The Radio Mic petition

[dbuckley]

165 pages to wade through.

If it's too much, then just read sections starting at 4.43, 6.82, 9.5 and A5.22. It's a well written and considered document, which does accurately reflect the concerns of the entertainment wireless users.

 

My take is summed up by these two selective quotes:

...modelling of the value to producers and consumers of PMSE use of the spectrum ... the approach taken to the licensing of this use in the past (which has not resulted in a market price for this service) and because PMSE is often an intermediate product rather than a final good sold to consumers.

 

...and the prices paid by users do not reflect the opportunity cost of using the spectrum, but at most recover administrative costs.

What I think Ofcom are looking for is an organization who will purchase the spectrum at market value and then rent it to entertainment wireless users. This won't be JFMG, I wouldn't think, but someone who operates wireless big time (say BT, Voda, IBA etc), and will fit entertainment wireless use in between other services they run. I suspect this will result in "market rates" being charged for wireless use. What does that mean? Probably several percent of your door take.

[twiggy]

Thanks for the reply, so baisically were waiting for a bit more infomation, but how does this make sense to the goverment? How many schools are going to have to just chuck the cheap or slightly less cheap gear thats fixed to one channel?

[Bobbsy]

Well, rather than waiting for more information, actually NOW is the time to write to both OFCOM and your MP asking that the needs of the entertainment industry be considered in their planning.

 

One of the problems is that I don't think they realise just how many small users there are. For every Andrew Lloyd Weber production that can pay big money for spectrum, there are hundreds of schools, churches and amateur groups who could be hit hard. Simply deregulating and allocating Channel 69 isn't enough since many amateur productions already use more frequencies than can be squeezed into a single channel.

 

It's hard to know what "market rate" will be for frequency spectrum, but it must be worrying that bids for 3G mobile services ran into literally BILLIONS of pounds.

 

Since the use of the UHF spectrum is something we currently have, taking it away and charging vastly more money is, in reality, yet another example of a stealth tax. Unfortunately, besides big business it will also hit small users with little or no ability to pay.

 

Bob

[Just Some Bloke]

An interesting feature in the latest L&SI magazine shows how The Sound of Music in London's West End uses 10 channels of the spectrum (32, 36, 51, 55, 63, 64, 66, 67, 68 69), Children In Need used 16 and Live 8 used 26. If the proposals go ahead as currently planned and no-one buys frequencies that they then make available at a sensible price, all of these would have only 1 channel (69) to use. Channel 69 provides frequencies 854-862MHz, allowing no more than 14 radio mics/IEMs to be used. As you can see, it's not just Live 8 that would suffer but any musical requiring more than 14 in the cast.

 

I've signed the petition.

[paulears]

It does strike me that these petitions are going to become pointless once the populace see how easy they are to do - very high profile ones like the car issue get national coverage, but this will condemn many like the one being talked about here to obscurity as the number of signatures will be iniscule compared to the save the frogs, ban the bypass, hug a tree type things that will get far more entries due to intenet spam!

 

This issue is important, but somebody just posted today a message about it on ABTT - not even knowing people are already working against it! It will never make big news, TV have done it on a slow news day, so won't be keen to pick it up. We're doomed..., doomed!

[boswell]

Just been to the Ofcom site and trawled throught the responses (23!)so far to the DDR, Most are about HDTV and PMSE/Radio Mics are hardly mentioned.

Unless we get writing, we will get walked over and end up all squashed into unlicensed Ch69 along with all sorts of commercial uses, keyfobs, baby alarms etc. 23 responses is just a signal to OFCOM that we don't care and they can do what they like.

 

Anyone fancy doing a standard letter that we can all send individually to our MPs, OFCOM, Ministers, PM etc ??

 

Mind you, it might get the 'Talent' to project instead of letting the mic do all the work :D

[jim b]

If you want to influence your MP write your own letter stating the case as MPs will spend much less time over an obviously 'cut and pasted' document. An easy way to do it is to use theyworkforyou.com, the email that appears at the MP is electronically signed and therefore they must at least respond to your query (in the same way as they must respond to a physical letter). There is an Early Day Motion (Number 531) which you can look at via the parliament.uk website which is to do with this issue. You can see who has signed up etc on that site, if your MP hasn't signed up then write to them to ask that they consider doing it.

 

The petition may turn out to be pointless but it takes seconds to do so, as well as doing everything else, you may as well do that too. If you mention it to any passing actors/actresses/directors/promoters/musicians then it may gather a more appreciable number of signatures.

 

I'll also be giving the consultation document a good read when I can fit it in.

[Ynot]

I agree wholeheartedly - the best way is always the personal approach - someone said in the other petition thread I think that a personal letter is worth a hundred sigs on a petition.

 

And your own MP is definitely the way to go.

 

But as Jim also says - this petition takes seconds and whilst it MAY not achieve anything, it is better than NOT doing anything - the only sure way to allow this c*ck-up to go forward is by apathy.

 

TD

[timtheenchanteruk]

the other question I'm wondering is, will mics not work, due to the interference of whatever is being "legally" broadcast, or would it just be a nice way of making even more from the change over by fining the unsuspecting users, of which at the price of some cheap mics, would be many. As I am sure that there will be a great deal of radio-mic users that are completely unaware of his happening.

[Hugh]

It does strike me that these petitions are going to become pointless once the populace see how easy they are to do - very high profile ones like the car issue get national coverage, but this will condemn many like the one being talked about here to obscurity as the number of signatures will be iniscule compared to the save the frogs, ban the bypass, hug a tree type things that will get far more entries due to intenet spam!

 

This issue is important, but somebody just posted today a message about it on ABTT - not even knowing people are already working against it! It will never make big news, TV have done it on a slow news day, so won't be keen to pick it up. We're doomed..., doomed!

 

You forget that every singly radio station and TV station will be severely affected by this. I am currently watching "Buzcocks", they are using at least 7 radio systems, and possibly more if the talkback is radio.

 

Rather than dissing others efforts. Try writing to your MP, threaten to vote against them if the do not stop this. It is suprising how politicians will act if they might lose ther comfortable seat. read the facts here- www.beirg.org.uk

[Bobbsy]

the other question I'm wondering is, will mics not work, due to the interference of whatever is being "legally" broadcast, or would it just be a nice way of making even more from the change over by fining the unsuspecting users,

 

<snip>

 

I'm entering the realms of speculation here but I strongly suspect there will be genuine interference if some of the plans go through.

 

While the spectrum is used for analogue (or even digital) TV, main transmitters have to be widely spaced geographically. This means that, in any given area, there will be a reasonable amount of spectrum that is interference-free for low power uses like radio mics.

 

However, many of the bidders for the "Digital Dividend" spectrum want the frequencies for some form of mobile communications. This could easily mean a multitude of transmitter stations close together with a great deal of overlap. Think in terms of the cellular networks. If things do go this direction, the technical problems will be very real...it's not just a regulatory issue.

 

Bob

[soundo26]

I've heard recently that OFCOM support the sell-off and stand to gain from it so not sure how seriously they are taking the threat, JFMG & BEIRG have been working hard to get the problem sorted but the problem is that they (we) are actually quite a small & insignificant part of the equation, throw into the mix that the main players who will be bidding for the frequencies are the 3G phone companies who have multiple millions available to bid means that the likelihood of us gaining any ground on the issue is very slim. It is EXTREMELY important that no-one in our industry sits on their hands thinking "it's not my problem"! This issue affects all of us, it's not just radio mics either, many other things use the analogue bands. Can you imagine trying to run a show without radio mics, wireless comms (walkie talkies) etc. the Olympics are going to be fun without those services and how about all you church people who use a myriad of radio mics!

 

At present we pay a reasonable cost for licensed usage of a limited resource, one of the likely outcomes will be that those costs will rise massively if we can afford to bid at all, the other possible outcome is that if we do get the usage of a part of the spectrum, there will be interference from adjacent services using wide bandwidths.

 

They are already having problems in the states and this issue affects us all from as early as 2008 although the switch over happens officially in 2012

 

So please do sign the petition and watch the websites of JFMG & BEIRG (google them) for news!

[Bobbsy]

OFCOM themselves don't benefit of course...they're just the regulatory body appointed by the government. The desire to earn money from this is a government invention...basically another stealth tax.

 

The good news is that politicians have to be aware of public opinion so letters and petitions ARE worthwhile. Your local MP probably doesn't want all the schools and churches that use radio mics to be angry with him!

 

Bob

[dbuckley]

READ THE OFCOM REPORT

 

OFCOM ARE ON YOUR SIDE

 

Ofcom estimate the annual Value to the Nation of entertainment wireless to be 100m-500m UKP, and then say "For the reasons set out above our estimate of the producer and consumer value of PMSE may understate the true value. Therefore, this should be taken into account when interpreting these results." Note that the Value to the Nation is not necessarily what the resource would fetch at auction.

 

Look at the chart on page 55 that shows five possible scenarios for spectrum use and all show PMSE allocations.

 

They say things like:

5.28 Circumstances under which a market-led approach may not prove to be optimal

might include:

• where the process of awarding the spectrum (ie through an auction) does not enable high value users to obtain the spectrum – eg if there are very large numbers of small users who have no mechanism for coming together to buy the spectrum as one entity; or
  
• where the total value of a service is disproportionately large versus the willingness to pay for spectrum. This might result in one of the higher value uses from a societal perspective obtaining less spectrum in an auction than might have been optimal.
  

OFCOM understand that there is no real alternative technology for wireless mics, in contrast to say mobile video

 

Developments of the iPod could, for example, prove to be more effective in meeting consumer demand for video content on the move than mobile

television; while linear television could be displaced to a greater or lesser extent by the consumption of on-demand content (where the user controls the time of watching, using a broadband connection) and/or content generated by users themselves (as with internet sites such as YouTube and MySpace).

 

Keep writing politely to OFCOM, and to your MP! But you don't need to slag off OFCOM, they are aware you exist, and are attempting to accommodate PMSE users.

[mikienorth]

BUMP!

 

I, like many others here (Probably) had an email yesterday purporting to be from BECTU asking us all to write to our MP to request they sign Early Day Motion 531.

This was an email that came with a template letter, and a copy of EDM 531 to send to the MP, and also, in case it was needed, a sheet placing the threat in to terms everyone can understand (no Children in Need, Olympics, Live 8 etc) and also explaining why digital systems are not yet technically able to do this work (delay)

If anyone would like this, PM me with email and I'll forward all the stuff on.

Your MP can be contacted by typing www.faxyourmp.com into your browser (it's an old site but redirects you to where you need to go) and you then enter your post code to get your MP. It is that easy.

 

The copy of EDM 531 that BECTU sent shows only 42 MP so far have signed this. Check if your MP has signed it first, and if so, write to thank them....

 

This does not just affect sound types, but all of us. These areas of radio are used for all sorts of things.