A very late reply too…
The government has had 6 years of trying to shut down community TV to come up with a use for that spectrum. Crickets…
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A final 12-month extension
The year is 2035, the Australian Government marks the 20th anniversary of the now annual CTV Licence Extension by granting another 12-month licence extension. Nobody knows why this tradition started or why it keeps going, but if it ain’t broke…
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Nice to see you got a reply. Mine must have got lost in the mail
I love how they say that they “continue to examine the potential options for using the vacated broadcast spectrum”.
How long do they need? This goes back to 2014. Actually it goes back to the 1990s where they found… that the spectrum should be used by community TV.
And, just putting it out there, why is community TV which the government doesn’t fund, not a potential option?
And given that none of the other channels that have gone off-air have sustained any form of existence, does that mean perhaps that the Government’s touted policy is flawed?
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There doesnt seem to be a plan beyond freeing up the spectrum - given the time that is taken to do this in other areas, committing to a future use is somewhat futile, the process takes too long to be completed.
One reason (and not one I necessarily agree with) is that the use of spectrum for the digital broadcasting of a single service isnt a particularly efficient use. I wouldn’t expect the commercial sector being amenable to an expansion of services and as we know, commercial interests trump decisions based on good planning
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Actually the Australian Government DOES fund C31, through its saturation advertising on the channel, every ad break has at least one ad for the Australian Government!
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Different budgets. Not the same as ‘funding’
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I wonder how the community stations in Adelaide and Melbourne are going in terms of moving to an online-only model? Here we are in the middle of April and no word on if they have any apps so you can watch community television after the June 30 shutdown. C31 has done almost nothing so far, their website is still looking like a retro 90s relic, and the live streaming picture quality is terrible. C31 and 44 were given undertakings to Paul Fletcher that they are going to vacate the frequency on June 30, 2021 (see letter earlier in this thread). They better get a move on!
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That’s because they won’t. There’s no sustainable online model for them.
He have been hinging on last minute extensions for the last 7 years.
I really hope they manage to survive beyond, but I think everyone internal there and the government know, it’s bound to end when the TV licence is pulled finally.
So could this be it for Community TV?
… not completely … Foxtel has the Aurora community channel and it is streamed …
Next to one watches Aurora. It has so few viewers that Foxtel obviously can’t be bothered including it in the ratings. It would just be another 0.0 channel.
There is plenty of community made video on YouTube. That is where the two community channels should be focusing their efforts, I think. Some content is already on YouTube, but it all should be there.
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60% of Aurora’s programming is infomercials.
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… yep, bit sad really … but then the whole business model of community television is that you have to pay them to put your program on so it tends to lend itself to that …
that’s right, if you are a content creator and you want your programme on Aurora you will have to pay for it!
not just Aurora … all of the community stations operate that way …
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Unless you’re a member partner of which a lot of programming gets on for free that way
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Aurora only wants Australian made content too so no streams of DW or random shows from USA Public Access TV when there’s no other programming to fill like Channel 31 Brisbane used to do.
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