It's difficult to know where to begin here but this is another nail in the coffin for international broadcasting. As happened at RCI, the gutted service will be of less and less value to listeners who will turn away from it and thus insure the final death knell a few years further on. RA was a valuable voice into underserved media markets in Asia and the Pacific. One only has to travel that region to understand that outside of a few major capitals and parts of China, Japan, and South Korea shortwave remains vitally important.
I would note that there is a tiny bit of light here. The redundancies are almost certainly a violation of Australian labor law, as I understand it, and the courts may thus intervene. Also, the Australian Football League has already been assured it's coverage into Asia and the Pacific via Australia Television will not be affected for the remainder of the AFL season (through September 27) and will, in fact, increase to six games per week. A sad day as the voices on shortwave will be further diminished. -- -Rob de Santos -----Original Message----- From: Internetradio [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of John A. Figliozzi Sent: Tuesday, July 15, 2014 7:26 AM To: <[email protected]>; [email protected]; [email protected]; Shortwave programming discussion; Internet radio discussion Subject: [Internetradio] Radio Australia Here's what I've been able to assemble from various sources that I consider reliable about what can only be described as a truly catastrophic situation for Radio Australia. Keep in mind that RA management is left with few options, none of them good, in its efforts to preserve and maintain anything resembling a viable service for its regional and international audiences. - The English Language Programming department (ELP) is effectively gutted. The only remaining RA productions in English appear to be some hourly news bulletins and the Pacific Beat program. All else, including the excellent Asia Pacific program, ceases. - At least for the time being, RA intends to maintain a 24/7 English language service by pulling all of its content from ABC Radio domestic sources (except for the morsels described above). A revised ELP schedule is in preparation and will be announced and implemented shortly. - Language services in Tok Pisin, Vietnamese, Khmer, Chinese, French and Burmese appear to remain but only in some skeletal form since about 3/4 to 4/5 of those staffs are to be axed. Again, it appears the plan is to pull some content from domestic sources, this time from SBS whose administration is likely to be housed with what's left of RA at Southbank in Melbourne as indicated in a previous press report. - As unbelievable as this may sound, the situation is so dire and so immediate that there will be a culling of half of the journalists on staff via a random process -- no evaluations, experience, records of achievement or years of service considered. - No reduction in shortwave schedules has yet been indicated, but it's hard to see how that continues unaffected and unabated beyond anything but the very short term. Personally, I will reserve comment on all this at this time and let the facts speak for themselves. However, some of you will be aware of my admiration and appreciation for Radio Australia over the decades so you are free to draw your own conclusions in that regard. John Figliozzi The Worldwide Listening Guide wwlgonline.com _______________________________________________ Internetradio mailing list [email protected] http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/internetradio To unsubscribe: Send an E-mail to [email protected]?subject=unsubscribe, or visit the URL shown above.
