Dee Forbes banging the RTE TV licence drum again 60m uncollected fee *poll not working - pl ignore*

So true it does look terrible, but they coudnt give a shite what the public thinks. The gubberment will do nothing to stop this monumental waste of taxpayers money nor demand any real action regardless of all the posturing in committees.

You are not wrong there Ginneral..not wrong at all.

The same lot are butt reaming John Q Taxpayer out there.

They haven’t shifted the ‘Little Corporal’ out of there yet.

One of the newspapers did door-step Dee, interesting to see that no-one is door-stepping Jimbo either

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/it-was-a-testing-time-rtes-kevin-bakhurst-reflects-on-ryan-tubridy-payments-scandal-with-sean-orourke/a894323735.html

"Sure **** it I'll do a soft interview with one of RTÉ's former top stars who is now doing a podcast with us, now how about a book review."

Remember here is an organisation trying to get value for money, when they get a chance to retire a presenter they bring them straight back in.

They pretty much are doing it in the dail. Green Party Patrick Costello is now on a war path to get RTÉ archiving into legislation. He brought this up during the scandal and has now brought it to committee, RTÉ came gave their evidence and didn't stay for the rest. All very one side, while a good idea it has some issues, unlikely to be passed but a good distraction amendment to the broadcasting Act, neither TG4 nor the CnaM were at the meeting though both would have to be involved.

Basically all involved more money to avoid RTÉ not being able to do the great work they currently do.

what they always do,pal, use the taxpayers euron to get exposure and then butt ream the same taxpayer with

nixers and ambassador crud to be kept off the books as far as possible.

Keeps the little corporal and his ilk with a nice little earner guv.

A pointless listen as much of the same is said again and again, Sean O'Rourke interview Kevin Bakhurst.

I will take a breath and rant another day.

There's a slot on recently manufactured TVs to enable the addition of Conditional Access Module that facilitates Pay/Subscription TV. This would require a CAM, smartcard and subscription management system as RTE has no such capabilities. Not even God could help RTE if any potential subscription system came to the attention of those who break such systems. It doesn't matter how many "consultants" or "technology" journalists say such a system is secure because if it is a viable target, it will be compromised.

Ireland is a very small market when it comes to subscription TV and most of it is already served by Virgin Media. This would make it a bit more complex to implement a subscription model. Then there is Internet access. RTE would end up with having to defend on at least three fronts.

https://2rn.ie/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Irish-DTT-receiver-spec_V9.pdf

Retrofitting a system like Saorview would be a nightmare even for a competently run organisation. RTE would do its usual trick of employing high-priced spoofers who know the buzzwords and nothing else about securing a system. The result would be inevitable.

Regards…jmcc

https://www.irishtimes.com/media/2024/10/14/rte-player-will-ask-all-users-to-sign-in-from-next-year-as-it-adds-more-original-shows/

Ah well I won't be signing up but sure it was nice while we had it

It would involve more expense because it is not a single system. There's Saorview and a CAM/smartcard for each TV. There's cable TV which already has a sophisticated system with RTE/TV3 on the basic tier. There's also Saorsat (on the same satellite as banned Russian and Iranian channels and which requires a different LNB). There's also an Irish TV feed via Sky on Astra. Then there's broadband. It isn't just a single Pay-TV system for Saorview.

It would be possible to design an integrated billing system but it would have to take data from multiple sources. Given RTE's history, it would be worse than PPARS and the HSE. The technical side of RTE is quite good. The management is not and there's no expertise in Pay-TV there. The usual RTE route would be to get "advice" from spoofers who claim to know about Pay-TV and Conditional Access.

Regards…jmcc

GOOD BOY a new RTÉ web series.

RTÉ player is filled with web series aimed at the yuff audience. It is telling when the Irish Times begins to blow wind up RTÉ that this could be either a potential hit or a massive flop, IMO it's most likely something that no one will remember.

All due respect to the people involved in the series and I hope I am proven wrong.

Today and yesterday the Press has been blitzed with the arrival of this new show. GOOD BOY is about a guy with ADHD (bought to with Audio Description and in High Definition, the writers can have that joke!).

So far RTÉ have release about 6 trailers for the show previewing the series. And I understand that you have to do that for a new series. They even had a press event at the Light House, they are putting in a huge effort into promoting the series and of course the Player, announcing that we can expect to be required to sign into the player in the near future.

To me the series is sounding more and more like a 8 to 10 min episode show. But according to the times via RTÉ this is a new era for the service (I imagine that IT would be sitting down to have a convo about such new eras with Dee Forbes and still ignore the elephant in the room, lets just get over the old era and look at how great the new Public Service Broadcaster is).

https://www.irishtimes.com/media/2024/10/15/good-boy-comedy-marks-new-era-for-rte-player/

There were several points during a preview screening of Good Boy, the first ever RTÉ Player sitcom*, where the laughs on the page were landing, the comedy timing spot on, the pathos executed with a deft directorial hand and star Tony Cantwell’s facial expressions such a rubbery delight where I had the thought “but this is good enough to be on actual television”.

Possibly not … but sure. If that is how you are think you are probably right and even as you plamas RTÉ about the series you cann't help but realise.

…for now, it has no channel air date lined up. That seems to say much more about where linear broadcasting finds itself than it does about Good Boy.

However it is not just that it probably won't work on any channel but also because your preview saw you watch 3 episodes of the "first" series and you can hope to have a second:-

This seemed to me, having seen three of the four short episodes made to date, to be self-evident.

I doubt that RTÉ would "preview" three quarter of the series on a Friday Morning if an episode was more than 15mins long, you'd get through the first episode hoping that you might make a quick escape before an hour had lapsed by the 3rd episode, even if the series was the best series ever produced.

No this is the same old, same old from RTÉ. It began in 2014 with new look RTÉ2, where over the next decade every show was a pilot never to be seen again, until ultimately these pilots moved over to the Player, away from the prying eyes of the public.

And of course in the crowd the new head of Content, Steve Carson, who was Director of TV Programmes at RTÉ in 2009, where he saw the beginning of the RTÉ2 pilots era and I am sure he's happy to be back now as Director of XtraVision, sorry no I mean Video director of VHS! The future looks bright.

Remember Dear Boy soon Good Boy will be a forgotten era of RTÉ shite talk.

*This isn't an achievement considering RTÉ in its 60s years have only ever produced a handful of sitcoms.

Doubtful she had much to do with Programming or Content in Discovery, I don't think she was a commissioner. Seems she was there to sell the channels to Pay TV companies.

But not implement Pay-TV systems or run them.

Regards…jmcc

Wonder if anyone would have any idea what sort of fees rte pay for contributors to their shows?

I was listening to Sunday Sport today on Rte radio, and Alan Cawley was on offering his knowledge and thoughts on the footy. From what I'd guess, he was sitting in studio watching the Man City and then the Liverpool games, and every so often telling us how they were going and his thoughts.

Would he earn much for this afternoons work?

Randomly I came across an article in one of the tabloids about Greg Dobson (former Prime Time presenter) and though to check out Perspectives with Sean O'Riordan (former Drivetime presenter) to see if he'd done any more interviews since Kevo Bee4.

Perspectives with Sean O'Rourke podcasts were weekly when it first launched,

7 eps series one published weekly

9 eps series two published weekly

15 eps series three published weekly

and finally just one episode so far published on 9th Oct 2024, 3 months 3 weeks after the release of the last interview with Sean and Greg! (aka Brian and Sean)

https://www.rte.ie/radio/podcasts/series/37870-insights-with-sean-orourke/

I think Kevo Bee4 arranged an insight with Sean O'Rourke as part of RTÉ "autumn" launch.

I see no other reason for this episode a soft sop to help with the rehab of RTÉ.

… Some names and details have been changed. I have changed people's names and programmes they presented. Some names and descriptions have been changed to protect privacy. To the best of my ability, I have re-created events, programmes, people, and organizations from my memories of them …