From: "Oscar" <...>

Steve West said:

adverts annoy listeners!

Agreed and understood. We know that something like a weekend LBP can be
operated on pocket money without advertising and can be a good way for
enthusiastic and dedicated people to put together some creative
programmes as a service to listeners. I wish there were a few more
people doing that in the present situation today. In some ways it makes
so much sense to focus on that option rather than others that folks seem
to go for.

Yes it must be said our cost base isn't very high at the moment so it wouldn't justify going to get advertising, it would probably just serve to annoy Ofcom who could then spread their false allegations that pirates make 4 grand a week!

Anything larger (such as anyone attempting a new offshore venture for
example) would need to be able to raise substantial amounts of revenue,
and adverts would become part of the price that listeners would have to
pay.

Yes totally agree, fuel costs BIG money these days!

I also find myself wondering, given that Big L were stuck with the
Trintelhaven transmitter, would it have been possible for them to
survive financially if the station had been run and managed in a
different way. What do you (and others) reckon?

They were trying to run a semi national station with big overheads when their AM signal just wasn't up to the job. They should have cut their cloth accordingly, run it as a satellite/internet station instead of a taking heavy losses. To be honest I'm surprised it survived this long, it's slow death is becoming painful. Fair play to them for trying, but it was destined for failure without a proper signal into large urban areas.

Furthermore, whilst it is an admirable and wonderful thing that people
who run LBP's are willing to spend their own money to entertain people,
do the panel believe that it is in any way wrong or "sinful" for people
to want to actually use their talents as broadcasters in order to EARN
money?

No way is it a sin. If you are good enough to earn a decent living from radio then good luck. It is something I could never do, firstly I don't have the talent, secondly wages in radio are getting to be pretty bad now so I probably couldn't afford the wage cut :-)