Radio Zero

Peter Tupper has an excellent article up at Tyee on the locked out CBC workers using podcasts and the net to continue to keep the CBC alive.

Labour disputes usually involve workers separated from the means of production. In the information economy, the means of production is the same as the workers, who take their names and their skills with them when they strike or are locked out. Digital technologies like mini-disc recorders, personal computers and the Internet make it possible to create and distribute media to the world for next to nothing.
the tyee

Now you know what’s coming….how come we’re paying 1.5 billion dollars a year for a service which a couple of guys with a digital recorder and an iPod can replicate. And no points for mentioning television. Once Hockey Night in Canada is back up the entire television network could be shrunk down to that essential Canadian bit and, for another $1,000,000 a year I suspect Grapes would be happy to read the news after the game.

No, seriously, why are we spending the money? Is anyone missing the CBC?…Anyone?

Written by jay on August 23rd, 2005 with 9 comments.
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Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Aeolus
#1. August 23rd, 2005, at 2:57 AM.

Thanks for the tip, Jay. Yes, I am missing the CBC. It’s the best source for news, commentary, and documentaries in North America. Three cheers for the employees and their CBC Unplugged podcasts or whatever. Unfortunately, they don’t have the resources to duplicate the real CBC across the board. If there are ways of delivering the real McCoy for less money, fine, let’s do it — but not at the expense of the employees. And isn’t that what management is trying to do — save taxpayer dollars by screwing the employees? (I would think right-wingers would be cheering management on.) As a contract worker in education, I’m not surprised by this.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Matt McIntosh
#2. August 23rd, 2005, at 3:23 AM.

Apparently one guy is.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com jay
#3. August 23rd, 2005, at 4:37 AM.

Aeolus, the interesting thing about the lockout is that the CBC management is at as much risk as the employees. If Canada survives a month without the CBC there will be a serious question as to why we should be spending 1.5 billion a year on it.

The wholeFM radio end can be run with about twenty people, the television end can be sold and the AM side could be put on a subscription/NPR basis. The money saved could be returned to an indifferent public.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Gareth Igloliorte
#4. August 23rd, 2005, at 5:29 AM.

My real problem with the CBC is that it isn’t public. It’s subsidized.

If it was public it wouldn’t need to air commericals and it could air whatever whimiscal, airy fairy stuff it wanted. Instead, it unfairly competes with private enterprise for advertising dollars, which is why they play great Canadian movies like Starwars and Signs over the summer rather than around the clock David Suzuki and Land and Sea (both of which my Father loves) documentaries.

If people really want the CBC, lets make it public, no commercial advertising, no coverage of commerical sport, period. Lets turn Peter Mansbridge into a televised beaurocrat (muahahahahaha).

Otherwise, lets take next years $1.5bn and buyout the employees at $200k each and let them start their own production and broadcasting companies. Hell, thats a model for every other government department.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com dcardno
#5. August 23rd, 2005, at 7:48 AM.

“Hell, thats a model for every other government department.”

I’m not sure I want to be dealing with a vigilante Revenue Canada, especially when the proprietor is trying to make back the premium he paid to buy out the last guy’s franchise…

Dean

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Sean
#6. August 23rd, 2005, at 10:56 AM.

“The wholeFM radio end can be run with about twenty people…”

Less, actually:

http://www.otsdj.com/

I’ve purchased this product and I can tell you that it actually performs much better than the ebuliant advertising on the OTS site claims. One person could easily run five radio stations from one multi-system console.

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com jay
#7. August 23rd, 2005, at 11:54 AM.

This is good news Sean…As CBC 2 is about the only thing I listen to on the CBC it is good to know that a little north of East Armpit you’ll be warming up the tubes ready to step into the void.

But seriously, how hard is it to be Jergen Gothe? I mean he goes away for weeks at a time and they simply play tapes of “The Best of” and no one is the wiser. (Much like regular season hockey…but that is another entry.)

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Laurence
#8. August 24th, 2005, at 12:47 AM.

These are fine proposals, ona and all, but they miss out a small but vital piece of research.
What does CBC spend all that lovely money on.
Programming? mostly, no.
Staff, mostly, no.
Answer: transmission costs. The CBC’s mandate means that Every Canadian, everywhere in Canada, has to have reasonable access to the public broadcaster.
That’s a deal that NO private broadcaster wants to touch. So you can all contrast and compare as much as you like from your urban settings with lots of choice…but the folks in Cambridge Bay?? Well, maybe they don’t count anyway…..

Get your own gravatar by visiting gravatar.com Gareth Igloliorte
#9. August 24th, 2005, at 5:54 AM.

I think the CBC’s mandate is, at best, outdated. What is so absolutely nescessary about access to public broadcasting that the government should spend $1.5bn on it?

The CBC does not provide a public good. It provides television: news and documentaries and lately alot of American movies. Why should people who live in the city subsidize the cost of television for those who live in the country or around the bay?

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