en About the Â鶹ԼÅÄ Feed This blog explains what the Â鶹ԼÅÄ does and how it works. We link to some other blogs and online spaces inside and outside the corporation. The blog is edited by Alastair Smith and Matt Seel. Sat, 28 Mar 2020 10:41:47 +0000 Zend_Feed_Writer 2 (http://framework.zend.com) /blogs/aboutthebbc Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds - an audio treasure trove for everyone in the coming months Sat, 28 Mar 2020 10:41:47 +0000 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/02bf6128-5a34-4410-b001-b522831d4b94 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/02bf6128-5a34-4410-b001-b522831d4b94 Jonathan Wall Jonathan Wall

Now more than ever, we know people want things which make them laugh and smile, tell them what’s going on and help support their health, education and wellbeing.

We’re making sure Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds is the best possible audio treasure trove for the nation over the coming months.

We’re adding special new titles and unlocking classics from the archive, so I wanted to share more about what people are going to be able to find on Sounds in the coming weeks and beyond.

The Coronavirus Newscast

Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds will play an important role in helping people in the UK impacted by the crisis with information, education and support.

Our daily podcast The Coronavirus Newscast will keep listeners updated with the latest from Adam Fleming and other Â鶹ԼÅÄ correspondents.

Next week we’ll have a podcast series called 10 Today, which will also be heard regularly on Radio 5 live sports extra; working with Sport England, they’re ten minute workouts aimed at older listeners to help them keep active. We also have special music mixes such as Pacesetter and new mix Solo Rave for those of all ages looking to work out - or rave - at home.

Pace Setter

Our children need help to fill the gap left by school closures so we will have two daily education podcasts, one aimed at primary and the other secondary students, and we’ll also have a new series of short, fun history lessons for all the family with Greg Jenner.

There are twenty classic novels in full on Sounds, and more than 100 short stories. All for free, and many such as Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson and Silas Marner by George Eliot appear on the GCSE syllabus. There are also fifteen children’s stories, including The Children’s Joke by Louisa May Alcott and Finn and the Scottish Giant by Harold F Hughes.

The Â鶹ԼÅÄ has an incredibly rich archive of audio, and we’re making sure there’s a huge variety of new and archive programmes on Sounds to help keep listeners of all ages entertained and connected to the world. We’ve especially brought back six series of the classic Hancock’s Half Hour and The Goon Show so whether you prefer those, classic episodes of Just A Minute, The Boosh and Flight of the Conchords, or one of the many episodes of Infinite Monkey Cage, there will be the best of comedy from across the decades to make everyone laugh at a time when it’s needed.

If you haven’t heard the radio series from some of today’s most popular comedians such as Mae Martin, Tez Ilyas, Sarah Millican and Twayna Mayne, they’re on Sounds now too.

Sounds is the place for the best of the Â鶹ԼÅÄ’s audio storytelling and escapism too. People can enjoy classic dramas such as Middlemarch, alongside all four series of conspiracy thriller Tracks (awarded best fiction at the British Podcast Awards) and more recent podcast dramas including The Whisperer In Darkness and Fake Heiress.

For those who want to get lost in an audiobook, we have lots for listeners to enjoy including: The Testaments by Margaret Atwood which we’ve just brought back to Sounds, Maya Angelou's Autobiographies, Life On Earth by (and read by) David Attenborough, Jon Ronson’s So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, The Mirror And The Light by Hilary Mantel, Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams and Adults by Emma Jane Unsworth. All of these abridged books, and many more, are available for people to indulge in.

The Testaments by Margaret Atwood

I’m one of the many, many people in the UK missing live sport. If you’re looking for a sports fix and good chat, we’ve got Colin Murray unearthing classic sports commentaries and interviews in Replay; our brilliant new podcast Match Of The Day: Top 10; forty of the most memorable conversations from Test Match Special’s View from Boundary archive with the likes of the youngest Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai, singer songwriter Lily Allen, comedy actor John Cleese, and writer Ben Travers (who was the first and watched WG Grace play cricket) are being re-released from next week; and the fourth series of hugely popular That Peter Crouch Podcast is arriving sooner to entertain its many fans.

Match Of The Day: Top 10

All of this great classic and current audio sits alongside our new podcasts landing soon too. Radio 5 live’s Elis and John are making special episodes - The Isolation Tapes - finding big laughs even amidst what’s currently happening, Too Rude For Radio with 1Xtra’s Dotty starts this month, and Perfect Sounds with the brilliant comedian James Acaster launches next month. New podcast You’ll Do has celebrity guests talking about the reality of relationships, and .

Dotty

We know how vital the news and analysis, music, entertainment and escapism we provide is in these challenging times. Last week live listening to our radio stations went up by 18% on Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds and there was the highest number of Sounds users - 3.5 million (200k more than the week before). Our top music mix, the Mindful Mix, had more plays last week than throughout February.

It’s because listeners turn to us during significant events that we’ll keep making sure Sounds has what people need over the next few months. In addition to the company of the Â鶹ԼÅÄ’s brilliant radio stations, we’ll give people classic and new programmes, audiobooks and podcasts for escapism and laughter, as well as things that help educate our kids, provide trusted information and means to help support the nation’s health and wellbeing.

]]>
0
Bringing the best British audio to everyone Thu, 28 Mar 2019 13:00:00 +0000 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/d1624a77-bd3d-48c3-ad42-301f19263364 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/d1624a77-bd3d-48c3-ad42-301f19263364 James Purnell James Purnell

We’ve published for the year ahead today. It sets out our interest in opening up Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds to others’ podcasts and commercial radio. I want to use this article to explain our thinking.

British radio is the best in the world. That’s been built on the quality and range of our programmes, and the creativity of everyone who works in the industry.

But there’s been another factor - we’ve always been in charge of how we reach listeners. We’ve built networks and we’ve built stations - so that everyone can get radio for free, at a high quality, with a raft of distinctive stations designed around the needs of British audiences.

Global players are entering the industry like never before. Already Apple and Spotify account for over 80% of the music streaming and podcast markets in the UK.

Choice and plurality are good. But dominance by one or two gatekeepers would not be. Colleagues from other industries often tell me they wish they had put more emphasis on building up their distribution channels rather than relying on social media. Many of them are addressing that through changes to their business models.

To be clear, radio isn’t in that situation yet. Reach has been growing and only a small proportion of listening is online. However, we should heed the lessons of other industries and change before we have to.

It’s vital we safeguard British radio for now and future generations, with a fully competitive market that involves investment and choice from UK providers as well as large global commercial players.

With Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds, we are already offering an alternative audio destination to the global platforms. But for the last few months we have also been talking to colleagues in British radio to see if Sounds could help them.

That’s why in the Â鶹ԼÅÄ’s Annual Plan we have confirmed we are in discussions with key UK stakeholders on how listeners could enjoy live linear radio and podcasts from third party providers in Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds. Our aim is to support the British creative industries, as well as champion new, niche, innovative UK podcasts that may struggle to achieve prominence on global platforms. We would like to make Sounds a platform that serves British audiences and British creativity.

It’s early days yet with the discussions and nothing is confirmed, but as we have to mention our ambition in today’s plan, it felt like a good time to explain our thinking a little bit more. We’ll talk about what we hope to do in the months to come.

In addition to Sounds, we want to continue to make our content available to third party platforms. But we want to do so in a way that ensures choice and competition. My colleague Kieran explained recently about the fact that . Google search only links you to their own app for instant playback of podcasts - rather than giving people a range of options, including Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds, Apple and Acast. This limits choice. It’s one of the ways it falls short of our Distribution Policy. We’ve asked Google to stop favouring their own app from search, but were told this wasn’t possible, and instead that the only option was to take our podcasts off their service. This is disappointing, and as Kieran said, we are in discussions with Google to resolve the situation.

Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds has had a great start. There have been more than 1.7m app downloads and 85% of Sounds users say they would recommend it to a friend. But - four and a half months in - it’s just the start. We’re adding functionality - this week we launched live restart in the app. You’ll never again miss that key bit of an interview or the start of a Radio 4 drama.

The Â鶹ԼÅÄ has always been here to bring the best to everyone. That means reaching everyone - and we’re seeing some great signs here. A third of Sounds users weren’t previously using iPlayer Radio. Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds can serve existing listeners brilliantly but also make sure that future generations grow up loving radio as much as we do.

I couldn’t be more proud of the unique portfolio of stations we have across Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio and I believe they all deserve a brilliant digital product which helps current and new listeners enjoy our programming. With so much competition for people’s time, and with big, mainly US commercial tech companies now dominating the audio market, I believe Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds is a crucial part of what we need to truly champion British audio, bringing the best of all UK audio to everyone.

]]>
0
Audiences recommend Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds and already listen for 2m hours each week Fri, 30 Nov 2018 15:52:11 +0000 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/c9930466-dd77-4f09-9947-100c40868591 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/c9930466-dd77-4f09-9947-100c40868591 James Purnell James Purnell

Beyond Today presenters Matthew Price and Tina Daheley

It’s a month today since we launched Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds at Tate Modern. The evening included the sight of three Jeremy Vines on stage simultaneously - the real one and his two impersonators from Dead Ringers.

That night we also had performances from Nile Rodgers & Chic, Craig David, Mabel and Tom Grennan alongside Dotty, Greg James, Claudia Winkleman and Annie Mac.

We put them at the heart of our launch because the whole point of Sounds is to help audiences find more content they love.

A month in, we’re already seeing that potential become real. Audiences are finding a wider range of content. Our most popular programmes on demand for under 35s in the app include: Michelle Obama’s Becoming (which has already seen over half a million plays and counting), That Peter Crouch Podcast, End Of Days, Beyond Today, Live Lounge and Radio 1 Dance Anthems.

Range is a vital part of public service broadcasting. So is giving audiences what they need, not just what they want. So, when the story about Brexit spikes, we’ve been able to put the brilliant Brexitcast in the most prominent spot on the app.

1.2m people are using Sounds to listen to an average of over 2.5 hours of radio, podcasts and music mixes per week. That’s over 5m plays and 2m hours of content.

We run a monthly survey with a demographically representative sample of respondents through an independent research agency.

From the first wave of that survey (sample of 1,300) we can see that over 4 in 5 respondents who had used Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds in the past month rated it as Excellent or Very Good and over three quarters said they would recommend it.

As I’ve said on this blog before, we are following a digital approach to this launch. We launched fast, with a good enough product, so that we can hear what our audiences think and respond.

Based on that feedback, we’ve made our auto-play function more logical so if you’ve just finished an edition of Beyond Today it will offer you the next one chronologically.

We’re also going to add a sleep timer, make it easier to subscribe to content, introduce a button so users can share their favourite content on social media, make it easier to find out more about a piece of content before committing to listen to it and display recent tracks played on our live stations in the app.

Keep your feedback coming, and we’ll provide updates as we make changes.

And watch this space for very special Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds content for Christmas...

]]>
0
Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio Wales at 40 Tue, 13 Nov 2018 10:00:00 +0000 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/d2bf6a7d-dfc2-4005-8f61-26710a292644 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/d2bf6a7d-dfc2-4005-8f61-26710a292644 Colin Paterson Colin Paterson

It was 6.30am on 13 November 1978 when Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio Wales began its journey, with its first broadcast to the nation.

The breakfast show in those days was called AM, and included a mix of news and current affairs, local issues, sport and popular culture. The first voice on the station was Anita Morgan; Teleri Bevan was at the helm as station editor, and the main news story of the day was rugby, with Wales having just played New Zealand at the Arms Park in Cardiff.

Since then, Radio Wales has established itself as part of the social fabric of Wales. It has become an important forum for national debate and current affairs with a unique mix of local, national and international news. It’s become a focal point for Welsh cultural and sporting events bringing top quality commentary and coverage from around the world. It’s an important platform for Welsh bands and artists to get their music heard and championed by the presenters who are experts in their fields. And throughout this, it remains rooted in Wales, with voices from all parts of the country coming together on this national platform.

Naturally, the way we work has changed over the years. The huge old machines that we used to use in the early days would take up entire rooms, and we used to be tied to the studio. But nowadays, the technology means that we can be far more flexible. We can link up with studios across the world far more easily, and we can go out to meet with audiences with little more than a microphone. And we can hit the road, as we’re doing this week, taking our 40th birthday celebration bus across Wales to meet our audiences and say thank you for the forty years of support that they’ve given us.

During this time, it’s not just the way we broadcast that’s changed, but also the way audiences listen to Radio Wales. Many of our audiences still tune in through FM radios, and we’re pleased to have been able to boost the station’s FM coverage last month so that we now reach 400,000 more people. More and more people are now listening on DAB radios and online. And the Â鶹ԼÅÄ’s newly launched app Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds lets listeners tune in on their phones and lets Radio Wales offer podcasts and other content alongside our schedule.

But despite changes to the way we broadcast and listen to the radio, Â鶹ԼÅÄ Radio Wales’ core message has remained consistent. We are committed to providing quality news, sport and entertainment for Wales. And as we celebrate our fortieth year, we continue to do that. The station is attracting the biggest names in broadcasting, producing more content from different parts of Wales and working with partners to bring great programmes to audiences across the country.

We’ll be marking our birthday with a variety gala at Swansea’s Grand Theatre on 22 November, for an evening hosted by Radio Wales’ Owen Money and joined by special guests including Gabrielle, Only Men Aloud, John Owen Jones, Mike Bubbins, Hannah Grace and many more. I hope to see you there!

]]>
0
How our podcasts are doing Tue, 23 Oct 2018 13:57:13 +0000 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/3025b421-e3ed-4d98-815b-6c0828b95e13 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/3025b421-e3ed-4d98-815b-6c0828b95e13 James Purnell James Purnell

Last June, I  we were going to be doing more podcasts.

Here’s an update on how it’s going. Overall, pretty well.

In September, in the UK, there were nearly 26.5 million downloads of Â鶹ԼÅÄ podcasts. That’s the highest number we’ve seen since August 2015 when we started recording downloads as we do now and an increase of around 10 million since then too. The previous record was 23.4 million.

There were 14.6 million Radio 4 downloads in the last month, more than we’ve ever had before and up from around 11m three years ago. Brilliant new podcasts such as The Ratline, our investigation into the mysterious disappearance of a senior Nazi, and comedy podcast Flip have contributed to the record as well as ones which regularly top the charts such as Friday Night Comedy and Desert Island Discs - not to mention the award-winning Fortunately.

For Radio 5 live there were around 4.7m downloads, the first time there have been more than 4m and up 60% from around 3m on the previous month. New podcasts such as That Peter Crouch Podcast as well as Football Daily and the return of Flintoff, Savage and the Ping Pong Guy are drawing in loyal listeners in big numbers.

Radio 1 also had its highest number of podcast downloads - over 750,000 and up 30% since the previous month with popular podcasts like The Greg James Podcast and Scott Mills Daily doing particularly well.

Around the world, there were nearly 63m downloads - also a record - with over 24.5m for Â鶹ԼÅÄ World Service podcasts.

We can see how listening habits are changing. Live broadcasting accounts for 88% of listening among the over 55s but that falls to 48% among 15-24 year olds (according to this RAJAR Midas ).

Six million of us listen to podcasts every week - that’s almost doubled over the last five years. It’s gone up by around a third in the last twelve months.

Contrary to what is sometimes said, younger listeners are listening to speech and music - but in the way that they want.

Audiences are passionate about the Â鶹ԼÅÄ and nowhere is that more true than radio. When a much loved presenter decides to move on, they are quick to tell us what they think and who should replace them. Long may that continue. It shows that we are doing something that really connects, that people love.

We want to build on that to help grow the sector for all audiences. Even though these numbers are rising, still only 11% of the country listen to podcasts each week.

Growing the market for everyone is one of the roles of our new app - Â鶹ԼÅÄ Sounds. We’ve been testing it with audiences and they’re already telling us that it’s helping them discover a much wider range of content. Introducing them to podcasts. Helping them find new music. Widening their interests.

It’s just the start - watch this space…

]]>
0
Getting the space to innovate Sat, 30 Jun 2018 11:00:00 +0000 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/a361d11c-2dc7-4071-b7dd-9b4f1e601630 /blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/a361d11c-2dc7-4071-b7dd-9b4f1e601630 James Purnell James Purnell

I said last week that we would be experimenting with new and different types of content. I want to tell you about one way we’ve been doing that  -  podcasts.

Podcasts aren’t new. The first podcasts  - as we now know them  -  were made in 2004. The same year, the Â鶹ԼÅÄ made Radio 4’s  available as a podcast. More Â鶹ԼÅÄ titles followed and we have had some global hits. Across the world, almost 50 million episodes of  have been downloaded.  gets around 2.5 million downloads a month worldwide. The Â鶹ԼÅÄ’s biggest podcast  -   from the World Service  -  regularly gets 10 million downloads a month. , which has had a cult podcast following since 2005, gets almost a million downloads a month.

But until recently our regulation constrained us. We were required to concentrate on releasing radio programmes on demand, rather than making original podcasts  -  a subtle, but vital distinction.

Now we’ve been given scope to experiment. We’ve commissioned eight new podcasts, which you’ll start to see appearing over the next few months. We have also done a lot more to curate our output in a way that podcast listeners would expect and welcome. Have a listen to the way we talk about the Radio 4 documentaries in our  strand or the way  is introduced.

The first new podcasts are doing well  -  is a true crime podcast from 5 live, which Apple have put at the top of the UK iTunes chart. We have released four episodes in one go too.  which started as a podcast idea and is now on air has been doing well since its launch in February.

We’ve learned two interesting things.

If we stop innovating it’s bad for the whole sector

I’m sure there were good reasons for the regulation that limited us doing podcasts that weren’t for broadcast. But it had a consequence; it stopped us innovating. Having been first into podcasts, the Â鶹ԼÅÄ had to narrow its focus.

As time went on however I suspect that harmed the UK podcast market. Podcasts are growing fast in the UK  -  with 8% of us listening to one every week. But in the States that’s 15% and in Sweden it’s even higher. If we’d been pushing innovation in podcasts since 2004 we could have stimulated the UK market even further. That would have been good for audiences and good for companies producing podcasts in the UK. Audiences adopting a technology early helps grow a bigger market, which makes it possible for companies to innovate in that country and then export what they’ve learned.

With the iPlayer, the Â鶹ԼÅÄ helped create a market  -  with podcasts, we’d like to help accelerate the growth of that market. I’d be interested in any views people have for how we do that.

Innovation is often about the small things

What makes it hard for incumbents like us to innovate is often the small things. With our podcasts, one barrier is time  -  because a scheduled programme really does have to be ready on time, anything made only for on-demand can fall to the bottom of the to-do list. So, we’re thinking about how we manage our workforce to support podcast innovation.

We’re learning more about podcasts all the time. We’ll share more of that over the coming months.

]]>
0