La Matinal, Radio Netherlands, Signs Off

A milestone in international broadcasting, as Radio Netherlands morning show for Latin America signs off for the last time. Jose Zepeda, who was one of the founders of the programme, explains the role it played, especially when satellite partnerships became possible after 1995. Have enormous respect for Jose, who must have travelled the Atlantic thousands of times in the last two decades. Delighted that his efforts, and those of the teams have been recognized in several Latin American cities. Really enjoyed working with him. For some reason the interview won't embed on other sites.Will always remember Jose with a mobile phone in his hand. Quite often he'd be talking to you and then suddenly be part of a news broadcast on a station in Mexico, Argentina or his native Chile.

Happy Birthday Pete Myers - 73 today

Today, my late friend and colleague Pete Myers would have been 73 years old. Sadly he passed away on December 15th 1998, much too young to enjoy retirement. I've been sorting through a series of sound archives and I constantly keep bumping into his voice, and the rich contributions he made to programmes I produced.

He was the host of great shows on the BBC African Service, being recruited in 1976 to revamp Radio Netherlands African service with a show called Afroscene. When I first came to Radio Netherlands Worldwide in 1980, he showed me the ropes, always advising his students to adapt what he was doing - never to copy. He later went on to start Mainstream Asia and Asiascan, as well as produce countless documentaries both on fact and fiction.

There's an old unwritten rule in international broadcasting called the "rule of sixes". After 6 weeks off the air, the audience will start to forget you. After six years they may even deny you were ever on the air.

I'm concerned that if you Google Pete's name today, you now only come up with an obituary in the UK Guardian, which reflects his early days at the Beeb, but very little of the Pete I was proud to know for 18 years at Radio Netherlands Worldwide. I note they got his birthdate and date of death wrong in the Guardian. In case of his birthday, that may have been Pete's fault. I remember his scrapbook of newspaper cuttings from his early days in broadcasting where he would make up all kinds of stuff to add to the hype around himself - born in Venezuela according to one article.

I've uploaded the show we made as a tribute to Pete - it was more of a celebration of his genius, rather in the style of BBC Radio 4's Great Lives. It's a 47 minute tribute to a great man. I put the programme back on line as an MP3. You can find it here or in iTunes as a Media Network podcast.

Media Network Ends its 30 Year Run

Andy Sennitt - Retiring Editor Media Network

Media Network web editor Andy Sennitt announced late this afternoon that their international media news blog is closing down as of Saturday March 24^th  2012. Andy is retiring. Radio Nederland Wereldomroep (Radio Netherlands Worldwide) is heading off in a very different direction in the future. So it makes sense to bow out knowing that a job has been well done. Several thousand people a week have relied on Andy’s sharp eye in spotting international media developments and their implications for those who work in the business of international story-telling. I understand the plan is to keep it online as a reference, since it’s a searchable record of media stories over the last decade that has more than academic value. That’s good news.

I hope you’ll join me in thanking Andy for great time and effort he put into editing the on-line version of Media Network. There are over 15,000 stories on the blog going back to October 2003 and he’s continued the tradition of international media reporting in fine style. That can only come from someone who is fascinated by the medium – it’s not a job – it’s a passion. As you can hear in the Media Network vintage radio archive, Andy was a regular contributor from the very start of the programme in 1981. I particularly remember that show we did about the offshore radio days. Andy has spent his career following the media, especially radio. He worked for BBC Monitoring in Caversham Park, UK as well as becoming Editor of the World Radio TV Handbook in Denmark. He moved the HQ of the WRTH to Amsterdam and Diana Janssen recruited him to work on a web-version of the radio programme.  


Andy isn't on Facebook (and only by accident on Twitter). So if you want to contact him with wishes and memories of his time at the wheel, the address is medianetwork@rnw.nl  

It’s not going to be possible to replace the Media Network news blog. But I will increase the frequency and focus of this Critical Distance blog to include more international media stories. I have been playing around with the Storyful platform, which allows you to mix video and audio clips to add to the traditional text and photos. So if you’re interested to follow what we get up to, visit this blog, subscribe and contribute to the next stage of the journey. We’re also on Facebook and Google+.  I hope we can persuade Andy to drop by from time to time. But for now, Andy we salute you. Big time!