Ofcom refuses to fix radio switchover date

19th July 2007

The title of this article was copied from the headline used for an article in the Mediaguardian reporting on what the chief executive of Ofcom had said in a speech at the Radio Festival, and the reason I copied the headline was to compare it with the headlines (and the content of the articles) used in The Times, the Telegraph and the Daily Mail, that were reporting exactly the same story, and yet they used the following headlines:

150m radios face being switched off for good - The Times

150m old-fashioned radios bound for the scrapheap in 5 years - Daily Mail

Drive hastened to switch off analogue radio - Daily Telegraph

I've copied the whole section of Ed Richards' speech concerned with switching off FM at the bottom of this article, but I'll just quote one small section here to show how completely at odds the articles in the Time, Telegraph and Mail are to what he actually said:

"With the last FM licence now awarded, and DAB licensing set fair, there are some here today that would like to see a specific timescale set for the end of analogue radio now, similar to that in television.

Let me be clear. We do not believe that Government announcing a swift forced march to analogue switch-off in radio today would be in the interests of listeners or industry."

Problems with switching off FM

There are 100 - 150m FM radios in use, but only 5m DAB receivers have been sold so far.
By the time FM can be switched off, the UK will have switched to using DAB+, so the 5m DAB receivers sold so far will be obsolete by then.
The BBC's Controller in charge of digital radio said recently that increasing coverage of its national DAB multiplex to the last ten percent of the population was "prohibitively expensive" and that "hybrid solutions" would be required. This means using DRM and/or DRM+, but there are virtually no receivers available that support DRM and the DRM+ standard hasn't been released yet.
No mass-produced cars contain DAB car stereos, let alone DAB+ car stereos.
If FM is switched off when there are millions of cars that don't contain DAB+ car stereos, radio faces losing millions of in-car listeners -- DAB+ car adaptors could be produced, but having something like this on the dash-board would be an invitation to thieves to break in, which would lead to millions of people simply not bothering to buy a DAB+ car adaptor and just abandoning radio in favour of listening to CD/MP3 on their car stereo instead.
I've been told by someone that has a relation in the car industry that DAB is "years away" from being installed as standard in mass-produced cars because the cost of the FM receiver section of a car stereo is tiny in comparison to the cost of including DAB.

Notice that I didn't mention the issue of sound quality, which is because by the time FM can be switched off we'll have switched to DAB+ and the sound quality will have improved a lot compared to what it's like now, and also there will be broadband Internet radio streams for all of the bigger UK radio stations providing higher quality than on DAB+ -- in fact, we should see the vast majority of bigger UK radio stations providing broadband Internet streams providing higher quality than we're likely to see on DAB+ within the next year or two. Indeed, virtually all of GCap's stations are being streamed at 128 kbps WMA already, and the BBC stations will be streamed using 128 kbps AAC by the end of the year.

When will FM be switched off?

It's going to take a long, long time to sort out the above problems, and I'd estimate that the absolute earliest we can expect FM to be switched off by is 2017, and it'll more likely be around 2020.

Section of Ofcom CEO's speech about FM switch-off

The following text is the full section of Ofcom CEO, Ed Richards' speech about FM switch-off:

c) A digital migration in radio

We also recognise that radio today has reached some sort of a threshold.

With the last FM licence now awarded, and DAB licensing set fair, there are some here today that would like to see a specific timescale set for the end of analogue radio now, similar to that in television.

Let me be clear. We do not believe that Government announcing a swift forced march to analogue switch-off in radio today would be in the interests of listeners or industry.

We must recognise the clear differences between radio and television.

In particular that:

* DTT television could not achieve universal coverage without analogue switch off.
* That there are between 100 and 150 million existing analogue radios, but no similarly affordable equivalent of the set-top box which provides a means of converting TVs for consumers.
* And the spectrum released by television switchover is far more valuable in how it can be redeployed for new and innovative services than its radio equivalent.

Against this background, should we even contemplate a transition from analogue to digital in radio?

Well in fact, I believe there are good reasons why we should consider how to move things forward.

Firstly, the cost of dual transmission to the industry is a very real burden.

That is money that could be spent on content to attract and retain listeners.

Secondly, the lack of a shared understanding about the future, which is reducing the incentive of individual groups or stations to make the transition to digital services knowing that others are not necessarily committed to doing the same.

Thirdly, because freeing up analogue spectrum, while not as valuable as TV, would give the opportunity for new services to be developed, including potentially new radio services.

In principle, we are therefore sympathetic to the idea of a joint working group between Ofcom and industry tasked with identifying the key issues that are raised by a transition from analogue to digital in radio.

Such a group would need to be clear about the issues raised and the implications for listeners, industry and manufacturers,

It would need to:

* provide robust analysis and research to support proposals for a digital migration;
* consider whether there is a sensible way forward that could evolve to meet all interests and concerns; and
* try to reach a consensus between all these parties that could form the basis of an assessment to Government in whose hands any final decision clearly rests.

That will not be an easy task, but it is one worth embarking upon.

Cleary, a necessary pre-condition to any road map will be the alignment of the end dates for existing analogue licences.

Without such an alignment we cannot sensibly begin to ask, let alone answer, the questions about what a sensible transition might look like. Without such an alignment we will be condemned to a hotch potch of analogue and digital for decades to come.

We suggested an AM review in 2009 and an FM review in 2012, but that may be too long to wait. We welcome your views.

Comments

FM switch off

By miken

21st July 2009, 17:45

Why on earth do we need DAB? We listen almost exclusively to BBC Radio 4 as do millions of people.I have never noticed any of the hiss or crackle the DAB fanatics keep talking about. Provided I can hear understandable speech I am happy. We have around a dozen portable or mains FM receivers dotted around the house and garage plus a few pound shop autoscan sets plus of course the car radio. All of these I understand will become scrap after the turn off.
Doesnt sound very green to me when I have to replace a few of them with new digital sets. It sounds like back to the 1960's when most householdshad one radio set and few people had one in their car.

The only winners will be the likes of Currys/Dixons/Halfords!

miken

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