Horse 1091 - The Colour of Radio

Members of the Twitterati will have read that yesterday I was in the offices of the ABC in Ultimo, to discuss something of perhaps future import.
The way I figure it, digital radio has the potential to offer a wider range of programming to listeners because of its extra bandwidth. I also figure that in the Australian radio landscape there have been great gaps and holes left behind.

Radio in the 50s and 60s was probably in its heyday in Australia. Comedy, drama, suspense and all sorts of radio plays could have been heard. Jason and the Argonauts, The Shadow, The Idiot Weekly, Please Sir etc went down in Australian folklore. Yet when the onslaught of television cam upon us, the medium of radio was abandoned.
Locally produced radio in Australia falls roughly into three categories - music, talkback and news and current affairs. True, the ABC does produce such shows as AM, PM, and Gardening programs, but really most of what is on the radio hardly deviates from that. There is very little in the way of new scripted radio content at all.

To be totally fair, I do like the BBC's Radio 4 and Radio 7 and probably listen to them far more intently that I do Australian radio. The obvious argument here is that if I'm already getting this content, then why do I need to complain? The answer to that is obvious - why can't we do it here?
Australia has a veritable glut of live comedy just asking to be put on the radio. The Melbourne Comedy Festival for instance could be broadcast live, with very little outlay. Radio is inherently cheaper to produce than television as well. Gone are the need to provide sets or costumes, and microphone equipment for radio is cheaper than a full kit of cameras and boom mikes.

And to this end I suggested that the ABC as part of its commitment to new content, set up a radio station which would be digital only (which might also encourage the switchover), and be similar in style to BBC Radio 7, but with more of an emphasis on live content.
Specifically, I like to be the host of the Australian version of either "Just a Minute" or "Does the Team Think?", both of which rely heavily on a panel of comedians having to think on their feet.

One of the questions that one of the grey suited penguins asked me, is if my proposed station were to be adopted, then what would I call it? (Always marketing types and their damn names), to which I ironically suggested that it be called ABC Radio Spectrum - "The Colour of Radio" and have various blocks of segments named for the "colour" of their content, rather like the old Penguin paperbacks. To tell the truth, it was BJD who gave me this idea when on many occasions whilst I was still at Tooney Baps, that he said that what the band was playing needed more "purple" or "orange".
Actually it's not all that hard to imagine a block of programming with the station idents going something like "This is ABC Radio Spectrum, you are now entering the Yellow Zone" if it was say live comedy or perhaps "this is the black zone" if it was a horror drama, or maybe "welcome to the green zone" for a block of crime thrillers.

Overall, I'd say that the meeting went well but as always with these things, you never can tell really.
The future is bright, the future is Orange?