Meanwhile, STV (the ITV local station in Scotland) is setting their radio station by 2030, with Ewen Cameron and Cat Harvey (of Greatest Hits Glasgow) fronting a mew breakfast show.
Fun fact - in the 1990s, 2 other local ITV stations in Scotland (Grampian in the North, Border for England/Scotland borders) tried their hands in radio stations, before being bought out by neighbouring stations (Grampian by STV, and Border by Granada after Capital got their radio assets)
I can understand OfCom blocking a new sports channel as Sport is already well looked after in the UK by the BBC and TalkSport but blocking a Radio 2 extension (50s, 60s and 70s) is a real head scratcher.
OfCom is using the bizarre argument, that by not allowing BBC to launch an oldies station, then this will make it more likely that Global and Bauer would?
That logic makes absolutely no sense to me as Absolute already has a 60s and 70s extension as does Heart (70s) and Smooth (70s).
Just because a market has multiple options already doesnât mean that it can accept an additional player, especially one operated by one of the worldâs biggest broadcasters
It is specifically aimed at preventing the BBC from destroying the digital commercial station Boom Radio, and one or two others. Boom launched specifically to cater for that audience, and a non-commercial BBC competitor would likely destroy it. Itâs one thing to have commercial stations competing, but an extension of BBC R2 is quite another.
Back in the 70âs the old national network (2FC, 4QG etc) used to have a state-based shipping forecast shortly after station opening at 6am: âhere is the (insert state) shipping forecast for costal waters and up to eleven nautical miles to sea⌠â Not quite so detailed as the BBC one
This includes the BBCâs national stations - BBC Radio 1, Radio 2, and Radio 3, 6Music, 1Xtra and Asian Network, Radio 4Xtra and 5Live - all the stations in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales and every local radio station in England.
The way theyâve done this makes no sense. Even though Sounds is being shut down, the station directory is just links straight back to Sounds! Also, fhereâs no longer going to be any schedules for those of us outside the old country, or listen again, but thatâs not really important. I suppose the one good thing is that all the expats keep their Light Programme and I donât have to spend 3 hours dealing with a VPN everytime my grandmother wants to listen to Radio nan GĂ idheal.
I created an iCloud account and set it to the UK App Store, this allows you to download BBC Sounds. Once logged back in to my daily account, I still receive updates.
The standalone feeds are great but donât have show or track info unlike the app.
RAJAR ratings were released today. And they are as follows. (I will not account for âbrandâ as a whole, since the DAB stations are grouped in with the traditional stations in those cases.)
Editorial update: I read on Digitalspy thread that BBC R2 have shed 2m listeners in 3 years. So I attempted an apples-to-apples comparison to see how that stacked up with the rest.
Rank
Station (*Network)
Reach (000s)
Chg
1Y chg
3Y chg
1
BBC Radio 2
12,619
-487
-699
-1,911
2
Heart*
9,671
-521
+47
+1,905
3
BBC Radio 4
9,226
-103
+250
-1,070
4
BBC Radio 1
7,483
+90
-639
+8
5
Capital*
7,001
-137
+9
+1,332
6
BBC Local Radio*
6,924
-141
-122
-749
7
Greatest Hits Radio*
6,657
+486
-868
+2,639
8
Smooth*
5,951
+250
-313
+1,234
9
BBC Radio 5
5,514
+135
-147
+390
10
Classic FM
4,428
-110
-25
-540
11
Hits Radio*
4,369
-315
-453
-1,881
12
talkSPORT
3,379
-127
-31
+691
13
LBC
2,645
Unch
+33
+36
14
BBC Radio 6
2,587
+10
-158
-263
15
Magic
2,253
-247
-397
-452
For overall figures in the industry as a whole:
*Unmeasured audio sources such as Internet, community, pirate, hospital and other types of less frequently consumed radio (Also include stations not subscribed to RAJAR)
BBC Radio 1 will have a new lineup of DJs for the Residency program. Reading from top-to-bottom and left-to-right, it includes Major League DJz, Oppidan, DJ Bou, SG Lewis, Taylah Elaine and KETTAMA.
It still broadcasts Friday morning at 8.00-10.00am AEST. The program will be renamed to a more mouthful version once Ofcom approves R1D as a DAB+ station: The Residency on Radio 1 Dance.
Ofcom has approved BBCâs request to reduce news and current affairs quota for Radio Foyle (1,043 hours to 710). It, however, was âdisappointedâ that the BBC breached licence conditions because a 2022 announcement of replacing a 2-hour breakfast program with a shorter show was not accompanied by a request in quota reduction back then. Ofcomâs Annual Report on the BBC will take this into account when it comes up later in the year.
The same quota has also been slashed for BBC Asian Network (1,224 hours to 675), and was explained as a way to introduce more music programming to the schedule.
Ratings for the stations in question was as follows. *Radio Foyle is only an opt-out version of this station and broadcasts weekdays between 8.00am and 4.00pm GMT.
Greatest Hits Radio is causing all sorts of trouble for BBC R2 - who have probably skewed a bit too young too quickly. To a lesser extent also Smooth is chipping away at their audience, and some smaller players like Boom Radio.
Not sure whatâs going on with Magic. I used to be a big fan when I visited UK, but it sounded like a 90s Boy/Girl Band horror show when I was there in May. Spent most of my time on Smooth or GHR or BBC R2 when driving around.
There is somebody who attempts to get as close of a music database of many UK radio stations as possible. Hereâs Magic, and let me know if this is not to your liking. (Donât worry, the cover pictures are AI-generated for some reason. Ignore everything after the songâs title and the hyphen.)
If the playlist is fine, then itâs just one of theseâŚ
Another local stations bites the dust. Nation is calling time on Time 107.5. The station, which has served parts of East London and West Essex since 1998, will be joining the Nation Radio network in less that 3.5 hours time. The news has just been announced on air, and the presenter implied that some local programming will remain. However, exact details havenât been confirmed.
