Posts: 3,614
Threads: 17
Likes Received: 5,844 in 1,903 posts
Likes Given: 2,643
Joined: Jul 2022
The government has announced plans to renew the local TV licences through to 2034. Not sure this really benefits anyone other than Narrative Entertainment, who run the Great TV network and POP channels on the mux.
I'm sure we all agree with media minister John Whittingdale when he says
Quote:Local TV stations from Belfast to Birmingham help to support local journalism, drive the creative economy and foster pride in communities. We want to see this continue, so we’ve set out plans for Ofcom to review all services to ensure they’re well positioned to continue serving local audiences with trusted and distinctive content for years to come
www.gov.uk
Of course for most of the local network operated by That's TV and Local TV the local provision is now barely ten minutes of poorly produced, not that local, news a night - compared to the intial licence agreement which pledged hours of original local content per week, not 80's music and Talk Radio simulcasts. They seem to hold up Notts TV and KMTV as examples of how local communities are served - and of course those two show local TV can be local, but that is far from the norm. The appendix states the Thats TV licences must offer 7 hours of local news a week - don't see how 10 minutes a day is achieving that.
A consultation is now open until the end of August.
www.gov.uk
(This post was last modified: 08-06-2023, 08:22 AM by
Brekkie.)
Posts: 622
Threads: 8
Likes Received: 1,248 in 384 posts
Likes Given: 60
Joined: Jul 2022
Hopefully during the consultation people and other companies will point out to the government that most of the current 'local' TV offerings are taking the p*** when it comes to the 'local' part. I'm not sure how simulcasts in the past of CBS Reality count, and even simulcasts of TalkTV whilst being more news related only appears to have two hour opt-outs for local news/programming.
It's almost as if the government either don't watch these channels and/or don't want to admit one of their flagship projects from 2010 has mostly failed. I think if it is allowed to continue then OFCOM need to enforce a requirement for more local hours content, rather than the current token efforts which allow these channels to retain their prime channel number, which presumably helps draw in views and ad revenue.
Formerly 'Charlie Wells' of TV Forum.
Posts: 932
Threads: 4
Likes Received: 873 in 436 posts
Likes Given: 0
Joined: Aug 2022
I presume these channels contribute to the treasury coffers like most of the "proper" channels do, which (thanks to Maggie) is probably is the main motivation for renewal of these things; though I would question how much they actually contribute in the grand scale of things.
I suspect the "7 hours a week" thing is an average over a longer period, although as Brekkie says how that gets achieved with 10mins a day is anybody's guess.
But at the end of the day, woo another decade of simulcast TalkTV. I'm sure we can't wait for that.
Posts: 178
Threads: 0
Likes Received: 188 in 93 posts
Likes Given: 2
Joined: Jul 2022
(08-06-2023, 08:35 AM)Keith Wrote: Hopefully during the consultation people and other companies will point out to the government that most of the current 'local' TV offerings are taking the p*** when it comes to the 'local' part. I'm not sure how simulcasts in the past of CBS Reality count, and even simulcasts of TalkTV whilst being more news related only appears to have two hour opt-outs for local news/programming.
It's almost as if the government either don't watch these channels and/or don't want to admit one of their flagship projects from 2010 has mostly failed. I think if it is allowed to continue then OFCOM need to enforce a requirement for more local hours content, rather than the current token efforts which allow these channels to retain their prime channel number, which presumably helps draw in views and ad revenue.
I think we only have to look at local radio to show that Ofcom won't insist that these "local" stations live up to the name. Much like how 'local TV' was to give us what ITV used to provide, it's been left to community radio (where there is no profit or commercial aspect) to do so.
And of course the other serious contender - BBC local radio - is being continually gutted too.
![[-]](https://pres.cafe/images//collapse.png)
The following 1 user Likes i.h's post:1 user Likes i.h's post
• DavidV
Posts: 14
Threads: 0
Likes Received: 5 in 4 posts
Likes Given: 0
Joined: Nov 2022
Give them a LCN relative to their viewing figures and I’m sure the licenses would be handed back quicker than you can say simulcast.
Posts: 3,614
Threads: 17
Likes Received: 5,844 in 1,903 posts
Likes Given: 2,643
Joined: Jul 2022
The local stations though generally deliver on their commitments - naemly an hourly local bulletin and usually now a three hour weekday slot, even if that local slot gives the local team very little creative control. In many ways that's the point though - Global don't want the local portions of the schedule to feel in any way inferior to the rest.
Simulcasting Talk TV or whatever wouldn't be a problem if these stations were delivering a relatively strong local core of programming in primetime - but they're simply not. It's quite hard to find the That's TV schedules online but Scotland seems to now have a 15 minute bulletin at 5.30pm and 6.30pm, which I believe is for the whole of Scotland rather than each local area - even though each local licence stipulates a minimum of 7 hours of "first run" local content per week and a minimum of 7 hours of "local news" each week. Glasgow is supposed to have 14 hours of local content each week according to the annex in the consultation document.
That said though the consultation isn't clear on what period those licences refer too - whether it's as they stand, what they propose moving forward or I suspect the licence requirement ignoring any reductions OFCOM have agreed too.
What I think the big for local television is is that whilst even in their reduced, nationally run form, local radio and local newspapers , along with local websites, add something to the local media, that on the whole local TV adds absolutely nothing.
Posts: 3,614
Threads: 17
Likes Received: 5,844 in 1,903 posts
Likes Given: 2,643
Joined: Jul 2022
Just thought it's worth looking at the ones that show local TV can be local. Notts TV viewers have local content throughout the day with just a couple of acquisitions by the looks of it, including Walks around Britain:
nottstv.com
It's the same in Kent too.
www.kentonline.co.uk
London Live relies more on acquisitions and I think their hour of news (at the same time as the BBC/ITV news) is their only regularly produced local content, but probably thanks to being able to acquire London centric content it still looks relatively local, though falls short of the 18.5 hours of local news required per week with just an hour on weekdays at 6pm and an hour on weekends at 6am (which I guess takes content from the weekday editions and probably isn't live).
www.londonlive.co.uk
I think Brighton, Belfast and Sheffield are the only other independent local stations, though IIRC Sheffield was largely a simulcast of a radio station and pretty poor.
Personally I think as a minimum these stations should have to run a two hour block of local content on weeknight evenings which includes 30 minutes of news and ideally 30 minute first run local non-news content too - though probably not every single night. That block can then be repeated once or twice during the evening, and then ideally they'd be a similar block at weekends but that could just be repeat programming rather than news.
The frustrating thing too is even with just a half hour commitment to local non-news content had these stations been run that way over the last few years they'd now have a fairly decent of archive local content to flesh out the schedule with.
Posts: 1,067
Threads: 2
Likes Received: 1,252 in 492 posts
Likes Given: 206
Joined: Jul 2022
I think largely the channels that were set up by community organisations or local consortiums seem to have been the ones that still feel like full local services, albeit of varying quality.
The trouble with the initial licensing was it was almost done like a trial with licences awarded to groups with totally different business models and ambitions to each other, but there was no process at the end to evaluate which ones work and managed to better serve the local audiences.
All that said, with the licences extended I wouldn’t be surprised to see That’s TV hover up more licences.
(This post was last modified: 08-06-2023, 02:26 PM by
Jon.)
The following 1 user Likes Jon's post:1 user Likes Jon's post
• Brekkie
Posts: 646
Threads: 0
Likes Received: 1,633 in 443 posts
Likes Given: 5,096
Joined: Oct 2022
What John Whittingdale has said should, and could, be correct of course - and in some isolated examples has been. However, it is misleading to characterise the entire network of local stations as a success.
I think the point of the 10 minutes somehow being counted as an hour a day is that they are allowed to count repeated content - so if they show the 10 minutes of “local” content 6 times a day that’s 1 local hour.
Much like with “UK exclusive hours” on the BBC News channel, it becomes a game of counting up content hours even if the actual output of those hours is not adding value at all.
I am really quite surprised at this renewal, though. I would have assumed that, with the future of DTT in general looking uncertain, and continuous pressure from mobile operators to surrender more spectrum to them, the local TV mux would simply go when the current term expires. After all, as we are all saying, it’s not been a success. An interesting experiment, but not one that has worked out. Even if local stations did want to continue long into the future, there is an argument that the reduced costs of internet broadcasting would make the model much more viable than a broadcast version.
I could see a future scenario where only the three main muxes continue on Freeview, with all the com muxes closing due to lack of viability. A conversion to T2 would leave, effectively, an empty PSB mux which could house the main PSB offshoot channels currently on SDN. Arquiva may just get out of the game entirely if the demand isn’t there for other commercial channels, which I suspect it won’t be. So Freeview Lite, everywhere, is a likely outcome. Add to that the NI mini-mux, which will continue, and the Local TV channels as throw-in extras seem like quite unnecessary and redundant additions.
Posts: 227
Threads: 3
Likes Received: 430 in 153 posts
Likes Given: 909
Joined: Aug 2022
Wow. Just wow.
The whole "local" TV experiment has surely needed putting out of its misery for the majority of the time since its inception. Renewing it for another decade, rather than using the end if the current licence terms as the opportunity to admit defeat, is the last thing that I would've expected.
Utterly bizarre.
The odd video clip posted in threads on this forum (and each if its spiritual predecessors) over the years is as much of the "local" TV output as I've ever seen, and I'm sure that 99.99% of folk outside of us pres geek forum dwellers remain blissfully unaware that these stations even exist.
