DAB, the digital radio, is a finalist in the Fiasco Awards 2009 in Spain, which just goes to show it's not just the British DAB that's turned into a fiasco. The nomination text runs through the history -- yes, the European Commission was involved -- and says:
the Spanish and the Catalan Governments launched from the year 2000 onwards, and for the last eight years they have been broadcasting with no audience. The estimated investment on digital radio has been of 50 million euros in Spain, an amount that got to 350 million thanks to the help of the other six European countries that believed in this technology. In Catalonia the fiasco was accomplished in November 2008, when after ten years without an audience, the Corporació Catalana de Mitjans Audiovisuals -- the Public Catalan Media Corporation -- brought digital radio broadcasting to a halt.
The UK has done a little better, of course, but we don't know how it would have fared without massive amounts of free DAB advertising from the "neutral" BBC, and regulators who don't appear to be giving much serious consideration to anything else.
Do you think it's worth contacting Spain's broadcasters to find out if they blame Steve Green?
Either way, you can go to the FiascoAwards.com site and vote.
