Should (and could) ITV regionalise again?

Rather than just renewing on current terms they could add a condition in to for example increase non-news regional content which ITV can basically then accept and renew or the whole thing goes back to tender. Unlikely though.

I also don't think it is likely ITV would walk away from PSB broadcasting as their viewers wouldn't just go with them - Corrie just wouldn't get the viewers on ITV2 it does on ITV. Also nowadays it is more about ITV Studios than ITV Broadcasting, but being the largest commercial broadcaster in the UK adds some prestige to their studios business.

ITV could be forced to franchise off some of their territories, in effect creating affiliates, only if their market penetration became too high.

Looking at both the television audience and commercial sales, I can't see how ITV's share, whilst powerful, could ever be seen as too dominant unless something really apocalyptical happened.

Like;

BBC cuts pushed BBC1 into a position where its audiences looked more like Channel4's or BBC2's, leaving ITV with the sort of ratios that all the companies collectively got in the '70s. Seriously if the BBC ever got to that state, there'd be market mechanisms in place to restrict ITV's power anyhow. (Chance 1/50)

A significant player in the UK commercial space, say Channel4, folded, gifting ITV with an adscape without real competition. Under the current climate C4'd be bailed out, but f there was a sale of going concern or license, this would actually hurt ITV, unless of-course ITV were the buyer! In that case, there would need to be competition-related compromises, which may extend to franchising off C4/ITV regions. Seriously, I doubt ITV would ever be allowed to buy C4. (Chance 1/100)

A political party became seriously interested in preserving (re-creating) regional /local media with plurality, subsequently winning a general election with this as a manifesto commitment. This could only ever be the Liberal Democrats, I can't see Sir Kier, Boris/Ravi, or Nicola that interested media plurality? Perhaps this may surface as an NI thing? (Chance - 1/10,000)

But ITV could drop PBS commitments in a flash if they wanted to - they would lose the benefits such as the channel numbers 3 / 103 and some of the guaranteed capacity on Freeview, but there is nothing stopping them handing back their licences and moving to a purely commercial model. They obviously calculate that it isn't worthwhile to do so.

Agreed, they definitely have enough inertia and brand to do just that. But commercially it would leave a channel3 shaped PSB void that someone else could pick-up, probably very cheaply. Looking at a lot of ITV decisions, they seem to want to preserve as far as they can control of PSB/3 and a decent share of PSB mux bitrate.

Who'd want to be a PSB ? What (other than the 'third' EPG slot) is in it for any outfit ? Especially in a decade that is likely to end with linear delivery being a far less important than it was at the start.

I doubt any company would want to create a PSB regional structure from scratch to replace ITV if Ofcom advertised for one - even with the lure of a 3/103 LCN.

We only have to look at the dismal failure of the 'local TV' attempts to realise that sad fact.

I don't think local TV is a particularly good example. Its problems were the way it was set up: über local TV channels competing with a plethora of mostly UK-wide channels.

Standalone local TV channels are only really viable in the largest cities and even then, they don't show strictly local shows. In the likes of America and Japan, they are pretty much like other stations, just without network affiliation. They just buy in their own programmes independently rather than relying on a network.

Local/regional TV is valued but largely in terms of news, current affairs and perhaps some cultural stuff and coverage of one-off events. There's no point in a local cookery programme really. Or local soap operas.

That's why network TV, where the regional station does a bit of local stuff but largely takes on a network itinerary, is the best model. It's a big reason why many stations in the US have tons of local news without even being forced to by licence obligations.

But the only way that system works is if everyone is on a level playing field. That means a regional licencing system for all channels and equal PSB requirements. It probably also means fewer channels than we currently have but if linear TV is going to further decline in importance, this may not necessarily be a bad thing.

if you take away the massive amount of hours per week US local tv pumps out of local news, you're left with a weekday mid-morning lifestyle programme and a weekend filler culture slot. Already mentioned is some stations will cover local events such as a parade. But otherwise, it's similar to what ITV were putting out before only being obliged to provide a monthly political programme in addition to news.

I genuinely can't see a system of regional licencing occurring in the UK unless the country turns federal and each nation and region having to come to deals with differing companies. This could lead to problems over "foreign influence" for example Northern Ireland would have a delicate balancing act.

I have to say that from what little I've seen of local tv (Sheffield Live, Mustard Tv and This is Leeds) that it is dire.





It is the studio system which to my mind is in the lead. You look at Sky and see "ABC Studios" as a content provider. Future EPG's may have a combination of "wallpaper channels" and "studio streaming" with new episodes being released at specific times eg Emmerdale at 7PM on Mondays, Wednesdays and Friday.

If some kind of regional news provision is required then maybe there could be an "ITV News" streaming local bulletins in a cycle eg

hh:00 Border/Tyne Tees
hh:15 Yorkshire

etc. That way different regions would have their news at specific times although this would mean the end of half hour shows. Local bulletins would be updated at specific times and National News would be at specific times eg 8AM. 12 PM. 6 PM and 10PM

If that provision were to be extended to include non-news programmes (highly unlikely I know but humour me) then there could be an "ITV Regions" like "ITV News" showing regional programmes at certain times

Yes, indeed..totally agree.

An issue with discussion with this and similar forums in the UK is the misunderstanding of the word "local". In the main US media markets, local TV is essentially what we would call regional TV. Often our sub-regions are smaller than US markets quite a way down the ranking.

Our "local TV" experiment wouldn't equate to local US or regional Australian TV, but to small often city-subsidised initiatives.

Having said that, even if our local stations were better scaled (eg Cambridge from Sandy Heath mux2, Norwich from Tacky, something from Colchester from Sudbury), it still wouldn't have worked.

The US network/affiliate model works because networks pay the stations a subsidy (network compensation) out of national /regional spot sales, and that the reach of most stations is (a) very large (b) has a monopoly in that area on the network, often with very little overlap with other media markets (c) carriage rights on cable TV.

The UK equivalent would have been sub-regional stations opting-out of C5**, getting a subsidy from C5 in the process. C5 would have needed to be much more highly scaled to support this.

** Well, aside from C4, it's the only candidate.

That is a good point. To my mind "local news" means Calendar whereas that would be better classified as "regional news"

Local news eg a city wouldn't work because of a variety of factors such as
1. Would it be the city or the city and surrounding suburbs
2. Financial concerns. Some cities are larger than other and many potential applicants wouldn't partake because they wouldn't mak profits
3. Transmitters. Bradford and Leeds are a few miles apart and individual stations for both could overlap

The Sandy Heath transmission area, all of it, including Luton, Northampton, Peterborough, MK, Bedford etc... etc...

That's how both BBC and ITV sub-regions work, and is probably fairly logical, given that all these places are close together. Peterborough is the most far-flung but is in the county. MK looks toward Oxford and Birmingham, and everything looks toward London. Northampton is the only real odd-fit, the county is a triple-overlap between sandy, Waltham, and a little bit of Sutton Coldfield, but presumably, the city looks south rather than north into the East Midlands?