Newstalk Megathread

mobius42

I was surprised at how little time RTE radio spent covering the elections. I found myself constantly switching to Newstalk, who seemed to be the only station giving consistent coverage.

coopersgreen

Yeah, kudos to them. It was good.

spank_inferno

The election coverage was ok
Good idea using acedemics for contributions/updates as it got the facts across rather than their opinions

>>>> anyway.... I noticed this today on the Right hook
I was watching the broadcast on their website via Ustream.tv

Hook finished up his item at 18:53 & cut to add breaks with George putting down his earphones and leaving.
The adds went on for 2 mins and then came back to the sound of hook reading a text and thanking the guests/staff.
....but.... Hookey had already left his seat at 18:53!

The text he read and his outro were obviously recorded, so while he was speaking other lads were walking around the studio.

It just seems strange that their flagship show cuts content to the bone and Hookey is gone nearly 10 mins before the hourly news starts!

Dub13

spank_inferno wrote: »

It just seems strange that their flagship show cuts content to the bone and Hookey is gone nearly 10 mins before the hourly news starts!

Yea its ridiculous,you could take them having 2 brakes in the last 10 min of the show if it meant less brakes for the rest of the hour but they seem to still fit in loads of brakes.

GSF

spank_inferno wrote: »

Hook finished up his item at 18:53 & cut to add breaks with George putting down his earphones and leaving.
The adds went on for 2 mins and then came back to the sound of hook reading a text and thanking the guests/staff.
....but.... Hookey had already left his seat at 18:53!

Maybe he had to be somewhere or maybe the bladder is weak?

ateam

Half of Matt Cooper's interviews aren't live. It's obvious.

Badabing

ateam wrote: »

Half of Matt Cooper's interviews aren't live. It's obvious.

Which he said loads of times on air, somtimes guests aren't available at a certain time.

More Music

Why is anybody surprised by this.

Texts and emails are constantly made up by stations to generate debate/more texts. The more serious current affairs shows for the most part don't do this (RTE, legacy local stations etc.).

It's rife in the likes of Spin SW and i Radio.

Segments are also pre-recorded and presented as live.

Optimus485

If you listen to the re-runs at night there are very few ads.

Dub13

Optimus485 wrote: »

If you listen to the re-runs at night there are very few ads.

Yes but the news can be over 12 hours old,not very professional.

spank_inferno

Badabing wrote: »

Which he said loads of times on air, somtimes guests aren't available at a certain time.

Which is of course perfectly fine.
But it wasnt an interview in this case, rather an "outro" that was presented as realtime but wasnt

Mabey I shouldnt have looked at the web feed and remained in blissful ignorance of their corner cutting.
2 add breaks in 10 mins is bad form

And yes, the commercial music stations are constantly faking their "requests" etc...... "yeah this is jimmy in blanch.... can you play Beyonce again for the 5 time this hour..."

mike65

I'm on Hooky watch!

er it seems I'm not.

Running now.

Dub13

I was in the car a couple of weeks ago and after a couple of months of not listen to the right hook I decided to give him another chance.So I tuned in and his show was coming from a cafe or something like that,their was a terrible humming noise coming from the 'audience'.I could only stick it for about 10min,its was very very unprofessional.

Why do they keep doing these half arsed outside broadcasts,surly they are losing listeners because of them.

Aidric

The problem is Hook tbh. He seems utterly out of his depth on issues of any substance.

Paddo81

I dont know, I always thought he was just a big rugby head, but when ya listen to some of his items, its clear hes pretty up to date with and has a real interest in current affairs.

The main reason I cant listen to him for any extended period of time is that hes abit of a know-all. And this combined with the short items and constant need for ad-breaks means he comes across as not listening to his guests. Once they go over the magic 1 minute response time hes just "yeah yeah ok ok, theres a key point here and its this" Gives me the sh!ts.

deadhead13

Ger Gilroy is taking over Off The Ball Extra as of tonight. Hopefully he will dump the hour of highlights and bring the Football Show back.

Dub13

deadhead13 wrote: »

Ger Gilroy is taking over Off The Ball Extra as of tonight. Hopefully he will dump the hour of highlights and bring the Football Show back.

I heard that,anybody know whats time its over at...?I hope its a full show ontill 10.

LordSutch

Last night Michael Jacksons death was announced, wall to wall discussions were had, his songs were played on many Irish & British radio stations > but Newstalk wasnt one of them due to the 10pm 'Live' shutdown & the through the night 'repeats'

I followed the whole story on BBC Radio Five Live.

Newstalk currently seem to be an 'opinion based', half baked, directionless joke and they really need to pull their finger out & become a serious 24 hour NEWS Radio Station (just like Radio Five), or alternatively just limp along aimlessly, neither fish nor foul, with a bit of music and no proper news coverage

Firetrap

Er...I was listening to Culture Shock Live last night from 10 til near midnight. They were giving updates on Michael Jackson's rumoured death and later confirmed it on the show. Just thought I'd point that out.

deadhead13

Dub13 wrote: »

I heard that,anybody know whats time its over at...?I hope its a full show ontill 10.

Everything was going along fine until..... the bloody highlights show popped up again....I won't be tuning again next week.

yamo

Camelot wrote: »

Last night Michael Jacksons death was announced, wall to wall discussions were had, his songs were played on many Irish & British radio stations > but Newstalk wasnt one of them due to the 10pm 'Live' shutdown & the through the night 'repeats'

I followed the whole story on BBC Radio Five Live.

Newstalk currently seem to be an 'opinion based', half baked, directionless joke and they really need to pull their finger out & become a serious 24 hour NEWS Radio Station (just like Radio Five), or alternatively just limp along aimlessly, neither fish nor foul, with a bit of music and no proper news coverage

What do you think Newstalk have in the way of resources for something like that? It's not a music station, so they wouldn't have a bunch of Michael Jackson CDs sitting around. They don't have journalists on call for events like Michael Jackson dying. You could argue that if it were a major world event such as a war or a political assassination, then maybe they could break into coverage of that.

It was a late night event, which is not something that would merit all night coverage on an Irish Radio Station. Did RTE break into 24 hour news coverage? Ireland is a small country with fairly minimal media resources. It's fine for Sky and BBC, both of whom run as 24 hour news stations to cover major events like this. Newstalk would maybe have covered the story for a small handful of people who weren't watching either of the 24 hour stations on TV. Would that have justified the expenditure that an overnight broadcast would have brought on? Not at all. Not for a celebrity who had undoubted talent, but a questionable personal life.

TaxiManMartin

What is Tom Dunne doing on Newstalk.
Every morning i have to switch off as soon as he comes on. And im not the only one either.
His show is just not doing it for the type of content i expect newstalk to have.
Please Newstalk get rid of him and continue the style of your morning programs on through the day.

Firetrap

yamo wrote: »

What do you think Newstalk have in the way of resources for something like that? It's not a music station, so they wouldn't have a bunch of Michael Jackson CDs sitting around. They don't have journalists on call for events like Michael Jackson dying. You could argue that if it were a major world event such as a war or a political assassination, then maybe they could break into coverage of that.

It was a late night event, which is not something that would merit all night coverage on an Irish Radio Station. Did RTE break into 24 hour news coverage? Ireland is a small country with fairly minimal media resources. It's fine for Sky and BBC, both of whom run as 24 hour news stations to cover major events like this. Newstalk would maybe have covered the story for a small handful of people who weren't watching either of the 24 hour stations on TV. Would that have justified the expenditure that an overnight broadcast would have brought on? Not at all. Not for a celebrity who had undoubted talent, but a questionable personal life.

I just thought I'd point out that they did have live programming on at the time. Culture Shock.

humberklog

Firetrap wrote: »

I just thought I'd point out that they did have live programming on at the time. Culture Shock.

Indeed. Which I was just listening to...at about 8.45 driving from the beach. "News just coming into Culture Shock- Jacko's dead". So it was covered at the time and then revisited on a Saturday afternoon, for the love of god. Sham.

luckat

What drives me crackers is the way Newstalk takes to the sports along with all the other lemmings every weekend afternoon all summer. I'd love to have just one channel that had news and news focus on all the time.

humberklog

yamo wrote: »

Not for a celebrity who had undoubted talent, but a questionable personal life.

I think you're strenghtening Camelot's point about NWTK being 'opinion based' right there.

It's not about them not covering Jacko it's about them not being there past 10 in the evening and when they are there they do appear just as Camelot says (and you re-affirm).

Could it be that expensive to live feed WRN from midnight to 6.30?!

Firetrap

Culture Shock on a Thursday night and Splanc on a Friday are live. It's not wonderful I know but better than nothing.

LordSutch

I was just trying to hilight the fact that I had to listen to all the latest Jacko news on Radio Five Live, because here in Ireland we don't have a proper professional 24 hour news radio station > and Maybe we should do? and maybe Newstalk could be 'tweaked' to become this serious News Radio Station, instead of its current remeit as a 12 hour 'opinion based' station with through the night repeats ............

GhostInTheRuins

Tweaked? A complete overhaul is what they need.

c montgomery

NewsTalk!!!!

I actually really like the station as i like talk radio but i have some real issues with it.

Saturday evening at about 7 i was listening to it and they were broadcasting rumours that michal jackson had died. I dont mind a station playing repeats late at night but playing them on a sat afternoon is really unacceptable.

The 30 cent text charge!!!!!!!!
What a complete rip off. This station depends somewhat on people texting in and giving their opinion, to be charged 30 cent for this is a scandle.
To text any other station its "normal text rates apply". Today fm have a standard network rate for texts and they are owned by the same company and are in the same building.
I just have it when they are talking about rip off ireland and how were get overcharged for everything here but when i text in to give out about their text rate they never read out my comment.

Oh and that fool they have doing the lunchtime news show, what a sensationalist prick. Who gives a **** what gerald keane thinks of anything, he seems to be on the show every week. A poor presenter on a poor show.

Moncrefe is excellent as is off the ball.
The breakfast show is ok, it was better before yates.
Tom Dunne is a complete lightweight, i like him and i know he could be a whole lot better but when he's talking about really trivial mundane things like emptying the dish washer and a nice cup of tea ya had the other day its hard to stay tuned.
Hook is a clown.

That is all