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RTE Cutbacks The Plan

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  • Registered Users Posts: 685 ✭✭✭TallGlass2


    Boggles wrote: »
    You were complaining about her going fleecing the tax payer with cap in hand, selling off assets negated the amount. No one claimed it was a long term solution.

    She has announced 60m in cuts in 3 years.

    So if you are judging her on how much the tax payer has to pay, her track record so far is admirable.

    Wouldn't you agree?

    No I wouldn't. I am judging RTE on there financial performance. The DG is over RTE, if they are not performing then they need to make the right choices for the org long term. Selling assets is not a long term solution, it's plugged the gap, going cap in hand to the government is not a solution either.

    The solution is the RTE gravy train stops, of course they don't want to give it up, the license payer is footing the bill for RTE, why should anyone in there care? RTE needs to drastically change from it's current form.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,905 ✭✭✭glenfieldman


    This live coverage of Gays funeral is another type of a waste of tax payers money


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    Nadella has 145,000 employees under him and managed to change the entire culture

    8,000 all female are currently suing Microsoft.

    Comparing a tech company to RTE is a poor example, but you picked an even poorer one that has had and still has a questionable culture.


  • Registered Users Posts: 30,702 ✭✭✭✭odyssey06


    In her 3+ year tenure at RTE to date, Forbes has done little other than make some cosmetic cuts and whinge to politicians about the TV licence.

    Has Forbes done anything that showed innovation based on extensive experience in the TV sector, or just done what an accountant acting as administrator for a PWC would have done with RTE?
    So far, I am just seeing the latter...

    "To follow knowledge like a sinking star..." (Tennyson's Ulysses)



  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    Boggles wrote: »
    8,000 all female are currently suing Microsoft.

    Comparing a tech company to RTE is a poor example, but you picked an even poorer one that has had and still has a questionable culture.

    That's a poor effort at a rebuttal if I ever saw one.

    Microsoft's stock went nowhere for years because it was resting on its laurels, maintaining its Windows and Office monopolies. Like RTE, which exhibits a similar monopoly mindset, it didn't appreciate for a long time how new tech would challenge its legacy business model. But when Nadella took charge, he stepped up and took decisive action to change the culture and orient Microsoft toward the future.

    RTE may not be a tech company, but it now has to compete with tech companies: YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, Apple, etc., are now all direct competitors of RTE. That means that RTE also needs to step up to the challenge and change its programming, its culture, its staffing levels, and its funding models.

    But instead, RTE wants to carry on doing things in the same old way it always has done, blaming the government and the taxpayer for its failures.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    Microsoft's stock went nowhere for years

    Jesus will you get real lad, you are making sound like he took over Yahoo and turned it around.

    It's Microsoft. I'd dare say you would made a fist of it.
    RTE may not be a tech company, but it now has to compete with tech companies. YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, Apple, etc., are all direct competitors of RTE. That means that RTE also needs to step up to the challenge and change its programming, its culture, its staffing levels, and its funding models.

    No they aren't and if RTE start to think that way they are goosed.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    Boggles wrote: »
    Jesus will you get real lad, you are making sound like he took over Yahoo and turned it around.

    Your increasingly irate and irrational responses are a good sign of someone on the losing end of an argument. :)
    No they aren't and if RTE start to think that way they are goosed.

    If they're not competitors, why on earth is the Irish Times publishing articles entitled "Can RTÉ respond to the challenge of Netflix and Amazon?"


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    If they're not competitors, why on earth is the Irish Times publishing articles entitled "Can RTÉ respond to the challenge of Netflix and Amazon?"

    It's pay walled. I can't read it. But the answer is No.

    Netlflix are about to release one movie that cost 140m. Their content budget is 15 billion. Anyone saying that RTE should be able to compete at the same level or are in direct competition with Trillion dollar companies is a complete unrealistic simpleton.

    Now the real question should be can RTE take advantage of the all out war streaming services are about to engage in?

    I think they can.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    odyssey06 wrote: »
    Has Forbes done anything that showed innovation based on extensive experience in the TV sector, or just done what an accountant acting as administrator for a PWC would have done with RTE?
    So far, I am just seeing the latter...

    I don't see that she's changed much in her three and a half years.

    Admittedly, RTE is hampered by its bureaucratic monopolistic legacy, unions, producers set in their ways, and is crippled by its bloated and overpaid staff — but it's her job to sort all that out.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    Boggles wrote: »
    Anyone saying that RTE should be able to compete at the same level or are in direct competition with Trillion dollar companies is a complete unrealistic simpleton.

    I think one would have to be an unrealistic simpleton not to understand that anyone providing content that Irish people want to watch is in direct competition with RTE. In times gone by, the denizens of Montrose just had to compete with the likes of the BBC, ITV, and Channel 4. Now, that competition also includes SkyTV, YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, and many others.

    Pointing out that RTE can't make a $140 million movie is beside the point. Irish children today are more likely to recognize popular YouTubers than RTE stars. Yes, RTE's "star" broadcasters in their 50s and 60s are being out-competed by American kids throwing up amateur content on a free streaming site.
    Now the real question should be can RTE take advantage of the all out war streaming services are about to engage in?

    I think they can.

    How can they compete with other streaming services when they don't even have a service of their own that works? Introduced in April 2009, the RTE Player is still an unusable piece of rubbish ten years on. What makes you think this will be fixed anytime soon?


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  • Registered Users Posts: 1,490 ✭✭✭KildareP


    Boggles wrote: »
    No they aren't and if RTE start to think that way they are goosed.

    Yes - they are.

    They are competing for screentime and listening time.

    Why do you think the likes of the BBC are pumping so much money into the BBC Sounds app, completely overhauling the iPlayer platform, developing dedicated apps to complement their CBBC and CBeebies channels, and keeping teens and young adults online with "channels" like BBC3?

    It's because they know if they don't draw their listeners and viewers into their platform and keep them hooked into them with content they want presented in a usable way, Netflix, Amazon, Sky, Apple, HayU and Disney are just chomping at their heels to do it for them instead.

    What are RTÉ doing?

    Drip feeding money to an RTÉ Player platform that is beholden with bugs, that falls flat on it's face when there's any sort of demand placed on it, a half-hearted RTÉjr app for babies, no attempt at developing apps for older children and young adults that they will want to seek out themselves and nothing that is reliable and usable from someone who doesn't own a traditional off-air TV.

    They're still stuck catering to an audience that in 10-15 years will be exempt from paying the TV license whilst completely alienating a whole new generation that are going to be questioning why they have to pay a license fee or broadcasting charge in the first place just to be legally able to watch their Netflix, Prime or Now TV?


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    I think one would have to be an unrealistic simpleton not to understand that anyone providing content that Irish people want to watch is in direct competition with RTE. In times gone by, the denizens of Montrose just had to compete with the likes of the BBC, ITV, and Channel 4. Now, that competition also includes SkyTV, YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, and many others.

    RTE have had to compete with BBC, Sky, ITV and Channel 4, etc for the best part of 20 years and in some cases longer.

    It's not new. IT's been "unfairly" up against serveral billions of programming a lot of FTA for some time now.

    It simply can't compete with the big hitting streamers which are about to cannibalize not just their content but themselves.

    But again, that is an opportunity for RTE.


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    KildareP wrote: »
    They are competing for screentime and listening time.

    Why do you think the likes of the BBC are pumping so much money into the BBC Sounds app, completely overhauling the iPlayer platform, developing dedicated apps to complement their CBBC and CBeebies channels, and keeping teens and young adults online with "channels" like BBC3?

    Again people need to start getting realistic with their comparisons.

    We are firmly into why aren't Cork City winning the champions league nonsense.

    The BBC spend more on online than RTE's entire budget.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    Boggles wrote: »
    It simply can't compete with the big hitting streamers which are about to cannibalize not just their content but themselves.

    Correct. And if RTE just maintains the status quo, the future is predictable — declining ad revenue accompanied by continued bleating for more money from the taxpayer.
    But again, that is an opportunity for RTE.

    How, exactly? As I pointed out above, the ten-year-old RTE Player gets 1.6 stars on the Google Play Store and is rightly derided as a piece of crap by most people who attempt to avail of it. Again, what makes you think this will be fixed anytime soon?


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,659 ✭✭✭✭NIMAN


    Boggles wrote: »
    Again people need to start getting realistic with their comparisons.

    We are firmly into why aren't Cork City winning the champions league nonsense.

    The BBC spend more on online than RTE's entire budget.

    Only idiots are saying RTE should be as good as the BBC, Netflix, Sky etc. and there are lots of them online.

    But my argument would be that people hosting a show on the radio for a handful of hours per week in Ireland shouldn't be earning half a million euro.

    I think RTe make plenty of good TV and radio, but it is shockingly run with wages that should be reserved for the bigger British and US stations.


  • Posts: 11,614 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Nobody expects overnight change, but Forbes has been in the job for three and a half years.

    In his first three years as CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella entirely transformed the company's culture. He removed redundant middle management, reoriented employees toward innovation, listened to customers' needs, and ultimately led Microsoft to the financial milestone of a $1 trillion market cap.

    In her 3+ year tenure at RTE to date, Forbes has done little other than make some cosmetic cuts and whinge to politicians about the TV licence.

    Nadella has 145,000 employees under him and managed to change the entire culture in short order; Forbes has about 1,850 under her and hasn't managed to change a thing.

    And even then, the proposed changes are fairly small in some cases, a drop in the ocean in others, and some again are unworkable.

    Some examples:
    1. The are going to sell The RTE Guide. Who honestly would buy it?
    2. The 15% cut of the top ten earners is going to save 450,000. With a target of 20 Million a year in cuts, 450k is less than 2.5% of their target saving


  • Posts: 3,621 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Has it struck anyone else the volume of advertisements from state bodies and quangos on RTE radio and TV?

    All except two short advertisements on radio 1 this morning were from state agency or quangos. Is the government getting good value for money? or are these subsidies by the back door?


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,864 ✭✭✭CrabRevolution


    Boggles wrote: »
    She shouldn't have to lead by example or take a pay cut. This thinking infuriates me.

    She isn't some simpleton who got the job because of time spent lingering around RTE or the "right" people.

    She was actively head hunted and brought to the table a wealth of experience.

    She ain't Joe Duffy, she could leave in a heartbeat and walk into a myriad of plumb roles around the globe.

    The problems at RTE won't be fixed overnight, there is 50-60 years of institution to untangle.

    I don't agree with everything she says, but she is making some right noises.

    She deserves the chance primarily because she is infinitely more qualified than anyone here and probably anyone that has assumed the role before.

    Yet the best she can do is beg the government for more money?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    Boggles wrote: »
    We are firmly into why aren't Cork City winning the champions league nonsense.

    So you acknowledge RTE can't compete on the "media empire" stage. That's a start.

    The only way forward for RTE is to focus on doing a few things well — namely, current affairs, home-produced drama, and the arts — rather than trying to do everything and doing it all badly.

    It needs to become a more efficient, streamlined, and cost-effective organization oriented around one TV station and one radio station, which should be really special. We need informative, objective, high-quality Irish media that we can be proud of, rather than third-rate stations throwing up a schedule of Home & Away and Grey's Anatomy.


  • Posts: 11,614 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    ronoc wrote: »
    Has it struck anyone else the volume of advertisements from state bodies and quangos on RTE radio and TV?

    All except two short advertisements on radio 1 this morning were from state agency or quangos. Is the government getting good value for money? or are these subsidies by the back door?

    This is commonly discussed on the Liveline thread. 1.45pm to 3pm with arguably a very large listenership. Its often a brief ad for an insurance company followed by an advert for the TV license. Its a sort of robbing Peter to pay Paul scenario. RTE stealing airtime from themselves to put on an advert or reminder for people to get a TV license which will go to pay for RTE, but losing out on additional cash from someone who would pay them for airtime. It really is a joke.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 70 ✭✭Zird


    And even then, the proposed changes are fairly small in some cases, a drop in the ocean in others, and some again are unworkable.

    Some examples:
    1. The are going to sell The RTE Guide. Who honestly would buy it?
    2. The 15% cut of the top ten earners is going to save 450,000. With a target of 20 Million a year in cuts, 450k is less than 2.5% of their target saving
    Enda Kilcullen is going to buy the RTE guide


  • Registered Users Posts: 7,319 ✭✭✭facehugger99


    Elmo wrote: »

    I don't think the 20 million supposed cuts that she as announced will materialise.

    €20m of cuts would bring the operating cost back to the level it was when she joined RTE.

    What a fcuking joke.

    She's being paid a king's ransom and has been there for years now, more than enough time to tackle outdated working practices and cut the eye-watering salaries.

    Instead, her main strategy seems to be to play the poor mouth and stick her paw out on RTE-produced programs.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 564 ✭✭✭Checkmate19


    Rte needs to be streamlined. One station. Get rid of 2fm. Produce quality home grown stuff. The cuts are a joke. Just saying oh we are doing something now give us more cash to waste. Just hope this gravy train is about to end as its a complete waste of money. Dating with my parents is an example of the pure muck these clowns are passing of as entertainment.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,497 ✭✭✭nkl12xtw5goz70


    The are going to sell The RTE Guide. Who honestly would buy it?

    A printed magazine with TV listings and no digital presence feels like an anachronism in this day and age.

    That said, the Christmas edition of the RTE Guide does sell around 300,000 copies.


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    Correct. And if RTE just maintains the status quo, the future is predictable — declining ad revenue accompanied by continued bleating for more money from the taxpayer.

    Nobody here is campaigning for the Status quo.
    How, exactly? As I pointed out above, the ten-year-old RTE Player gets 1.6 stars on the Google Play Store and is rightly derided as a piece of crap by most people who attempt to avail of it. Again, what makes you think this will be fixed anytime soon?

    Streaming is about to get a whole lot more expensive for what is essentially a diluted product. Are people going to pay 5-6-7 subs to get their fix. No.

    Competition in media nearly always ends up being more expensive for the consumer. Take Sky Sports as an example, they had the bulk of the premier league, La Liga and The Champions League. 2 of them are gone, so you need 3 active subs to watch what you were getting on one.

    It leads to illegal streaming and downloading.

    RTE should be actively cherry picking the best of this content.

    Because lets be honest if Netflix were the state broadcaster that spent 15 billion 95% of it which is complete horsé**** we'd all be going apeshíte.

    At least RTE produce 95% horsé**** on an infinitely smaller budget.


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,659 ✭✭✭✭NIMAN


    Rte needs to be streamlined. One station. Get rid of 2fm. Produce quality home grown stuff. The cuts are a joke. Just saying oh we are doing something now give us more cash to waste. Just hope this gravy train is about to end as its a complete waste of money. Dating with my parents is an example of the pure muck these clowns are passing of as entertainment.

    Again, not specific to RTE.

    Check out BBC, ITV, Virgin Media, Channel 5 in the UK.....in fact most stations are capable of producing rubbish.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 12,653 ✭✭✭✭Plumbthedepths


    Boggles wrote: »
    Nobody here is campaigning for the Status quo.



    Streaming is about to get a whole lot more expensive for what is essentially a diluted product. Are people going to pay 5-6-7 subs to get their fix. No.

    Competition in media nearly always ends up being more expensive for the consumer. Take Sky Sports as an example, they had the bulk of the premier league, La Liga and The Champions League. 2 of them are gone, so you need 3 active subs to watch what you were getting on one.

    It leads to illegal streaming and downloading.

    RTE should be actively cherry picking the best of this content.

    Because lets be honest if Netflix were the state broadcaster that spent 15 billion 95% of it which is complete horsé**** we'd all be going apeshíte.

    At least RTE produce 95% horsé**** on an infinitely smaller budget.

    I can choose not to pay for Netflix's horse****, I'm forced to pay for RTE's horse****.


  • Registered Users Posts: 40,236 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    I can choose not to pay for Netflix's horse****, I'm forced to pay for RTE's horse****.

    There is no one forcing you to pay for RTE and if they are I suggest going to the guards.


  • Posts: 11,614 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Boggles wrote: »
    There is no one forcing you to pay for RTE and if they are I suggest going to the guards.

    If you have a television, its the law.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 15,682 ✭✭✭✭Beechwoodspark


    Do ppl not realise that the tv license is mandatory


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