As the founder of the only national commercial radio station that’s remotely like 6Music – and someone who recently complained to the BBC Trust about the commercial impact of ‘BBC Introducing’ – I’m dancing on its grave, right?
Wrong. 6Music embodies what the BBC should be doing. It’s fresh, original, rightly popular, and sits happily alongside our more focused and entirely different offering in Amazing Radio. It brings more listeners to digital radio, where it and we are about the only interesting things going. It may have fourteen times our annual budget, but we’re not jealous. We’re lean and mean and growing rapidly, building a global private sector business that indirectly benefits from the BBC’s heritage (it trained most of our people, after all) but contributes to GDP too.
The BBC may be bloated, but 6Music is the wrong place to wield the axe.
As someone who listens to both Amazing Radio and 6 Music I couldn’t agree more.
6Music may be popular, and I agree it plays the best output of all BBC stations, but, if the BBC has to wield the axe over its radio coverage, then something has to give. They aren’t going to axe Radios 1-5 and their local radio stations (apparently) are there to serve a community and are pretty much set in stone, even though a few mergers wouldn’t go amiss (just how many local BBC stations does Yorkshire need?) Unfortunatley, that leaves 6Music, 1 Xtra and the Asian Network; can you imagine the cries of unfairness if it were to axe 1 Xtra and the Asian Network and left 6Music untouched? This may not be the full answer but the BBC’s political correctness agenda couldn’t possibly allow these 2 stations to be axed and leave 6Music alone.
Hi Phil, Many thanks for the comment. I don’t think the BBC has to lose a radio station, and I don’t think it’s about the cost. 6Music reportedly costs £7m p.a. to run. The BBC’s annual income is £4bn. 6Music is not even a drop in the ocean. (As one newspaper put it this week, the cost saving would barely pay Alan Yentob’s taxi bill).
I suspect this is actually a political ploy, deliberately designed to provoke outrage (that’s working), to show how much people love what the BBC does. Then the Trust will reverse the decision because of the public outcry. The BBC appears responsive to the public and the politicians get a reminder of how much public support there is for it. Clever, huh?
I was going to write ‘I couldn’t agree more’. There – I have.
I’m not so sure about the “publicity stunt” conspiracy theory angle. Otherwise why was such a blatant blackout imposed by the BBC on reporting the two protest rallies (both of which I attended) right outside Portland place?
By the way, will Amazing Ambient be available on DAB?