All posts by Briantist
Below are all of Briantist's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.
In a video Reports on changes to regional news (ITV Yorkshire and ITV Central South) - 2006 - YouTube they say that Thames Valley is *PART* of the Central South region (3:20).
There's some static weather maps on Thames Valley Tonight: 2006-2007 | TV Live which also Oxfordshire, but not the Ridge Hill area.
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Michael: Thanks - yes I know and I mentioned it above. The service has it's own page at Ridge Hill (ITV West) (County of Herefordshire, England) Freeview Light transmitter | ukfree.tv - 10 years of independent, free digital TV advice .
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Paul: Thanks. It seems that the text has been removed from the actual pages, but I think I have enough evidence for the configuration now.
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Just to note that Ofcom | Radio Broadcast Update May 2013 says
"Removal of Ridings FM: A simulcast of Ridings FM (Ofcom Licence number AL242), a service broadcasting popular music from the last 35 years through to the present day. The news and information is relevant to its localised audience in the Wakefield area."
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Stevie Parslow: That's SG:U, it just ends after 40 episodes, "Gauntlet" is the last one.
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Bert: As you mention you have an amplifier - can you see Freeview signals: too much of a good thing is bad for you | Digital switchover | ukfree.tv - 10 years of independent, free digital TV advice please?
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Bless the newspapers and their "experts"... Millions of households could lose television signal as 4G network is switched on | Mail Online
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John: R+T says the mast was off air for 20 minutes yesterday for a scheduled upgrade.
The power increased from 3.8W to 15W and BBCA moved from C62- to C50 which means YOU HAVE TO RETUNE.
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Michael: Perhaps I should market a Freeview box that only shows the first five channels?
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Monday 3 June 2013 10:49PM
Briantist: To quote from the above blog link (from archive.org)
Basically the old Thames Valley Tonight, Meridian Tonight South East, and Meridian Tonight South are all being amalgamated into one programme Meridian Tonight.
The West and East of the new region will each get their own version of Meridian Tonight for the first 15-18 minutes of the six oclock programme, after that the services will merge to cover stories that are relevant to the whole of the region what the jargon calls a pan-regional service.
The West and East part of the region will also get their own dedicated late bulletin usually at 10.30pm. All the other bulletins GMTV, lunch and weekend will be pan-regional.
Inevitably this has meant some reduction in staff, and most visibly it will mean there are only two presenters for two regions, rather than six for three regions.
The new presenting team are Fred Dinenage and Sangeeta Bhabra, and you can see profiles of them on our front page, as well as those of our new family of correspondents on our website - Latest News - ITV News
The other presenters Debbie Thrower, Ian Axton, Wesley Smith and Mary Green have left. And you can read what the official press releases said about them here.
The changes have all been made against a background of massive upheaval in British broadcasting. In a nutshell ITV had an obligation to make regional news as part of the original conditions of its broadcasting licence. But those conditions have been relaxed as a result of the huge number of digital stations now competing for advertising revenue, and the credit squeeze.
This is all part of a big national debate about PSB public service broadcasting, and who should pay for it. The problem is that PSB is EXPENSIVE, and cannot be maintained on a purely commercial basis.
The BBC is obviously paid for by the licence fee, but other PSB providers, Channel 4, Channel 5 and the largest provider, ITV, are asking for either separate funding, or to be released from their obligations. The government is promising to come up with a solution soon. In the meantime economic realities have forced changes across the whole PSB landscape.
Having said all that I do know the team here at Meridian are very good at what they do, and will identify stories of interest to our whole audience, and we still have enough reporter/correspondents to get across the whole patch. We have had to come to grips with new working practices to do this, and reporters now operate cameras and edit their own material. New technology also means we are able to to edit on location or go live and beam reports back to base from anywhere across the patch, using the internet, or any of our three satellite trucks.
Also we will be developing our online services and will hopefully fill any gap viewers may feel has not been filled by the new service.
So as one blogger put it give them a chance we are confident we are still best placed to inform and entertain the viewers of the South and the South East.
Blogged by Jonathan Marland
ITV Meridian Online Editor