Sun man slams regional commercial broadcasters

Sun Online's assistant editor told an industry forum that local and regional commercial broadcasters have failed to embrace their communities and give them a forum for discussion.

Speaking at the Westminster Media Forum, yesterday, Marc Webber said that people were flocking to MySun because they did not feel they could hold debates with local broadcasters.

He said the problem was 'widespread' throughout local commercial broadcasters both on radio and television.

Mr Webber said that local commercial TV was in danger of coming off second best to local newspapers as it developed multimedia platforms.

He also claimed that the launch of the MySun interactive element had resulted in several thousand people signing up to the service.

He later told Journalism.co.uk: "They [local commercial broadcasters] need to make it obvious that they want to communicate with their audience... if you look at local radio stations you couldn't find any debate or encouragement for debate on what their community wants to talk about."

He said there were exceptions and praised Virgin Radio for its fan forums and ability to engage its audience.

He added: "When you listen to local radio stations the only time they encourage people to ring in, apart from breakfast, is when they try to do funny things or competitions.

"Their argument is to say 'people don't want to get involved in local news or discuss burning topics'. I disagree, they are doing it with us, they are doing it with local newspapers, online and off-line, they want to talk, they want somewhere to go.

"Commercial broadcasters I have a big problem with. I understand the pleading poverty argument from them but it doesn't cost much to open your mouth on the radio and say 'what do you think of this?'"

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