Posts by Danyl Mclauchlan
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Danyl, point me towards Mahler's 8th on the internet (in full, for free) and I'll buy you an ice cream.
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if Concert goes down, you'll be stuck with the Four Seasons and the Flight of the Damn Bumblebee on endless rotate on ClassicalGasFM.
So now there seems to be a consensual fantasy in which Concert FM is the only way people can listen to classical music. As has been pointed out, you can buy it if it's that important. If you don't have the cash you can listen to it for free on the internet. If you don't have the internet you can borrow it from the library.
Seriously, if you insist to compare the music broadcast by RNZ Concert to ice creams than I'm going to go ahead and suggest that maybe it's you, you know.
I'm going to go ahead and suggest that you find this argument infuriating because you can't actually answer it. It's a valid analogy. Obviously music and ice-cream aren't the same thing - that's why it's an analogy! But if we can have a taxpayer funded classical music station because people like it and they (supposedly) can't hear the music any other way then why not taxpayer funded free ice-cream?
Can't the same arguments be made in favor of it? The free ice-cream provides many flavors, whereas the market only a small handful, poor people cannot afford their own ice-cream and unless the taxpayer provides it for free they'll go without, it doesn't cost that much, it's barbaric to scrap it, etc.
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On many an insomniac or jetlagged night, I have listened to the deliberately calm and soothing voices (on both National and Concert) linking the deliberately calm and soothing programmes and music, and thought "yep, tonight a DJ is saving somebody's life."
Maybe they should rewrite the charter to ban the broadcast of Sibelius and Mahler after 10 PM.
Didn't it used to be the station that broadcast the cricket commentary, back in the day? And if it still were, would we even be having this discussion?
I think taxpayer funding for sports broadcasting is even more indefensible than the Concert program. And don't get me started on our ongoing obsession with publically funding yacht-races.
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I'd like to know why. Why are we doing this
I guess my point (that I've obviously failed to make) is that the question is not 'why not?', but 'why?'. If someone asks me why we need Radio New Zealand, or public libraries then I can (I think) make a pretty good case for why we need those institutions, how they serve the public good and how the taxpayers benefit from them. But when it comes to Concert FM there doesn't seem to be a case to make, other than 'because I like it' or 'why not?'
And, as I've pointed out you can use these arguments to make a case for any conceivable expenditure of taxpayer money: free ice-creams? I like it! Why not?
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Having a radio station which represents a broader view of culture is important.
But Concert FM has an amazingly narrow and specific view of culture.
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OK Danyl - let's just listen to your kind of music.
I mostly listen to classical music. I just fail to comprehend why the taxpayer should pay for the broadcasting and performance of it.
Classical music, plus all the kinds of less than commercial genres supported by the concert programme, is important to a lot of people in a lot of places around the country
If there were a government owned ice-cream stand giving away free ice-creams in the middle of Twizel then it would (one presumes) be very important to the people of Twizel. But that's not a valid argument. Of course people who like listening to classical music like having their hobby subsidised by the rest of the country.
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You'll probably have to say goodbye to the development of New Zealand composers.
Another strong argument in favor of the axe.
What is the cost of running a second station, a few DJs who crossover onto Nat Rad?
There are plenty of things the taxpayers could pay for that wouldn't cost too much money: hand out free ice-creams in Twizel, translate Beowulf into Maori, provide subsidised parking for people with no vowels in their name; the real question is why should the taxpayer pay for those things? Why should we fund a classical radio station?
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Much as I cherish Radio New Zealand I'm pretty comfortable with the proposal to shut down Concert FM. I can't see how it serves the public good for the taxpayer to own a classical radio station.
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"poor dishevelled Deborah"
Why would you take cheap shots at her appearance when her column is such a target rich environment?
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Pinker aside, Hill-Cone hasn't actually read Blink. A lot of the book is actually about how experts use experience and training to develop the ability to make intuitive judgements about their area of expertise. It attempts to understand how experts can make powerful, fast decisions, it's not an argument against expertise or 'the value of intuition over facts'.
That's like describing War and Peace as a novel about Napoleon's successful invasion of Russia.