Monday morning, and here in North Wales the Bank Holiday is not having much of an effect. We have already had two council rubbish collections, there are two electricians working next door, my neighbour who runs his own roofing business went off to work at 08:30, another neighbour has just had a delivery and collection by the local cleaning company, yet the Jeremy Vine Show slumbers on in blissful ignorance of The Real World.
So, no news today then? How about this:
We read in the papers over the weekend that the Murdoch media control over a fifth (22%) of the UK's "news" consumption. Now normally I would not miss an opportunity to have-a-go at the Murdoch empire, but more interestingly the same article shows that the BBC controls a massive 39.3% of the stories broadcast in the name of "news". We discuss today whether there is too much "news" broadcast by the BBC and what could be cut. My show is an obvious candidate as even the About Radio 2 website page does not acknowledge its existence stating that "BBC Radio 2 ... combines popular music and culture with a diverse range of specialist music, documentaries and comedy". So would you miss my show? I particularly want to hear from those Radio 2 listeners who do not normally listen.
Ref: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/organgrinder/2010/dec/30/murdoch-to-control-22percent and http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/help/about/