Enjoyed listened to a Monday lunchtime programme on RTE, a programme which was the last show to be broadcast on mediumwave in Ireland....RTE has closed down the network. Since the FM network has been there since the mid-sixties, I think that's long enough for a switch-over. Now its switch-off.
RTE's broadcasts began life on the MW service as 2RN, later known as
Radio Athlone and Raidió Éireann, and in more recent times as RTÉ
Radio 1. RTÉ introduced the superior sound of the FM service in 1966
to counteract interference and poor reception on the mediumwave band. Now, RTE has pulled the plug on mediumwave (though longwave 252 kHz is still there, partly because of the spillover into Northern Ireland and the UK Mainland.
For Medium Wave Goodbye, presenter and producer Brendan Balfe assembled a superb programme highlighting some of his favourite moments on Irish radio. Brendan promises an entertaining and fascinating 90 minutes of memories of a service which has brought the world into homes all over Ireland since 1926, capturing moments of
history and life through decades of news, sport, features and entertainment. The programme includes archive audio of request programmes, pop and trad music, features, documentaries and commentaries - as well as references to shortlived Shortwave Service from Athlone.
More here at the special RTE page. The audio show is available on line until March 31st 2008.
wInterestingly enough although RTE is experimenting with DRM (as in Digital Radio Mondiale) on LW to find out whether it could suit to reach Irish living in mainland UK and Europe, they obviously did not want to go ahead and promote Digital Radio on MW or LW. It seems as if they are still waiting (like everybody else in the game) for a broad market for digital radio on AM and is fully ignorant to the fact that for a switch over to digital you better go for "sticky" audiences in the niches than wait for the illusive broad audiences... It would mean to get together with the industry and start developing markets where receivers could be sold, etc. but, ey, you have to start somewhere, and "overseas" Irish interested in getting good radio from home is a lot better than many other things I have heard in the last couple of years...
ReplyDeleteUsing DRM is a rather expensive way for RTE to reach Irish abroad, especially those outside Northern Europe. There are great web feeds, plus plans for RTE to be back on Astra after they pulled Tara TV. I don't think the Irish abroad will buy a DRM radio just to listen to RTE, for the same price they can buy a satellite dish.
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