http://www.crikey.com.au/2009/05/25/alstons-cold-dead-hand-still-controls-broadband/ now with extra source Sun, 12 Feb 2012 02:48:10 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 http://www.crikey.com.au/2009/05/25/alstons-cold-dead-hand-still-controls-broadband/#comment-27232 CHRISTOPHER BLACKIE Mon, 25 May 2009 05:10:32 +0000 http://www.crikey.com.au/?p=60903#comment-27232 Actually, the problem for lots of regional areas is not that they don't get capital city news services (they all do), but rather that they don't get a 'local hicksville' service. WIN already does all Victorian news services out of Ballarat, with a smattering of actual local content in amongst stories from other regions. This leads to a situation where viewers in Mildura are served up a couple of stories on local issues with the rest made up of local-interest stories from, say, Traralgon, as though regional issues can be all lumped in together in one non-Melbourne service. If the NBN makes it even more difficult for license holders to provide local content, the real impact would surely be to make it harder to find 'local hicksville' news rather than making it easy to escape from it. Actually, the problem for lots of regional areas is not that they don’t get capital city news services (they all do), but rather that they don’t get a ‘local hicksville’ service. WIN already does all Victorian news services out of Ballarat, with a smattering of actual local content in amongst stories from other regions. This leads to a situation where viewers in Mildura are served up a couple of stories on local issues with the rest made up of local-interest stories from, say, Traralgon, as though regional issues can be all lumped in together in one non-Melbourne service. If the NBN makes it even more difficult for license holders to provide local content, the real impact would surely be to make it harder to find ‘local hicksville’ news rather than making it easy to escape from it.

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