Tech Talk: Don't Kill the BBC World Service

I'm grumpy. I've just learned that in a few weeks time, my favorite radio station will be pulled off the air. Yes, the trusty BBC World Service is ceasing service in many of its international transmission regions. North America and Australasia are first; then, as the Beeb's beancounters see the savings pile up, I'm sure Asia will follow.

My tip is that by this time next year, there'll be no more World Service to balance the nonsense and lies heard from, er, less independent broadcasters. The sun never used to set on the British Empire, but as Tony Blair cozies up to the Europeans, the BBC seems to be stepping into line.

I'm arguing this not from a technology standpoint. I think online radio is one of technology's greatest advances, a godsend perhaps heightened by the fact that circumstances see me living in Singapore, hardly a liberal bastion of unfettered information flow. This is the country that thinks a free press is a big discount at the dry cleaners.

When I am in my cable-enabled office, my so-called info-junkie daily life has me compulsively wiring up to the overnight "Six O'Clock" TV news from London, Jim Lehrer's "News Hour" from Washington, the morning radio news from Melbourne, and then National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" via KQED San Francisco. And that's just before lunch.

Post-sandwich, its a talkback host raising Sydney's ire, more thought-provoking NPR from WNYC New York, the afternoon news from Melbourne and, depending on the day of the week, marveling at the wit of Garrison Keilor's "Prairie Home Companion" from Minnesota, the excellent "Fresh Air" arts program from Philadelphia, Ira Glass' quirky "This American Life" from Chicago, and the wacky Bostonian "Car Talk" guys. If it's the weekend, it's the football from Melbourne and the cricket via Cricinfo.com. All delivered via the Net. For brain nourishment, it sure beats the "Straits Times" and "Channel News Asia." The real world? What's that?

So as I sit in my "global headquarters," with the cream of the world's media just a click away, I should be celebrating that the BBC remains available online and on TV. But I'm not. The BBC is spinning that it's moving with the times, and that the World Service is available as independent as ever via the Internet. Which is great if you've got fast access for audio streaming, or reliable phone lines and lots of cash to leave it connected all day, which requires at least a second line so as conduct normal life. But how many Net users in Asia, where independent news is needed the most, have all of that? Cable access is still pretty thin and it will be years before the region has comprehensive broadband. Online radio is pretty useful in East Timor. Yeah right!

The fact is that streaming software, like Real Audio and Windows Media Player, is still a long way from being good enough (though the word is Microsoft's new XP operating system has addressed some of this issue). More alarmingly, governments are learning how to control stuff they don't like being said about them.

Even if streaming access is open and up to scratch, the BBC website's capacity is reportedly such that it can support just 20,000 simultaneous listener-users. That means mega-buffering, the signal fading out and always at the crucial moment, kind of like those high camp, B-grade Hollywood films when the dying man pops off before fessing up the name of the villain. To fix the problem, the BBC would have to spend money cranking up capacity, the money presumably saved by dropping the radio transmission. Makes a lot of sense.

Call me old-fashioned. Don't kill the shortwave.