Whilst listening to the BBCWS DRM test from Sackville, Canada, the other evening I heard a sponsorship commercial just before the 2330UTC news. Are the BBC going commercial? Why not, they have with BBCAmerica. Feeling somewhat upset by this I decided to write a few emails to some of the DRM folks. At first they denied that there was any advertising on the BBCWS saying that they sent the signal live from the studio to the transmitter.
Hmmm. Official denial. Must be true then! In an effort to further bait the powers that be over at Bush House I recorded the commercial. Click here to listen to it. You'll find that its the usual "this program is brought to you in part by ...". So armed with the evidence I emailed it off to them. They were every bit as surprised to hear it as I was.
It turns out that this commercial is being "crashed" into the live feed by CBC whom own the transmitter. If you listen carefully the advert suddenly appears in the middle of the English announcers sentence. The BBC's presentation style is such that there are periods of dead air for a few seconds before and after the news. This allows for a convenient "out" for the commercial providing they have done their timing right.
So either CBC think that the BBC are not listening and so can earn some revenue from the BBC (transmitter time is paid for on a "you scratch my back" basis) or the BBC is going commercial. I can confirm that the BBC are not listening. I have an email from them stating such.
-----Original Message-----
From: Andy Giefer [mailto:andy.giefer@bbc.co.uk]
Sent: 06 May 2003 10:25
To: g7ltt@g7ltt.com
Cc: James Briggs
Subject: US jingle
Mark
Thanks for highlighting this problem. The jingle has nothing to do with
BBC World Service and is _not_ an indication that BBC WS is going
commercial. The jingle is inserted by PRI whose satellite feed we are
using. We are on the case.
Thanks again,
Andy
------------------------
Andy Giefer
BBC World Service
Room 716 NE, Bush House
The Strand
London WC2B 4PH
Tel +44 (0)20 7557 3188
Email andy.giefer@bbc.co.uk
Since then I have caught a very dodgy cover up commercial. It seems that RCI have siezed
upon the oportunity to put their ident into the BBC's transmission and then the BBC put
theirs on to p of that. Here
is the resulant balls up. If you listen carefully you'll hear the original commercial
follwed by the start of an RCI ident followed by a BBCNews.com advert followed by the out
of the RCI then the out of the original commercial.
What's going on?
© & ® Mark A Phillips, G7LTT 1997-2004
This page was last updated Saturday October 09, 2004 22:39 Eastern Daylight Time