Issue 2 – Monday 31 July
Mixing desk misery brings silence to the airwaves
Jon Wright
To err is human, but to really mess things up you need technology. Maybe not the best attitude for someone from the Media Centre, but it's mine and I'm sticking to it.
Hopefully some of you will have tuned into 87.7FM Radio Global on Saturday. We had a fantastic launch with Ben and Elissa behind the mike, two of our volunteers who came on the pre-camp training weekend. The two hours included a wide range of music and some snap-shot interviews of all the hard work going into getting Global Village up and running.
We then looped it for the rest of the day and streamed it onto the web. So far so good.
Now, I don't want to get too specific, but one of the main bits of a radio station is a mixing desk. Everything goes into it – microphones, the music computer and a couple of CD players, and then hopefully nice, interesting, stimulating things come out which is then broadcast across Global Village. Sadly, our mixing desk has been feeling a bit poorly and decided, without much notice, to have a sick day.
This was very disapointing for our two presenters, John and Sian, who had arrived at the Media Centre for six o'clock Sunday morning all ready for their first show. After a trying various things with tape, wires and sweat, we had to call off the day's broadcast while we found a long term solution.
As I write this I'm confident the 87.7 Radio Global will be back on the airwaves soon, and that what we put out will be of interest to all those at camp.
One way of making sure what you hear is of interest is to come and take part in making it. We have an editorial meeting every morning at ten o'clock. We can then see what stories and features we want to make and help people go out and cover them. We're also on the lookout for interesting guests to come in while we're live on air between seven and eleven each morning. It's your media... when it works.