Yesterday, another small piece of radio history was made when RTE closed down it’s final Medium Wave transmitter.

It was first put into service 75 years ago to give national radio coverage to the Eucharistic Conference which was hosted by Ireland in 1933.  Since then, if it didn’t put Athlone on the map, it certainly put it on radio dial with the towns name proudly displayed on many a tuning dial from the 40’s through to the 70’s.  Then in 1975 the 100kw monster was moved to  Tullamore where it broadcast until yesterday.

Despite all this reminiscing, this points to the future somewhat. Why? Well during the 80’s Medium Wave was still the dominant transmission medium. Now 25 years later it no longer exists. Where will FM be in 25 years time ???

Word out this week in the Financial Times that Apple are doing a deal with record companies where customers get free unlimited access to the iTunes library if they buy a premium “all you can eat” iPod or iPhone. The plan, some say, will kill radio.

Are we worried? Not in the slightest. iPod as cool as some might think it is (not us) is missing the immediacy, intimacy and community that radio provides. Radio is still the No.1 music discovery platfom for the vast majority of the population. iPod might deliver music excellently but as anyone in radio will tell you, it’s what is between the music that makes a radio station and on that front Apple couldn’t even begin to compete.

I am very angry today at Sony. My son’s PS3 packed up but not before we’d the sense to run a full backup and keep all our photos, home videos, and the all important game data saves. Took the machine to the store to be fixed and they very kindly replaced it with a brand new one. Here is where I get angry. When we tried to restore our data onto the new machine … no way jose. Why the hell not? They’re my photos. They’re my sons own videos he shot on our video camera. All the music was scanned from CD’s we own ‘cos we’re big on supporting artists and BUY MUSIC. Worst of all, all the game data is gone which means we’re at square one with every single damn game.

Perhaps this inability to restore our data to the new machine is a Digital Rights Management setting to prevent people from copying from one machine to another. However when all is above board, as in our case, it’s really really annoying. I feel as angry now as I did when my PC died a few years back and tried to copy the music I bought from iTunes back onto my new PC .. again no way jose. Eventually when the iPod died so did all my music purchaces. Might explain why I’m now an avid fan of Creative.

So all the above, while technically possible, has been prevented by the manafacturer using DRM to deliberately control how a user uses their product.

This incident with the PS3 and the issue of control made me think back to many negative comments made at the IBI conference on digital radio. Like Apple and the music industry in general before it, it appears to me that existing broadcasters are trying to protect their investments by exerting some control on the market by putting DAB down. To be fair, were I in their position I’d try to do the same. But will it work? I believe if there is something good out there that people want … they’ll find a way of getting it - legal or otherwise. I feel the comparative freedom digital radio gives a listener will make it a winner and no-one can control that.

As for the PS3 - bugger it. Sending it back tomorrow for a Wii.

My apologies for the rant. Feel free to comment as you see fit. Things are a bit more relaxed on this site!

Photo Steve Garry

Lively DAB discussion at the IBI conference last Tuesday during the final session on the Future of Broadcasting.

Dan Healy of iRadio boldly stated DAB was a failure in the UK. Lucy Gaffney, Communicorp Chair, was upset to think DAB broadcasters might not have the same obligations her stations had to endure. Pat Donnelly from Channel 6 warned DAB would be swamped by UK stations.

On the other hand David Tighe, IBI Chair and Chief Exec Live 95FM, said the bigger threat to independent radio was now new media and not RTÉ. He said radio needs to offer relevant content iPods and the web cannot match. The Minister, Eamon Ryan, in his opening speech also made a great deal of new digital media and how, with roles converging, broadcasters needed to at the forefront of new technologies. Celine Craig, Deputy Chief Exec of the BCI, said they as regulators would be working on new digital radio platforms from Q4 this year.

As a pro-DAB company we obviously welcome and agree with the latter comments. On the opening salvo of negativity a few questions;

Dan Healy completely dumped all over DAB asking “what are we trying to fix here?”. How about fixing FM’s inability to present radio in a creative mulit-media manner which DAB is capable of? No doubt when digital 087 phones arrived with new “text messaging” Dan was first to say what are we trying to fix here!

Lucy Gaffney, who’s passion and conviction I admired, felt it was unfair advantage for digital broadcasters to have different regulations from existing services. How would Lucy answer digital broadcasters who’d argue that FM stations market presence, track record and relatively broad remit will always deliver larger audience. Is that unfair advantage?

Pat Donnelly from Channel 6 predicted Irish DAB would be swamped by UK stations. Think he’s mad ? Check out NTL/Chorus radio offerings .. a significant amount right there today are UK stations. Do you think he might actually have a point?

Whatever the claims from both sides of the debate, one thing is for sure, it was lively and passionate which means we must be on to something here!

A project we’ve been hoping to do for years has just launched today. It’s called Raidio X .. and yes the Raidio is spelt correctly.

The format is simple, bangin’ Top 40 hits presented in the Irish language. Up to now the only Irish language radio station available was Raidio na Gaelteacht, a high-speech content primarily Gaeltacht focused station for adults.

So we’re working with Conradh na Gaeilge to establish a modern Irish language station aimed at 15 - 34 year olds and so far the reaction has been amazing. The energy of the guys from CnaG is infectious and they’ve really enjoying setting up the station.

The big launch was today at Trinity College Dublin where we had 100 people line up in the shape of an X for the publicity photo above. All in all, Raidio X will be great craic and can only lead to bigger things.