LISTENERS’ INTERESTS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 17953, 3 December 1932, Page 8

LISTENERS’ INTERESTS

LOCAL RADIO COVERAGE ADVERTISING NOT FAVORED The fact that the subject of sponsored radio programmes from “I!” Broadcasting' stations has been discussed at some length in Parliament has been brought to a focus local interest in the broadcasting of advertising matter. Ft has been suggested -that if the “PC’ stations were permitted to use advertising as a medium of financing their operation, the listeners would receive superior .service, and that the interests of listeners, operators. and advertisers alike would be well served. This view is run supported by the comments of Gisborne residents interested in the present and future of radio. -So far as the smaller towns of the Dominion are concerned, the lack of a sufficiently extensive field of local talent for broadcasting purposes compels the “B” stations to subsist mainly upon recordings, and those, while offering very satisfactory entertainment value, are not the perfect medium for the purpose of sponsored programmes, in respect of which the sponsors are called on to pay for the time and the talent consumed in carrying out the programmes. It is a fact that some sponsored programmes -have been delivered from local stations, under license from the Radio Board, but there has been no recent development in this connection, and at present .there seems little prospect of advertising matter penetrating extensively into the entertainment field of the radio listener, Five nights of the week are at present devoted to the broadcasts of a station which works in eon junction with the Radio Board, under an arrangement which precludes the use of advertising material, and the other local station has not as yet taken advantage of the recent relaxation of restrictions which formerly applied generally to advertising on the air in New Zealand.

Discussing- the position with regard, to the (broadcasting of programmes in Gisborne, under arrangement with the Radio Board, one citizen deeply interested in -the future of the industry (mentioned Hint the New Zealand board had accepted the recommendations of the Radio Coverage Commission with (regard to isolated areas, and was endeavoring to give, with the help of “lit” class stations, satisfactory on(teTiainment value in the respective districts where YA reception is subject ’to atmospheric interference in a marked degree, The cost of establishing a low-powered station at Gisborne, for J instance, would consume more than a proportionate share of the revenue from • this district’s license fees, and the alternative adapted by the board was to enter into an arrangement with one of the existing “R” stations to supplement the YA service. One of the provisions of this agreement was that the board, in due course, would supply to the chosen station full recorded programmes, from a stock which it is im-

porting from Britain, and the first of these recordings would be heard on the air in this district at an early date. 'Specially prepared for radio work, tae programmes should arouse much interest among listeners, who in due course would be invited to express opinions on the quality of their entertainment.