Category Archives: Teilifís (Television)

The Lenovo IdeaCentre Q190 – A Proper HTPC

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The Lenovo IdeaCentre Q190 Mini-PC and HTPC

The Lenovo IdeaCentre Q190 Mini-PC and HTPC

While many consumers have bought into the commercial push for so-called Smart TVs the majority of the products on the Irish market are far from smart (yet). Very few have true internet browsers at the level of Chrome or Internet Explorer and most are limited to dedicated applications for specific services such as YouTube and Facebook which curtails their usability. Additionally some of the better known apps on Smart TVs supplied by manufactures for sale in Ireland can’t even be accessed from this country (the most prominent being the BBC’s iPlayer).

Anyone who has used a so-called Connected TV will know how lacklustre the performances can be and how many websites can confuse or crash the onboard browser (that’s when you can persuade the television to communicate with your wireless router in the first place). Even the addition via the TV’s USB port – if supplied – of one of a growing number of cheap Android dongles for “Google TV” (not actual but known off-handedly as such) adds little of value. In fact such an “upgrade” can cause a whole new set of problems of its own. In a similar vein connecting external devices, such as a portable hard drive, can be an onerous task whether by USB or HDMI cables. It is hardly surprising then that consumer research has proven that the majority of Smart TV purchasers do not have their televisions actually connected to the internet (which somewhat defeats the purpose of buying the sets in the first place).

A long-standing market solution to these issues (which actually pre-dates the development of Smart TV technology) is a Home Theatre Personal Computer or HTPC. Basically imagine a small computer connected to your TV with all the functionality of its bigger cousins but largely used for the purposes of multi-media entertainment. This is certainly the route I took when I decided to purchase a good off-the-shelf HTPC that combined a decent sized HDD (hard disc drive), an optical drive for playing DVDs/Blu-rays, a HDMI output to hook up to a Hi-Definition TV and a wireless internet connection for browsing. I say “off-the-shelf” since there is a considerable home market in people building their own from sourced parts though this can carry some pitfalls of its own. After much research I settled on the Lenovo IdeaCentre Q190, choosing the 1TB HDD version with the rather low-powered Intel Core i3 processor, a DVD/Blu-ray combo drive and a wireless multimedia remote.

Stripped of all the jargon the Q190 is basically a mini-PC, roughly the size of fat hardback novel, that can sit horizontally on a shelf or vertically in a supplied stand (it also comes with a small metal bracket that can be fitted to the back of a TV or a wall, complete with screws, to hide it completely). The 1TB drive gives lots of space for video and image files though some of that space is taken up by the rather hoggish operating system, the infamous Windows 8. Otherwise extraneous software is kept to a minimum with not even the usual Microsoft sample pictures or videos to take up valuable memory (which of course is a good thing). A bundled trial version of Microsoft Office and a few other bits and pieces are added for those who intend to use the Q190 as a replacement desktop though these can can be easily deleted.

Techies might prefer to replace the Win8 OS with a somewhat more frugal version of Linux, XBMC or some other operating system to free up even more space. As it is Win8 takes some getting used to and I’m not sure it suits the intended purpose of the Q190 (but that is a general criticism of Win8 on all non-touch screen machines). That said the handheld remote is quite good once you get used to it. It combines a battery-operated, backlit, mini-mouse/keyboard and makes navigation around the machine fairly easy (AA batteries are supplied and the blue-coloured wireless dongle for the remote is safely housed in the battery-compartment – remove it and place in a free USB slot on the machine before switching on). However for long-term or detailed use a dedicated full-size wireless keyboard and mouse might be preferred by some. I should note that you will need some sort of keyboard and mouse to set up and use the machine. In all other respects it is still simply a PC. So purchasing the wireless remote with the Q190 is probably the best option for most users.

I was pleased to discover that the remote can be set up under the Windows’ Irish keyboard option meaning the síneadh fada can be employed whether you are using the English or Irish versions of Win8.

The actual set-up itself of the Q190 was rather easy: a standard HDMI cable from the PC to the TV followed by some 20 minutes of entering the usual location details, user profiles, passwords, updates and restarts (most of the Windows’ updates needed to be done manually). No big surprises so far though there was an issue with the Date/Time but that was an easy fix. Connecting to the internet was painless too though I’d recommend downloading Chrome to replace Internet Explorer if you purchase the machine. As some might have guessed with a Core i3 processor this is not the fastest device in the world. There is a slight delay in some tasks such as opening or starting programmes that might frustrate power-users.

As for usability the image and sound quality from video files on the machine is fine (including playing 1080 HD video files – I’ve downloaded MPC-HC x64, a good video/audio players). DVD/Blu-ray playback is good too. I might well be investing in a surround sound system to complement both. Attaching additional drives was hassle-free, with no problems reading from a 64GB flash drive and a 1TB external hard drive connected via the back and front USB ports (the latter hidden behind a door), and a 1GB memory card. Streaming from the internet was good too with no issues watching webplayers from TG4 or RTÉ. I haven’t installed TOR or similar yet but I doubt there will be any problems watching foreign web services like the BBC’s iPlayer.

My only criticism, Win8 aside (which might be a matter of personal preference for some), is the slightly noisy fan. I had hoped for quieter but it’s not too bad and in most conditions, watching a video file or Blu-ray, it’s ok. There are various 3rd-party programmes to alleviate the issue that I will probably check out.

All in all this is an excellent machine, a true space-saving mini-PC that works very well indeed as a means of providing an internet connection to my HDTV or providing video and audio playback from local files on its large hard drive or disc-player. The wireless remote is actually quite clever, once you get used to it, and is certainly adequate for casual use. I purchased my Q190 from Amazon where it is slightly cheaper than from Lenovo’s own webstore, though as always with Amazon the euro-conversion is far too high.

If you’re in the market for a HPTC or thinking of upgrading your old HD television to a Smart TV I’d certainly recommend the Q190.

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RTÉ – Reform Or Die

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RTÉ vs. TG4

RTÉ vs. TG4

Here’s an interesting snippet from the ever-vigilant NAMA Wine Lake. Guess which TV station was the only television broadcaster in Ireland to make a profit in 2011? Not the country’s official “national” broadcaster RTÉ, which ran up losses totalling some €70 million, despite broadcasting little beyond a diet of cheap overseas programming (with €351 million in revenue for 2011 one wonders where all that money went…? Actually one doesn’t since one know’s perfectly well where a large chunk of it went). And certainly not the British-owned tabloid channel TV3 whose dubious strategy for success has centred on becoming an über-trash “ITV Ireland“. It lost nearly €7 million euros in 2011, no doubt irritating quite a few hedge-fund managers back in London. In fact the only TV company to produce anything resembling a gain was none other than “minority” TV station, TG4, which generated €109,000 from an operating budget of €32 million.

Not much you say? Paltry, even? Perhaps. But it wasn’t a €70 million euro loss. A loss equal to one-third of a full year’s TV licence fee payments (or more than double TG4′s total annual budget).

One might argue that if it wasn’t for the vested interests in RTÉ and elsewhere the Irish state would have turned over English language broadcasting in the country to the private sector decades ago. And the politicians might even have done things right and established real regulations guaranteeing responsible ownership and quality of output for non-public broadcasters. We might then have allowed the “national” broadcaster to be what it should always have been – an Irish language broadcaster. This would have created the space for private broadcasters and overseas media providers to fulfil the market need for English language television and radio in Ireland while the public sector provided what the market wouldn’t – TV and radio programming in Irish.

An RTÉ network with two television channels and three radio stations and a state-funded (but independently administrated) budget of €300 million would not only be value for money but actually serve the purpose and spirit of public service broadcasting. Instead what we have now is a mess: a dog’s dinner of a mess that stinks to high heaven. A bloated whale of incestuous back-rubbing represented by RTÉ (which is increasingly indistinguishable from either the BBC or ITV in terms of actual shows broadcast), two foreign-owned, entirely-for-profit trash TV channels, TV3 and 3e, that pump out visual excrement with impunity, and TG4 which almost single-handedly is propping up indigenous television-production in Ireland, particularly in the independent sector, and actually attempting to fulfil its public service mandate.

Or is all this common sense way too radical for the conservative elites that lord it up in Television Centre and Leinster House?

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Truth Is The First Casualty Of War

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Cecil O'Donovan, age 18, and his brother Aidan, age 14, murdered by the Royal Irish Constabulary, 20.02.1921

Cecil O’Donovan, age 18, and his brother Aidan, age 14, murdered by the Royal Irish Constabulary, 20.02.1921

Last Monday I watched the second part of TV3’s drama-documentary series, “In the Name of the Republic”, where once again Eunan O’Halpin claimed to offer an analysis of the alleged actions of the Irish Republican Army during the Revolution of 1916-1923. Despite a few days of thinking it over and trying to see some historical value in the whole exercise it is hard to escape the impression that the programme (like the one before it) was anything other than some weirdly anachronistic anti-Irish Republican propaganda film. If fact it could have come straight from the film archives of the British Imperial War Museum, stamped 1921.

Stripped of the shallow pretence of balance it was obvious that the documentary makers had set out to “prove” that the men and women who fought to defend Irish democracy at the start of the 20th century were simply “terrorists” and “murderers” lacking in any sort of electoral mandate or support. In fact, going further, the programme all but justified British colonial rule in Ireland by taking the point of view of the country’s British paramilitary police force, the Royal Irish Constabulary, the British judicial system, the British Occupation Forces and individual members of the Irish population who actively supported or collaborated with British rule.

I suppose if the Revisionist fringe of academia in the southern United States can produce books and movies to “prove” that the Confederacy was actually a paragon of democracy and morality with hundreds of thousands of happy-go-lucky slaves then why not a “reform” of Colonial Ireland? What is it that the Neo-Confederates in the United States now demand as the proper title of the internecine conflict that scarred the nation during the mid-1800s? It’s no longer the American Civil War, it’s now the War Between the States. Or should that be the War of Northern Aggression? 

So what’s next for our own Irish Revisionist tendency? Will the Irish War of Independence become the War of Irish Aggression? Some Neo-Unionists in Ireland are already half-way there with their favoured meme of the moment: the Irish Terror. Not as in the Irish being terrorized by their then colonial rulers from Britain.  Oh no. It’s the other way around. The Irish terrorized the British – and the Irish terrorized the Irish. Or so they would have us believe. And sure, if the facts of history don’t fit that interpretation don’t worry, they will be ignored or replaced with some home-made ones of their own. It worked before. Just ask Peter Hart.

Perhaps I should leave it to others to offer a more studied opinion of the televised theatrics of the TV3 documentary? Professor John Borgonovo has his say in the Irish Examiner:

“In the first episode, viewers met an aged Co Laois man who related his boyhood encounter with a neighbouring farmer, who claimed he had dug up a body while ploughing his field, one of three corpses supposedly buried there by the IRA.

Series host Prof Eunan O’Halpin (of Trinity College Dublin) told the audience his research had uncovered two civilians abducted by the Tipperary IRA and “never seen again”. The rest of the episode attempted to prove his theory that they were interred in this Laois field.

At considerable expense, a team of forensic archaeologists dug up the fine pasture, before informing O’Halpin that no corpses could be located. Meanwhile, O’Halpin travelled to Dublin to request the release of Department of Justice files relating to his two missing men.

The episode concluded with O’Halpin opening the sealed files, only to learn that both had survived the conflict. They were never killed by the IRA, much less secretly buried in Laois. The obvious lesson here is: Finish your research before you rent the JCB.

Undeterred, in the second episode, O’Halpin moves to more fertile ground in Cork City and Knockraha, a village a few miles east of Cork. In recent years, the area has attracted considerable speculation about the killing of alleged informers, especially Protestants.

Much interest stems from Gerard Murphy’s 2011 book, The Year of Disappearances, which received overwhelmingly negative reviews from historians concerned by his over-reliance on folklore and supposition. Murphy’s unlikely theories of covert revolutionary activity in Cork included the IRA’s unrecorded killing of up to 30 Freemasons in the spring of 1922, and the drowning of Protestant schoolchildren by IRA intelligence agent Josephine Brown.

The absence of such dramatic events in contemporary and later records (civilian, military, governmental, and religious) leads me to conclude that they did not occur. I was surprised, therefore, by the sight of Murphy relating additional theories for In the Name of the Republic.”

Surprise is one way of putting it. But then birds of a feather an’ all that.

Meanwhile historian John Dorney, who’s truly excellent website The Irish Story has gone to great lengths to present a dispassionate and fair evaluation of the revolutionary period, examines the issue of the 200 “murders” Eunan O’Halpin alleges were carried out by the Irish Republican Army:

“Immediately this set alarm bells ringing. In 2012, O’Halpin published the first results of his and Daithí Ó Corráin’s research, which revealed that the IRA in the War of Independence, was responsible for 281 of the 898 civilian fatalities, with British forces being responsible for 381. A further 236 deaths could not be confidently attributed to any party (the IRA, loyalist, rioters, undercover Crown forces).

This brings up two questions – first of all, where did all the extra ‘disappeared’ victims come from? There was no effort made in the programme to verify this figure of 200 secret killings by the IRA. Secondly, given that state forces actually killed more civilians, why was this not given greater prominence in the programme?

Even worse was the programme quoting the Royal Irish Constabulary as an impartial witness to events. An RIC DI was quoted saying,  ‘People are afraid to be associated with the forces of the crown’, by an IRA – ‘system of universal terrorism’, and called for the ‘extermination of these bandits’. What else would a party to a counter insurgency campaign say?

In the second part, looking at County Cork, it was alleged that the IRA Cork Number 1 Brigade, which covered north Cork and the city, abducted and killed up to 90 victims and secretly buried them on the farm of one Martin Corry.

Corry claimed in his IRA pension that 27 bodies were buried on his farm and in a bog (now forest) called Knockraha. In recordings in the 1970s he claimed that there were ’60 even’. The problem with this testimony is that there does not seem to have been 60, 90 or even 30 victims missing that could fit into the alleged mass graves. Corry for instance told local historian Jim Fitzgerald that 17 ‘Camerons’ (of the Highland Cameron regiment) were buried there. In fact, John Borgonovo tells us, the regiment had only 3 men missing in its time in Cork.

I am informed that Jim Fitzgerald himself estimates that between Corry’s farm and Knockraha there may be 15 bodies buried. The figure of 90 secret deaths comes from Gerard Murphy, whose book, the Year of the Disappearances, was rightly savaged here on the Irish Story by Pádraig Óg Ó Ruairc for presenting supposition as evidence.

But there was no evidence presented for scores of disappeared civilians. Nor for tendentious talk about the Cork IRA’s campaign of ‘extortion’ and ‘torture’. The casual viewer would never have guessed that the IRA represented a political movement with overwhelming electoral support in the elections of 1918 and 1920.

…this was a bafflingly biased programme. It presented and inflated all the bad things the IRA did, shorn of context while proposing a thesis of hundreds of disappeared which was never even remotely proved.

So why the sensational anti-republican tone of ‘In the Name of the Republic’?

There is nothing to be gained by treating nationalist history as a sacred cow but nothing either by making radical claims unsupported by evidence.”

But that begs the question, is there nothing to be gained by the falsification of Irish history as it relates to the War of Independence? Or are there in fact real political gains to be made by inflicting untold damage on the Irish people’s understanding of their own history? Are we seeing in Ireland a larger “culture war”, as has been witnessed in the United States, over the nation’s past, present and future? A war played out in the pages of our national newspapers every week, and on our radios and TVs? The United States has Glenn Beck or Fox News. We have Kevin Myers or the Sunday Independent. In the struggle between Progressives and Regressives in Ireland the Irish Revolution represents the greatest loss of status and influence for the latter. Is it any wonder that they wish to contest it, even in retrospect?

And what about Ireland’s British-owned television channel TV3? Some more analysis and dramatic re-enactments of supposed events from world history in a series of exciting new TV programmes? Perhaps the “truth” about Anne Frank? Or a sympathetic examination of the Lost Cause? But after the farce of the last two weeks will anyone be watching?

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In The Name Of History

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Mutilated remains of Harry Loughnane Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army tortured to death by the Royal Irish Constabulary 1920

The mutilated remains of Harry Loughnane, age 22, Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army, tortured to death alongside his older brother Patrick, age 29, by the Royal Irish Constabulary or RIC, Britain’s loathed colonial police force in Ireland, 1920

I’ve just finished watching a history-documentary (and I use that term advisedly) on Ireland’s British-owned private television channel, TV3, called “In The Name of the Republic”. Presented by Eunan O’Halpin it set out to investigate the alleged “disappearance” of some 200 Irish people during the Irish Revolution, supposedly executed by the Irish Republican Army as part of its struggle against the British Occupation Forces from 1918-1923. Beginning with an archaeological dig searching for the corpses of three men found shot dead in 1921/22 by a local “eccentric” farmer the program goes on in drama-documentary style to present a case for the mass and indiscriminate murder by the IRA during Ireland’s War of Independence of countless innocent civilians (who may or may not have been British spies or informers, officers of the feared British paramilitary police, the Royal Irish Constabulary or RIC, or soldiers of the British Army).

Of course the archaeological dig failed to uncover any evidence of any murdered men (spies or otherwise), despite the fact that the program makers offered us some identities for two of the three supposed victims, complete with dramatic reconstructions of their capture and deaths. However (and quite bizarrely) at the end of the program we were told that the two suggested victims actually survived the conflict completely unharmed.

Not only do we not have the bodies of the ”murdered” we don’t even have any suggestions for who was “murdered”. In fact we don’t have any evidence that any “murders” happened in the first place! What we do have is a supposed drama-documentary from the Peter Hart school of Irish history, with a hefty dollop of Gerard Murphy (of which more here).

By the by, if any historians are looking for murder victims from the Irish Revolution with, you know, real actual identities and, hey, actually physical remains, here they are. The photographs above and below are of Patrick and Harry Loughnane, aged 29 and 22, both Volunteers of the Irish Republican Army, detained, tortured and murdered by members of the RIC’s Auxiliary Division in November 1920. From Pádraig Óg Ó Ruairc’s article that featured on The Irish Story in 2012:

“The Loughnane brothers were arrested in daylight at their family home at Shanaglish, Co. Galway on the 26th November 1920. Their partially burned and mutilated bodies were discovered in a pond near Ardrahan on 5th December that year. The two brothers had been tied to the back of an R.I.C. lorry and forced to run behind it until they collapsed from exhaustion and were dragged along the road. Both of Pat’s wrists, legs and arms were broken. His skull was fractured and there were diamond shaped wounds, resembling the cap badge worn by the RIC Auxiliaries, carved into his torso. Harry’s body was missing two fingers; his right arm was broken and nearly severed from his body. Nothing was left of Harry’s face except for his chin and lips. A doctor who examined the Loughnane’s bodies stated that the cause of death was “laceration of the skull and the brain.” The attached photographs of the brothers’ bodies at the time of their discovery show some of the horrific injuries they suffered. The same month that the Loughnane brothers were killed, members of the RIC in Galway also killed a pregnant woman and a Catholic priest.”

Mutilated body of Patrick Loughnane Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army tortured to death by the Royal Irish Constabulary 1920

The mutilated body of Patrick Loughnane, age 29, Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army, tortured to death alongside his younger brother Harry, age 22, by the Royal Irish Constabulary, Britain’s feared colonial police force in Ireland, 1920

If I might also add, all that archive film shown in the “documentary” of supposed victims of violence by the Irish Republican Army during the War of Independence, including men, women and children made homeless sitting in ditches at the side of the road? They were actually from a contemporary newsreel showing Irish civilians hiding in the fields of north County Dublin following the Sack of Balbriggan. That is the burning of the small Irish coastal village of Balbriggan by the British Occupation Forces in 1920.

Irish refugees hiding in the countryside following the Sack of Balbriggan

Irish refugees hiding in the countryside following the Sack of Balbriggan, the destruction by the British Occupation Forces of the small village of Balbriggan during the War of Independence, Ireland, 1920

A column of Irish refugees fleeing the ruins of their homes following the Sack of Balbriggan

A column of Irish refugees fleeing the ruins of their homes following the Sack of Balbriggan by the British Occupation Forces during the Irish War of Independence, Ireland, 1920

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Some Quick Posts

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Scúp - TG4

Scúp – TG4

First up a review in the Irish Times of the new TG4/BBC co-production, the comedy-drama “Scúp”, penned by Irish author and screenwriter Colin Bateman (the man behind the mid-2000s BBC hit “Murphy’s Law”):

“From reporters having to beg for their salaries to the canny deployment of question marks in headlines to see off libel accusations, Scúp, TG4’s new drama about a Belfast Irish-language weekly paper, hits some amusingly accurate notes in its depiction of a local newsroom.

Given most television portrayals of journalists fall several broadsheets-in-a-row wide of the mark, it’s no surprise that Scúp is the creation of a former journalist.”

Second is a heads-up for Sibéal Davitt’s invitation to experience some Trip-nós at the Culture Box in Templebar, on the 14th of March. And if you’re wondering what Trip-nós is:

“Trip-nós – it’s disco but not as you know it. Experience a completely unique dance experiment mixing Ireland’s indigenous ‘sean-nós’ dance with contemporary disco-inspired moves. Trip-nós is a live performance / workshop mixing sean-nós and contemporary dance with electronic music.

How does it work? It’s simple. First the Trip-Nós gang do their thaaang and then participants must choose which style of dance they would like to ‘represent’. They will then learn four steps or more in their preferred style which will be categorised in numbers 1-4. Finally the two groups must battle it out in an 80’s themed dance-off and… hey presto… Trip-Nós is born! Expect some belters including the epic ‘Inspector Norse’ …yeah, you know what I’m talkin’ bout!

There’s only room for 30 people so register here.”

Tayto as Gaeilge - Cáis agus Oinniún

Tayto as Gaeilge – Cáis agus Oinniún

Now there’s a mashup! Talking of which the Oirish Sun, model Roz Lipsett, Tayto and An Ghaeilge:

“Yesterday Tayto crisps launched a limited edition 1980s-inspired pack ‘as Gaeilge’ to promote the language. Model and Gaeilgeoir ROZ LIPSETT, 27, showcased the retro package.

Here she talks about why her native tongue is so important to her.

I ABSOLUTELY love that I can speak Irish, it’s something I’m very proud of and something I’m very privileged to have.

I went to a regular English-speaking primary school but in sixth class my parents sent to me to Colaiste na Rinne in Waterford, which is a strict Irish-only school. At the time I was horrified at having to leave my friends and move from Dublin to Waterford as a boarder.

But now I know my family did me a huge favour and I’m still friends with loads of the guys I met in An Rinn.

Irish was always my best subject in school. My family are all Gaeilgeoirs so they always spoke Irish at home. They are from Mayo and they have a very proud Irish tradition.

By the time I was leaving An Rinn I was fluent. Now, any opportunity I get, I will start waffling on in Irish, it feels very natural to me and I just really enjoy speaking it”

A quick blast from IFTN:

“TG4’s ‘Lorg na gCos: Súil Siar ar Mise Éire’, which concerns the making of Irish masterpiece ‘Mise Éire’ (an examination of Irish society in the years surrounding the 1916 Rising) has been nominated for a Focal award recognising excellence in archive films.

The documentary, which translates as ‘Finding The Footprints – A Look Back At Mise Éire’ has been recognised in the category for ‘Best Use of Footage in an Arts Production’ at the 10th annual Focal International Awards, set to take place in London on 2 May.”

And a view of Irish from the United States.

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TG4 Scoops It Rivals

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Scúp - TG4

Scúp – TG4

Three quick posts on TG4, the real public service broadcaster in Ireland, all from IFTN (the Irish Film & Television Network). Colin Bateman is a well-known Irish novelist and dramatist behind such media hits as Divorcing Jack (the book and movie) and the long-running BBC television crime drama Murphy’s Law. He now has a new eight-part drama on TG4, Scúp, his first work produced in the Irish language which has stirred up a considerable media and on-line buzz. I missed the first episode due to work commitments (don’t ask!) but so far the reviewers are impressed. You can watch the opening episode here.

Promo below

In related news another TG4 drama series, An Bronntanas, is in pre-production and is scheduled to start shooting soon. What makes it stand out from the TG4 drama crowd is the starring role of American actor John Finn, who is probably better known as the lead character Lieutenant John Stillman in the hit US police procedural series Cold Case. Finn is a fluent Irish speaker having learned the language in the United States and appeared in a 2005 on-air-promo of the Cold Case series for TG4 that became an early online viral hit.

Finally a reminder that Ireland’s best television channel manages to produce an unrivalled range of domestic programming on a budget of just €32 million (roughly 20% of RTÉ’s annual budget).

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That Infamous Nolan Show

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Well a lot of people have been discussing last night’s highly controversial Nolan Show from the BBC in Belfast which debated the anti-democracy protests by the extreme of the British Unionist community in the north-east of Ireland. I say “debated” when I probably mean “fought over” as the show descended into chaos with a Unionist-dominated audience attacking virtually every speaker and every non-Unionist contributor to the programme. It may have made for car-crash TV as a baying mob took over a prime time BBC regional news and current affairs show but it was certainly illustrative of the attitudes and politics of the Unionist mob.

Above is a YouTube video of the 16.01.2013 Nolan Show. Watch it while you can!

Nick Greger, a leading British fascist, poses with the infamous Johnny Adair, a former senior British terrorist with the UDA-UFF terror group

Nick Greger, a leading British fascist, poses with the infamous Johnny Adair, a former senior British terrorist with the UDA-UFF terror group

Meanwhile a report from Niall O’Dowd in the Irish Central on some of the Far Right and Neo-Nazi elements in Britain who are supporting the Unionist anti-democracy demonstrations in the North of Ireland. Frequently led and directed by members of the British terrorist group the UVF these protests have drawn allies from the British fascist party, the BNP, as well as sundry extremist groups like Britain First. Of course the close ties between separatist British terrorism in Ireland and the Far Right in Britain go back many decades as I examined in a lengthy post here, which takes in everything and everyone from Apartheid-era South Africa to the British Army killer Johnny Adair.

Ceol Ar An Imeall

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Ceol ar an Imeall, TG4′s indie music show, is back tonight at 23.00 on TG4. Lots of Irish bands performing live in studio plus interviews with a host of international acts. A whole gaggle of performances for Ceol ar an Imeall are available to watch for free here. Enjoy!

Follow Ceol ar an Imeall on Facebook or Twitter.

Hibernophobes – Or Ireland’s Gaeilgeoir-Hating Press

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The Oirish Independent newspaper, that bastion of Anglophone supremacism, carries yet another hate-rant against TG4, the Irish language public broadcaster. Two weeks ago TG4 secured some of its biggest audience figures when 550,000 people tuned in to watch the channel’s live Saturday coverage of the rugby match between Leinster and Munster at the AVIVA stadium. The next day another 500,000 watched Sunday’s Ladies’ Gaelic Football Finals at Croke Park making TG4 the top TV channel in Ireland that afternoon. The previous night the station was narrowly beaten by bigger rival RTÉ as the most watched television channel in Ireland (despite the latter having a budget some five times bigger than TG4’s).

However according to the Indo’s TV reviewer (the same one as here?):

“ I was most encouraged recently by a letter from a man who runs a sporting pub in Dublin, who informed me that his customers simply refuse to watch sport on TG4. In particular, they can’t understand why rugby is shown in Irish, when it would get far more viewers if it was shown in the actual national language on RTE.

This speaks to a number of themes that are dear to me. It reveals how quickly we reject the Irish language as soon as it intrudes on our enjoyment of life in any meaningful way.”

Presumably these rugger-loving chaps (and I’m pretty sure that in this particular establishment it is mainly chaps) don’t make up the half-a-million viewers who did watch the sports on TG4. And in particular the rugby.

In the interests of public safety should we not be told the name of the “sports pub” where the Irish language, and by inference Irish-speakers, are not welcome? After all one wouldn’t want to walk into the wrong bar and say the wrong thing, or rather use the wrong language, and be escorted from the premises for doing so – or worse.

Oh, no doubt these Anglophone fundamentalists will tell us that though they hate the Irish language they do not hate Irish-speaking men and women. Just as Christian fundamentalists tells us that they hate homosexuality but do not hate homosexual men and women. Or Islamic fundamentalists hate America – but not Americans.

But, seriously, who believes that?

BBC Alba And The Success Of Scottish Language Broadcasting

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BBC Alba

The Scotsman newspaper has an in-depth profile of Maggie Cunningham, the new head of BBC Alba, the Scottish language television service. Like Ireland’s TG4, Scotland’s BBC Alba has experienced a marked increase in audience figures over the last year despite its (extremely) limited funding and coverage. As with the Irish language many new Scottish speakers are urban dwellers and in the future the station’s programming will need to better reflect this demographic change.

“Farpaisean Chon-Chaorach is unlikely to trouble Downton Abbey in terms of ratings or audience share, but BBC Alba’s coverage of furry bullets rounding up their bleating foes has succeeded in corralling me as a fan. I came upon the Sheepdog Trials, in its English translation, while randomly stabbing the remote one Sunday evening. And there they were. Man and beast in perfect lock-step, separated by hundreds of yards, but in constant communication through the iPhone of the canine world: a symphony of whistles and the occasional cry of “come by”. Those Cheviots didn’t stand a chance. On screen were collies with the dribbling powers of Ronaldo, and so smart that after snaring the sheep in the pen I half expected them to settle down with the FT and prepare their owners’ tax returns. The programme had a contented, soporific feel with Donald MacSween and Catriona Macphee introducing us to the owners of these four-legged wonders. Yet there was one thing missing from the television coverage: head cams. In these days of miniature cameras why weren’t they fitted to the dog’s head so that the viewer could follow the action eye-to-eye? Surely it would revolutionise the sport and farmers would soon be driving Porsches and wearing Red Bull logos on their smocks.

So when Maggie Cunningham, the new chairwoman of BBC Alba, agreed to an interview it is among the first questions I put to her. Sitting in a booth in the bar of the Blythswood Hotel in Glasgow, the former joint head of programmes at BBC Scotland thinks for a second then replies: “That is a very good idea. I will be sure to tell them about it.” So if Farpaisean Chon-Chaorach looks a little different next season viewers can direct their e-mails of praise this way.

Having contentedly put a big red tick next to “dog cam” on my list of questions, I could then move on to one every journalist is required by law to ask whenever the subject of Gaelic is raised: “Maggie, why, in the midst of the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, are we spending £20 million a year promoting a language spoken by just 55,000 people?”

The idea of yanking the life-support of public cash from Scotland’s Gaelic television channel would clearly not be considered a “very good idea” by Maggie, who says of the question: “It’s boring, that is the first thing I would say, and secondly it’s not for 55,000 people, it is for 500,000 people (BBC Alba’s average weekly viewers) as you can see. We are talking about austerity but we are also talking about identity in lots of different ways and Gaelic is core to Scotland.

“If you look back at our history, it is the only place in the world where Gaelic is an indigenous language. I am very pro language-learning and very pro supporting people coming to live in Scotland and bringing their own indigenous culture, but basically Gaelic is the indigenous culture of Scotland. It is so fundamental to everything we are trying to preserve that nobody would challenge that we preserve Edinburgh Castle or the Wallace Monument or some of our great paintings, so why challenge the importance of keeping a language alive?”

It is four years since BBC Alba was launched and now that it is available on Freeview it is attracting a healthy audience of 500,000 per week, with nine out of ten viewers unable to speak Gaelic but drawn to the channel’s mix of documentaries, the occasional drama and, most popular of all, sport. Yet Cunningham is concerned that viewers will begin to switch off unless the channel can offer more than just 90 minutes of original programming each night. “Why will it be hard to hold on to that audience? Well, unless we can get additional funding we cannot sustain a channel on an hour and a half (of original programmes) every night. I don’t think an hour and a half a day is enough to hold an audience over time. The last four years, it has started well, it has exceeded expectation but once you start exceeding expectations, the expectation gets greater so the audience will keep wanting more. They have been happy to have what they have, but people will want more. I do think that at an hour and a half over a long period, the channel is unsustainable, basically.

“What we require is more origination (original programming) and maybe different ways of looking at the schedules and more content. How that plays out over the next four years, God knows, but we do need more original content. Ideally by 2017, if the BBC charter gets renewed, I would like to see us having three hours of original content per night, double where we are just now. On the same budget or finding clever ways to enhance the budget. There is no getting away from the fact that people want to watch the telly, and the big challenge is ‘How do we get people to stay watching us?’ They do watch us: 500,000 is good. The challenge is ‘How do we continue to deliver?’”

My other brilliant idea is that BBC Alba develop a new detective series, since the chattering classes are happy to watch murder if it comes with subtitles. We agree that subtitles are no longer the barrier they were in the past. “If you look at the success of The Killing or Montalbano. I’m just back from Sicily and part of the reason I went was Montalbano. If we could do something maybe like Montalbano, it would be universal.”

The channel is already in discussions with Chris Young, the producer of The Inbetweeners, the comedy series which became a monster hit when released on the big screen. “I am not responsible for commissioning, but I know that our guys are talking to Chris Young. He is based in Skye and video-conferences with LA, who are now doing an American version of The Inbetweeners. He doesn’t see the point of flying over all the time. He is very keen on Gaelic. His wife is pretty fluent and he himself is learning. The key is to use talent and also to allow the creativity to come through and not say ‘we need to have a drama and this is what it needs to be’. We want to see what we can do if we put a few creatives together.”

BBC Alba is unique in that it is a partnership between the BBC and another company, MG Alba, and could, in an independent Scotland, be the core around which any new post BBC channel is formed.”

Let us hope that any independent Scottish public broadcasting service makes a better job of serving its nation, and the two linguistic communities that form it, than RTÉ has made of serving the two language communities of Ireland. A job RTÉ did so poorly (and with such obvious anti-Irish bias) that in the end it had to be given to an entirely new broadcaster - TG4!

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Big Boost For TG4 Audience Figures

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TG4 – Súil Eile

The growing popularity of TG4, the Irish language television station, was underlined by last weekend’s audience figures for the channel. From a report by Hogan’s Stand:

“Saturday’s live coverage of the RaboDirect PRO12 match between Leinster and Munster at the AVIVA stadium pulled in a massive audience for the channel.

Nielsen TAM, the official measure for TV audience in Ireland, reports that 550,000 people tuned into TG4′s live match coverage.

TG4′s audience makes this the most watched RaboDirect PRO12 televised match so far this season on any channel in Ireland.

Saturday’s rugby ratings were followed by another major audience-winner for TG4 with yesterday’s live coverage of the 2012 TG4 Ladies’ Football Finals at Croke Park. Nielsen TAM reports that approximately half a million people tuned into TG4 at some stage during the finals on Sunday with an average audience of 190,000 watching the Senior Final, where Cork overcame neighbours Kerry to win their 7th TG4 Senior title in 8 years.

Approximately one in five of those viewing TV in Ireland during the matches on Saturday and Sunday were watching TG4. TG4 was the second most popular channel in Ireland on Saturday night, beaten narrowly into second place by RTÉ One, while TG4 was the top Irish channel by a distance on Sunday afternoon, securing a viewing share twice the size of its nearest rivals.”

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BBC Alba Leading The Way For A Scottish Broadcasting Service

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BBC Alba

Some potentially significant news for Scottish broadcasting reported by the Stage:

“Scotland’s first minister, Alex Salmond, has called for the country to have its own public service broadcaster, claiming the current situation is “failing Scottish TV viewers and producers”.

Addressing the Edinburgh International Television Festival, Salmond said that Scottish TV viewers and producers are being “failed by out-dated Westminster attitudes”.

He argued that Scotland should have its own public broadcaster outside of the BBC, which would be controlled by the country’s government.

“Scotland’s contribution to broadcasting is unparalleled. Television was invented by John Logie Baird and the very concept of public service broadcasting was shaped by Lord Reith. But Scottish viewers and TV production talent are today being short-changed,” he said.

He added that BBC Alba – the national Gaelic language station – had been a “huge success, with an audience size last month nine times the number of people who speak Gaelic”.

“So viewers are clearly voting with their remote controls for more Scottish content. Yet we do not have an English-language public service broadcasting channel of our own,” he said.”

At the moment Scotland contributes in excess of 320 million pounds (over 400 million euros) a year to the overall BBC budget via the television licence fee. However the money reinvested in Scottish broadcasting by the BBC will soon stand at some 80 million pounds (100 million euros) – around a quarter of what it taxes from Scottish television viewers. Using either a TV licence fee or direct public funding through general taxation, with limited commercial advertising, it would not be unreasonable to expect a Scottish public television service to be able to operate with a budget of between 400 and 500 million pounds (roughly over 500 to 600 million euros).

The total budget from all sources for Ireland’s award-winning Irish language television channel TG4 stands at less than 39 million pounds per annum (around 49 million euros), yet it is widely respected and admired internationally for the range of programming it produces and broadcasts. A future SBC would have a budget twelve times that of TG4.

Can anyone seriously question Scotland’s ability to produce and sustain quality television broadcasting?

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Broadcasting In Native Tongues

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Some more Native American (and a bit of native Irish) news, from The Atlantic:

“Loris Taylor, the CEO and president of Native Public Media, still has the scars on her hands from when she was caught speaking Hopi in school and got the sharp end of the ruler as a result. “They hit so hard, the flesh was taken off,” she remembers. “Deep down inside, it builds some resistance in you.”

Now, she’s at the forefront of a movement to revive dead and dying languages using an old medium: radio. As CEO and president of Native Public Media, she’s lobbied the FCC and overseen projects to get increasingly rare tongues like Hopi onto airwaves so that Native Americans can keep their ancestors’ ways of speaking alive—and pass those ways of speaking to new generations.

“At a certain time, people thought ‘We live in a white man’s world and have to change our language to make it.’ But now we see how wrong that was.”

Similar efforts are taking place worldwide. In Ireland, Dublin’s youthful Top-40 Raidió Rí-Rá and Belfast’s eclectic indie Raidió Fáilte have been broadcasting entirely in Irish for several years. In Washington, D.C. earlier this month, indigenous radio producers from Peru, Mexico, Canada, El Salvador, and a handful of other countries gathered for the “Our Voices on the Air” conference, organized by the 40-year-old non-profit Cultural Survival and the Smithsonian’s Recovering Voices program.

Following centuries of oppression that have marginalized minority languages, radio represents a modest but surprisingly promising way to reinvigorate the traditions keeping those languages alive. In the Maori community of New Zealand, for example, the combination of 21 radio stations and rigorous early childhood immersion programs have brought Maori-languages speakers from an all-time low of 24,000 in the 1980s to 131,000 in 2006, according to Mark Camp, deputy executive director at Cultural Survival.

The swift and sure loss of indigenous language in the U.S. was hardly an accident. From the latter part of the 19th century to the latter part of the 20th, the Bureau of Indian Affairs systematically sent generations of Native American kids into boarding schools that were more focused on punishment and assimilation than on education. In a piece for NPR in 2008, Charla Bear reported on the terrible conditions that persisted at these schools for a century—how kids were given Anglo names, bathed in kerosene, and forced to shave their heads.

In recent years, the government has taken steps to reverse some of the damage. In 1990, the Native American Languages Act was passed, recognizing the right of indigenous populations to speak their own language.

Still, the effects of centuries of forced assimilation run deep. Richard Alun Davis, station manager for Arizona Hopi station KUYI 88.1 FM, says that the disappearing vocabulary creates a “complex tapestry of shame” in the approximately 9,000-person population his station reaches.

“Even if they can speak, they usually do not do it outside of the home for fear of being corrected,” he says. Because the Hopi religious tradition is firmly rooted in the language, “It’s not only a moment of discomfort with the literacy. It’s also showing that you’re unable to participate in all the culture.”

Let’s Bring Back ‘Gal’ Davis, a blond-haired, blue-eyed Brit who fell in love with Native American literature in college and speaks Hopi (“people joke that I’ve created my own dialect”), believes that radio is the easiest way to counteract these bleak statistics. His station, KUYI, covers three counties, from the border of the Grand Canyon National Park, up to the Utah border, and down toward Winslow. Its programs include a junior and senior high school class that broadcasts in Hopi, a morning Sunday show aimed at small children, and cultural discussions for adults that are held according to the lunar calendar, in keeping with Hopi tradition.

Congress’s passage of the Community Radio Act in 2011 means that community radio stations could soon—in Camp’s words—”mushroom,” which offers a lot of potential for Native American media on reservations, where there is usually little infrastructure and in many cases no electricity (certainly no wifi). In these areas, a low-power FM station that’s plugged into the grid in the center of town allows people with battery-powered, handheld radios to listen in to what’s happening all around them.”

Just a reminder that Ireland’s Irish-language television station TG4 is a founding member of the World Indigenous Television Broadcasters Network (WITBN), something we should all be proud of.

Mary Tamm – The Perfect Companion

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Mary Tamm, Romana

Unfortunately I believe I have got to that certain age when the authors and musicians and actors and actresses of one’s formative years seem to pass from life with alarming regularity. Sometimes one views it with a raised eyebrow and a pinch of surprise or sadness. Sometimes though it instils a real sense of loss, as if a little bit of one’s childhood passes away with them.

That is certainly the case with the death of the British actress Mary Tamm at the all too early age of 62 (and from cancer, but of course). Sixty-two? What a terribly short life that is when one thinks about it. Three score years and two is no time to have experienced all that this world has to offer. How unfair it seems.

The Doctor and Romana, Tom Baker and Mary Tamm

Mary Tamm, in the character of the Time Lord Romana, was for me the greatest Doctor Who companion, bar none. No shrinking violet, or substitute adolescent-cum-viewer, she was every bit the equal of Tom Baker’s wonderfully exuberant, idiosyncratic Doctor: intelligent, self-confident, elegant, she put every female companion before, and after, to shame. Unfortunately in some ways that was her undoing as writers and producers latterly pushed her character towards the more traditional role of women in Science-Fiction. Lots of screaming, knuckle-biting, and falling over one’s high-heels while being pursued by monsters. Eventually she left the show and it was all the poorer for it. Until the character of Amy Pond appeared there was no one really like her in the Who universe.

Perhaps that’s why I’m attracted to smart and articulate women? Exposure to a genuine female role model at a very early age? (and why I detest tramp-stamp Barbie dolls and Jersey Shore wannabes – in Ireland they inhabit the television space titled appropriately enough Fade Street. Though looking at the pictures of Mary Tamm today I’ve just realised that quite a few of my ex-girlfriends had more than a passing resemblance to her in the role of Romana, and not just in terms of personality…!)

Romana and the Doctor, Mary Tamm and Tom Baker

Not so long ago I purchased a Doctor Who boxset, The Key of Time, first broadcast from 1978 to ‘79, a vague recollection from early childhood that surprised me by even better in reality that in memory. Thanks in no small measure to the quality of Mary Tamm’s acting Tom Baker excels as the two bounce off each other in the sort of Douglas Adam’s verbal jousting that one rarely sees on television these days (Aaron Sorkin apart. Talking of which, The Newsroom, excellent – but also a little dated, preachy and wide-eyed optimistic. American TV journalism as American liberals would wish it to be – but not as it actually is. Of course Ireland’s journalistic elite are just as bad)

If only all classic Doctor Who stories had stood up so (relatively) well to the passing of time. Have you tried watching any of the Davidson, Baker or McCoy era programmes? While one can make allowances for the antediluvian period they was made in, limited budgets, the audience demographics and all the rest there are only so many excuses one can make. Be honest. Much of it is terrible. In fact as far I remember I was an early escapee from the sinking ship, abandoning the good Doctor in the first outing of Sylvester McCoy’s cringe-inducing Time Lord and his companion, the apocalyptically awful Melanie Bush (Bonnie screamin’ Langford!), followed by the less awful but just as irritating Ace (Sophie Aldred, in proto-Rose Tyler form, in a jacket covered with “right-on” badges. Arrrgh…!).

One longed for the class, wit and poise of the original Romana, and an actress of the calibre of Mary Tamm to bring those attributes alive.

Two Time Lords are better than one, the Doctor and Romana, Tom Baker and Mary Tamm

From the obituary in The Guardian:

“The Doctor Who actor Mary Tamm has died aged 62, her agent has said.

Tamm, who played the Doctor’s companion Romana alongside Tom Baker, died at a hospital in London on Thursday morning. She had been suffering from cancer for 18 months.

The actress was born in Bradford, West Yorkshire, the daughter of Estonian refugees, and had a long career on stage and screen. She starred in the films The Odessa File and The Likely Lads and had recurring roles in the soaps Brookside and EastEnders.

Tamm, who lived in Battersea, south London, trained at Rada. Her first professional job was at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre where she worked alongside Derek Jacobi, Joan Sims and Ronnie Barker. From there she moved on to television work and film, her first feature film being Tales That Witness Madness with Kim Novak.”

I think I’ll have another watch of Mary Tamm in one of her most enjoyable roles this weekend, in tribute and affection (and a wee bit of mortality-driven nostalgia. Ah, age…)

Bravetongue

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Two stories highlighting good news for our fellow Gaels in Scotland as the declining population of Scottish speakers begins to stabilise and we start to see signs of a small resurgence, in part attributable to the official recognition and promotion of Scotland’s native tongue by the SNP government in Edinburgh. From the Scotsman newspaper:

“A MAJOR push to train more teachers in Gaelic has been announced, to try to double the number of pupils speaking the language in Scotland.

Development agency Bòrd na Gàidhlig has produced the second National Gaelic Plan for the Scottish Government, making its headline target to increase the number of pupils speaking the language entering Primary One from 400 to 800 a year.

To meet this aim, officials are prioritising pre-school education alongside community action.

Bòrd na Gàidhlig will play a leading role in rolling out a teacher education strategy.

This includes initial teacher education, support for teachers currently teaching through the medium of English interested in transferring to Gaelic medium education, and support for teachers currently in the Gaelic system.

Dr Alasdair Allan, the minister for learning, science and Scotland’s languages, launched the Scottish Government’s National Gaelic Language Plan 2012-17 on a visit to Stenhouse Primary School in Edinburgh yesterday.

The plan states there is a need to strengthen the infrastructure of Gaelic education and learning generally by supporting the recruitment of a confident, properly trained workforce in order to service the expansion of Gaelic education.

Along with the help of the Scottish Government, local authorities and further education institutions, the Bòrd will support initiatives to increase the range of courses available to those who wish to enter teaching, or to transfer to teaching Gaelic.”

Meanwhile over on ForArgyll an article focusing on the success of BBC Alba, the Scottish language television channel:

“Since its launch on Freeview and on Virgin Media in 2011, BBC ALBA is now serving an audience of around half a million viewers a week.

Today, 29th June, MG ALBA, the Gaelic Media Service, published its Annual Report for the financial year 2011-12., highlighting the following successes:

  • four out of five Gaelic speakers are watching BBC ALBA every week
  • the average 15+ minute weekly reach for BBC ALBA for the year was 436,000, compared with 180,000 the previous year
  • the anytime average weekly reach was 515,000, compared with 220,000 the previous year
  • viewing of BBC ALBA programmes on the iPlayer doubled over the course of the year, rising from 1.56 million viewings the previous year to 2.2 million viewings
  • in the course of the year, MG ALBA funded 384 hours of content for BBC ALBA, with 72% (target 50%) of the programme expenditure being with eighteen (18) independent production companies
  • LearnGaelic.net, an interactive website that provides a one-stop-shop for anyone interested in learning Gaelic, was launched in October 2011.  This online resource was created in partnership with the BBC, Bòrd na Gàidhlig, the Board of Celtic Studies and Sabhal Mòr Ostaig with help from the Scottish Government
  • MG ALBA celebrated the success of its FilmG project that is growing year upon year, with 76 new films submitted to the competition. Over 200 short films made by individuals, schools and communities can be viewed here at the FilmG website.

Alasdair Morrison, Chairman of MG ALBA, says:  ‘Not only has BBC ALBA made an important contribution to broadcasting in Scotland over the past year, but it has also strengthened the profile and use of the Gaelic language.”

Trash TV Versus Irish TV

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TG4 – Súil Eile

Last week I reported on the risible claim by some journo over at the Oirish Independent newspaper that staff with the Irish language radio station Raidió na Gaeltachta were on the same exorbitant salaries as the rest of RTÉ’s employees (RnaG is part of the RTÉ corporation – to its misfortune). The article also claimed that RTÉ’s Irish language news and current affairs output which is supplied to RnaG and TG4, as well as broadcast on RTÉ Nuacht, was to be “amalgamated”. Since TG4 is an entirely separate public broadcaster from RTÉ I was able to point out just what complete and utter nonsense that claim was. And hey! Guess what? From today’s Indo, under the “…and in other news” section:

“Meanwhile, a RTE Raidio na Gaeltachta spokesperson has clarified that staff at the Irish language station are not paid the same as their RTE counterparts, as was reported last week, and are actually paid less. They are on a grade and pay structure unique to any other division in RTE.

It is now understood that a triangular consolidation of Irish language assets, as was reported with respect to the proposed overall RTE reforms, is not to take place. This consolidation would have seen an amalgamation of Radio na Gaeltachta, TG4, and the Nuacht news service.

However, TG4 and RTE are in fact two separate bodies under the 2009 Broadcasting Act, and such an amalgamation would require a change to the act. There is, however, a process under way to amalgamate the RTE Raidio na Gaeltachta news service and the RTE Nuacht news service, as part of an urgent process at RTE to maximise efficiencies and to reduce costs. RTE Nuacht provides Irish-language television news for RTE and TG4.”

As I stated on An Sionnach Fionn more than once, unify TG4 and RnaG as a single public service broadcaster, and turn RTÉ over entirely to English language programming. It’s 99% of the way there already so why keep flogging a dead horse? Let it go the same way as private rivals TV3 and 3e with wall-to-wall Anglo-American trash: quiz shows, reality shows, soft-porn and infomercials. At least with a new Teilifís Raidió na Gaeilge or TRnaG corporation controlling revamped television and radio broadcasters TG4 and RnaG (and hopefully a new, nationally-orientated RG4) we might have something that intelligent adults can engage with, instead of the casual infantilisation of the general public that comes from our current English language broadcasters.

TG4 And RnaG – Time For A Single Irish Public Broadcasting Service

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RTÉ vs. TG4

The Oirish Independent newspaper carries a report announcing “major reforms at RTÉ”, especially in relation to its, er, Irish language output (no sniggering!):

“A consolidation of the Irish language assets of RTE, with an amalgamation of Radio na Gaeltachta, TG4 and the Nuacht news service, is planned as part of the national broadcaster’s cost-cutting drive.

There is also the anomaly of the senior editors and producers in Radio na Gaeltachta and TG4 being paid at the same levels as their much busier counterparts in RTE TV in Dublin, an equality explained by the public-sector origins of RTE, which meant treating all its subsidiary sections or departments in the same way, and with the same pay levels.

But the feeling now is that this outdated structuring must be changed.”

TG4 originally began life as part of the RTÉ corporation (back when the Irish-language station was called TnaG) but it was made a separate public service broadcaster quite some time ago. However RTÉ stills provide a percentage of its programming, including its news service, an anomaly that should have been ended when the television station became statutorily independent. While it may seem sensible in the short term that the disparate news and current affairs teams for TG4, Raidió na Gaeltachta (RnaG) and RTÉ’s own Nuacht service are rolled into one there is a far more ambitious plan that should be implemented.

Several months ago I suggested that Irish language broadcasting in Ireland would be far better served if RnaG was split off from RTÉ and placed under the control of TG4, as its radio arm. As I said then:

“In the area of public service radio broadcasting in Irish TG4 is surely the logical organisation to turn to. Raidió na Gaeltachta (RnaG), for reasons which mystify most people, remains under the control of RTÉ. As an Irish language radio station its treatment in the RTÉ structure is simply abysmal. Underfunded, under-resourced, poorly ran and structured, it is the (deliberately) forgotten arm of the network.

RnaG must be liberated from the dead hand of Montrose and this can only come through an amalgamation with TG4. A single Irish language television and radio network, with a unified corporate structure and image, would provide the greatest value for money and service to viewers and listeners. What we have now is a mess, a national broadcaster that broadcasts almost exclusively in English controlling an Irish speaking radio station, when an Irish speaking TV station could do the job, and probably double the return in terms of investment and resources. The uniting of TG4 with RnaG would create a mutually supportive, symbiotic organisation with a cross-fertilization of audiences and programming.

It is time we faced up to the facts of where we really are in terms of Ireland’s media organisations. RTÉ is Ireland’s national English language public service broadcaster on television and radio. TG4, with RnaG, must become Ireland’s national Irish language public service broadcaster on television and radio. This is the only way forward that makes sound financial, organisational and broadcasting sense.”

I would also argue, in the interests of media plurality if nothing else, that a separate TG4-RnaG should have its own news and current affairs department, quiet separate from RTÉ’s, with a strong presence in the capital.

As for the rest of the newspaper report, the idea that TG4 or RnaG staff are on the same wages (and benefits) as the English broadcasters and staff in anglophone RTÉ is beyond risible.

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Wizards and Warriors

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For all you hardcore geeks (myself included) the utterly obscure, utterly surreal Wizards and Warriors, a short-lived American television Fantasy series from the early 1980s. If you remember this you are definitely one of the fraternity. Well done! ;-)

A United Ireland – Digitally At Least

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Well, better late than never I suppose. From the Hollywood Reporter (ooh-la-la!):

“TV viewers in Northern Ireland will be able to watch digital channels TG4 and RTÉ One and Two from the Republic of Ireland on digital terrestrial TV platform Freeview following Northern Ireland’s transition from analogue to digital TV, the U.K. government said Tuesday.

RTÉ, the Republic of Ireland’s national broadcaster, and Irish language broadcaster TG4 have joined forces to form a not-for-profit venture, which will be responsible for the installation of the new infrastructure.

Delivery of these channels will be supplemented by coverage from Saorview, Ireland’s equivalent of the U.K.’s Freeview service.”

Some more on this:

“[British]Communications Minister Ed Vaizey said:

“I’m delighted that the digital future for TG4, RTÉ One and RTÉ Two in Northern Ireland is now strengthened and secure. Today’s announcement is good news for viewers and continues our delivery on commitments set out in the Good Friday [Belfast] Agreement.”

Speaking in Dublin, Minister for Communications, Energy & Natural Resources, Pat Rabbitte, said:

“This announcement means that from Analogue Switch-off on 24 October, over 90% of viewers in Northern Ireland will be able to receive TG4 and the two primary RTÉ channels in digital on the Freeview service or by way of the overspill from the Saorview service.  It is a hugely positive result in terms of practical cooperation resulting from the Good Friday Agreement.”

To ensure the new Freeview service covers as much of the population as possible, the new service will use the modern MPEG4 and DVB-T2 standards which can be received on Freeview HD equipment. Many of the TV sets, set top boxes and digital recorders currently on sale in the UK already meet these requirements, and more information will be made available to the public by Digital UK and broadcasters well in advance of the launch of the service.

Digital switchover completes in Northern Ireland on 24th October 2012. It is intended that the new multiplex will be launched at the same time.  Switchover co-ordination body Digital UK and the Digital Switchover Help Scheme will lead on public communications on the availability of these new services. Both the UK and Irish Governments are committed to providing all possible support to meet the challenging timetable.”

No mention of British television channels being made available in this part of the country as part of this new arrangement, a commitment which is part of the original 1998 Belfast Agreement. But then perhaps the British know which way the wind is blowing. Who needs such arrangements in a Reunited Ireland?

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Craig Ferguson In Scotland

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Thought you might like this one. Scottish comedian and (subversive) chat-show host Craig Ferguson has recently been presenting his US-based Late Late Show from Scotland and here is an interview with First Minister Alex Salmond: