Posts from ‘June, 2008’

The first phase of Beijing’s wireless city programme has been put into operation enabling citizens and travelers to access the Internet in Beijing’s urban areas via a wireless network, reports the Chinatechnews.com website. So far Wi-Fi signals cover a total of 100 square kilometres of the city and extend out to its second ring road, [...]

Eleven members of the Kenyan Parliament have dared the Government to close a vernacular radio station, saying they would mobilise their supporters to condemn the action. The MPs, mainly from Rift Valley Province, said they would also defend Kass FM in Parliament and in courts. On Wednesday, the Government threatened to close down Kass by today [...]

The Federal  Government of  Nigeria has secured more financial aid to the tune of N554 million (526 Japanese Yen) for the improvement of the mediumwave radio broadcasting network in the country. This amount will enable the government to expand the Enugu phase two of the network through the provision of a 100 kW transmitter to support [...]

SES Astra announced today that the public channel ARTE will start broadcasting its German programme in High Definition (HD) on 1 July on the Astra Satellite System. The HD programme will be broadcast from Astra’s prime orbital position 19.2 degrees East and offer high quality content from ARTE in superior picture quality. ARTE will use [...]

UK communications regulator Ofcom has today fined 30 local radio stations, which form part of GCap Media’s One Network, a total of £1,110,000 for the unfair conduct in a listener competition; Secret Sound.  Taken together, the fines amount to the highest total financial penalty to be imposed for the broadcast of radio content which has [...]

Major pay-TV operators in the Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa expect to carry more than 340 HD television channels by 2013, up from 32 channels currently, according to a new Euroconsult report commissioned by Malaysian satellite operator Measat. By the end of the year, 70 percent of the 25 platforms surveyed - including 21 in [...]

UEFA officials said today they were confident there would be no repeat of a breakdown which deprived television viewers around the world of nearly 20 minutes of Germany’s Euro 2008 semi-final win over Turkey. Vienna’s International Broadcast Centre (IBC), from where TV pictures are relayed, lost power last night after being hit by hurricane-force winds and [...]

The French government today fought off accusations it was tightening its grip on public television after President Nicolas Sarkozy unveiled major changes. Sarkozy announced that the head of France Télévisions would be named by the government instead of by an independent body as part of an overhaul that will see the end of advertising on the [...]

BBC World Service is to close its Romanian language service. The news and current affairs service is proposing to cease broadcasting on 1 August 2008 after 68 years of broadcasting. BBC Romanian broadcasts for almost four hours a day on radio and also runs a complementary website. It is the last of the BBC’s non-English [...]

A draft enabling the state-run Turkish Radio and Television Corp (TRT) to broadcast in different languages and dialects other than Turkish, has been approved by Turkish President Abdullah Gul. Under the law, TRT will also be able to employ foreigners.         
The law allows the national public broadcaster of Turkey to sign contracts, agreements or protocols with other [...]

The BBC today unveils a new-look BBC iPlayer* which fully integrates radio and TV in one interface, as the service records over 100 million requests to view programmes in the six months since its launch. The new-look service, which launches in beta tomorrow, will ‘dual run’ alongside the existing iPlayer for the next few weeks.  
Audiences can [...]

Turkmen security forces detained and tortured a commentator for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) after he had refused to stop working for the broadcaster, the station said. ”Today a contributor to RFE/RL’s Turkmen Service (Radio Azatlyk) was found beaten and tortured for refusing to sign a letter in which he agreed to stop reporting for RFE/RL,” the [...]

The new local broadcaster in Hilversum, which will replace the current Omroep Hilversum later this year, can count on substantial financial support from the town council.  The council’s media advisor has recommended increasing the annual subsidy for the local broadcaster from the current €158,000 to €250,000.  No decision has yet been reached, but the council has agreed to [...]

BBC Worldwide announced today it will acquire Australia’s subscription-television channel, UK.TV, taking 100% ownership of the channel from July 1st 2008. As one of three stakeholders in UK.TV (formerly with a 20 per cent share), BBC Worldwide’s Channels business has agreed terms with joint partners FOXTEL and FremantleMedia to become the channel’s sole owner. The move [...]

Two radio engineers have called for the Broadcasting Bill to be amended to require Irish public broadcaster RTÉ to operate its longwave radio transmitter [on 252 kHz] at full capacity.  The former RTÉ employees believe the decision by  RTÉ to end its mediumwave service earlier this year means it must focus on providing a better service to listeners [...]