.
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That’s embarrassing, but I suppose to some extent good that it limits how much they can network so they don’t follow SCA in doing something like networked regional breakfast.
When SRN can out do you on networking it’s something…
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I like to keep in touch with my Regional SA homeland so while scanning around an Adelaide SDR I noticed a few months ago that 5CS, CC etc were playing J&A in overnight hours (not exactly overnight here in Perth haha)
I didn’t think to mention it as I just figured that was the general ARN thing lately that they’re doing over there but with all this Gold and KIIS change I wonder if that was part/start of the transition? I just remember noticing while scanning the SDR as most regional commercial stations in this country are generally automated music overnight (except those SRN ones over “way” east).
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How do you know this?
It came to me in a dream.
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You mean it came to you from someone on the inside 
I can confirm what hes saying is true based on my contract interactions with ARN over the years. Infact alot of their link equipment is quite antiquated compared to SCA/ABC/SRN. There is no capability for direct live audio between regional and metro. You would think in the 3 years they have owned the regionals they would work that out but No!
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