Local TV channel "Made in Cardiff" takes to the air

Made in Cardiff will show daily news and magazine programmes about the city on Freeview channel 23.

Station manager Bryn Roberts said Cardiff was the ideal location for a successful local television service.

But deputy culture minister Ken Skates said he was concerned public funds were being diverted from traditional broadcasters to support "struggling" local TV stations across the UK.

Local television services were created after a move by the UK government to replicate the success of similar small broadcasters in the United States.

They are partly funded by the BBC licence fee.

Two other local TV stations in Wales - Bay TV Swansea and Bay TV Clwyd in Mold - are due to launch in 2015.

'Ideal size'
Mr Roberts said that while Made in Cardiff's budget was small, the "adrenaline" was helping his team of 12 people to produce 14 hours of programming a week.

He also predicted the new TV channel would fare better than others.

"I think Cardiff is an ideal size for this kind of venture," said Mr Roberts.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-sout ... s-29617740

Looks like it's starting in a couple of minutes, you might have to retune your telly, it's on channel 23.

I'm wondering what exactly they're going to showing on this.

A bizarre start at 8pm - no introduction, the first thing on screen were Samba Gales, drumming their hearts out. No intro, no words, just samba drumming. In Wales.
There's been a doc about the IRIS prize and a confusing array of segments. The talking heads are actually quite good.
7/10

I'm not sure if I'm entirely sold on the concept of "hyperlocal" TV, personally a Wales-wide (or at least South Wales-wide) channel with larger budget would make more sense considering our population size, sort of like an English S4C maybe. I'm not sure if there's really enough stuff to report about going on in Cardiff to make a TV channel out of it.

After all, Scotland has STV, which seams relatively successful over there. And sure, there's the regional BBC/ITV channels, but other then sections of the news and weather, there's so little difference in programming most of the time they may as well just be the exact same channel's people see over in England. I wonder if when they build the new BBC Wales HQ, there will be more local programming? Maybe not, but it would be nice.

Edit: Also, they should probably fix the voiceover track on some of their programmes, you can barely here what they're saying on top of the music.

I'm loving the weather reports, I'm pretty sure there's not going to be that much of a difference between the weather in Whitchurch and the weather in Llandaff North for example It's rain, lots of rain., but anyway.

Also, I'm hoping for some local, local adverts. will we get some gems like this once day?