famefm wrote: ↑Mon May 15, 2017 8:04 pm 25 watts I think rinse is about that?

It's not 25w! More like 200w. Most London legal community licences have larger allocations due to the short distances 25w would cover in a built up area.

As for Albert's claims about funding, they can have a percentage of income from grants/charities. It may well be Tower Hamlets is funding their youth project?

Every community station has volunteers, it's just in the case of Rinse that they have big name DJ's.

Incidentally Flex is continuing online until the relaunch of the legal FM freq, but the rig is still on with no audio.

I sure they started with less and were given more power I heard the 107.3 station has 300 and I remember that at 1 time choice 96.9 only had 36 watts for South London

Flex rds is still on as well looking like they will switch off soon like they have not got round to it yet

Im not sure Ofcom have some kind of ulterior motive here? Afterall it fits their criteria! They get paid and are seen to be 'Down with the streets' rather than just pompous out of touch gits! lol
As long as they don't get any substantial complaints? I don't think they care!
In reality though, Money talks! If a billionaire popped up tomorrow and wanted to broadcast on 106.8? Rinse would have their bags packed like a shot!! lol

Seems weird and risky leaving the old rig on - as in the rule that any involvement in illegal broadcasting will render you liable to a five year ban from working in legal radio? Surely if Ofcom made the link between the two the Flex licence would be in jeopardy?

It happened with rinse and ofcom reminded them that they had to turn it off

As one of the original Flex FM DJs who was there on the first night transmitting back on 103.6, I wish the current team the best of luck but going legit is a double edged sword, especially with a community license.

sinus trouble wrote: ↑Mon May 15, 2017 10:12 pm Im not sure Ofcom have some kind of ulterior motive here? Afterall it fits their criteria! They get paid and are seen to be 'Down with the streets' rather than just pompous out of touch gits! lol

It's good publicity for Ofcom for them to say "We've licenced two dance pirates" in the space of six years. They clearly want to recreate the success of Rinse with Flex in SW London.

Nope. They've picked the option that ticked all the boxes on the application form but is unlikely to survive more than a few months. This is part of OFCOM's cynical plan to "demonstrate" that Community Radio can't work. All the Community Stations in the UK are in severe financial trouble - without exception. They're all run by Volunteers and even the licensees can't make a living from operating these efforts.

Albert H wrote: ↑Fri May 19, 2017 3:53 am Nope. They've picked the option that ticked all the boxes on the application form but is unlikely to survive more than a few months. This is part of OFCOM's cynical plan to "demonstrate" that Community Radio can't work. All the Community Stations in the UK are in severe financial trouble - without exception. They're all run by Volunteers and even the licensees can't make a living from operating these efforts.

This is my very last post cause i don't feel i need to entertain this "Albert Anyguy" anymore... You say 3 months.. What like you said Flex would be a waste of time when we came back on?
How are we not going to make this work.....Were not a small minded guy with too much time posting on a forum talking about radio! Were a pro active team of like minded people working VERY hard towards our end goal!

So on that note i've got to go as i'm soooo busy : )

p.s. Have fun x

A community license doesn't seem to be required here in Auckland, the protocol is you get yourself a powerful rig and startup on one of the LPFM frequencies from a high site using far more power than the 1watt eirp allowed - no one cares, not even the regulating authority. The radio inspectors are aware but only seem interested if there's interference being caused, they were complained to a while back by a couple of stations who couldn't come to an agreement over side-band interference to each other, so one up's their power - the other does the same in response, both have good sites and cover a decent chunk of Auckland.

We have a community station in Sheffield and tbf it's crap! We had two but one went bust! Look at rinse, they have gone downhill big time... Flex would be better off being pirate than some legal community radio heading straight to failure..
Oh and Albert is well respected on here and he's no any guy! He was building for stations before you were born and seems to know the radio industry inside out.

So what's gonna happen with 997 then? All I can hear is a silent rig left on with 1035AM from Crystal Palace mast coming out over it quietly. Surely this is already a breach of their licence conditions?

I have said before that rinse broadcast for at least 10 days live program before they were off air when they got their licence award and I agree about Albert he is the most interesting poster on here

Flex law wrote: ↑Fri May 19, 2017 9:39 am
This is my very last post cause i don't feel i need to entertain this "Albert Anyguy" any more... You say 3 months.. What like you said Flex would be a waste of time when we came back on?
How are we not going to make this work.....Were not a small minded guy with too much time posting on a forum talking about radio! Were a pro active team of like minded people working VERY hard towards our end goal!

I didn't say "3 months" - I said 6 months (that appears to be about the average). Flex was - and will be - unlistenable amateur rubbish. Your target demographic is virtually penniless (as Kiss famously discovered) so real advertisers won't be interested. You'll end up with a couple of dozen listeners at best and be wasting your time and energy.

You're not allowed to make any money. Read the Licence very carefully and if you're in any way serious, get really good - very expensive - legal advice. The only way you're going to have any chance of survival is to take on OFCOM about the restrictions. The terms of the Licence guarantee that you'll fail - they're designed that way.

Shall we run a sweepstake on the listenership ratings and the time they remain on air? Or - perhaps - how long before they're another Crapital, Heart, Smooth or whatever.........

Could be worse there is already a heart extra on dab they could end up with it on 106.5 in London and that would prove that the system is riged against the small scale intresting radio most of us want I should imagine that the house fm management must feel like asking for thier £600 application fee back

Something on 997 now? That didn't take long no RDS

Albert H wrote: ↑Fri May 19, 2017 2:34 pm

Shall we run a sweepstake on the listenership ratings and the time they remain on air? Or - perhaps - how long before they're another Crapital, Heart, Smooth or whatever.........

The community licence ensures that Rinse or Flex can't sell out in the same way Gordon Mac did with Kiss to survive.

Kane in Guildford has also survived despite providing services for the youth in their area.

Kane, ICR, Reprezent, and all the other "Community" stations are unlistenable amateur rubbish. If they survive it's only because somebody is foolish enough to plough their own money into keeping it going. None of them are financially viable (the licence terms see to that) and their "community" remit is seldom met - another way that OFCOM can gleefully rescind their licences! They're all just a complete waste of bandwidth, designed to fail.

I have to agree especially the 107.3 depressing rubbish