Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Thursday, 24 November 2022
Joint Committee on Tourism, Culture, Arts, Sport And Media
Future Business Model Plans and Long-term Vision for the Media Sector: Discussion
Mr. Simon Myciunka:
Sport was mentioned earlier. I would just like to shine a light on a national brand, Off the Ball, which is an example of investment that Bauer Media has made into digital literacy. We impact a broadcast programme into a distributed media business, which means a lot of social broadcasts and lots of digital broadcasts and events. That is a huge investment in tech and infrastructure but, most important, in skills as well. The problem is that the distribution is on tech platforms that offer disproportionate levels of revenue or limited or no access to monetising that content. That has proven to be a bedrock for how we operate on some of our other brands such as Newstalk, Today FM, 98 FM and Spin. They all have a similar investment in skills and talent in order to make sure we have a multi-platform array of content creators. It is definitely something we are doing but it is very difficult to get the monetisation of that content that we had before. In answer to an earlier question, broadcast revenues have shrunk by 33% over the last 15 years. That shows the stark environment in which radio operators are currently operating.
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