Ryan Couldrey, a part-time photographer working at the CBC, is posting a series of shots of “retro, lo-fi audio gear,” on his blog.

This is the first in the series. It’s an Ampex 351 reel to reel recorder. The intertubes tells me that this machine is from the 1960′s. There’s a video demonstration of one of these in action here.

Anyone have any stories/memories of using this gear?

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	Archives/Vintage Media, The Exit Interview	Posted at 7:17 am (10 Aug 2010)

In a quick email John Cruickshank explained that his decision to leave CBC News does not reflect on the CBC. “I’m going to The Star because I want to go back to newspapers because I understand them and love them. I miss the feeling of being directly involved with a story from conception or event right to the doorstep,” Cruickshank said.

As far as the concerns about his departure he said “One of the challenges Richard [Stursberg] and I have been working on is how to create more authority and accountability in all senior roles.

I believe the things we accomplished as a team in News were extraordinary. There’s now a great leadership group, we have a great plan, an inspiring and evolving mission and a structure that has brought all the News staff together,” Cruickshank said today.

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	News & Journalism, The Exit Interview	Posted at 1:14 pm (27 Nov 2008)

Outgoing CBC Radio vice-president Jane Chalmers sat down with me (well, via phone) for her Exit Interview. Even though she uses the management-speak phrase “leveraging our content assets” (what do they make those people smoke at the Niagara Institute, anyway?), I thought she was quite candid. Best wishes, Jane.

How long have you been thinking about leaving?
I’ve been thinking about it since the spring. My aunt, who is a second mother to me, died in March, and I was with her to the end. I was sitting at home afterwards and I gathered some letters that my mom who died 18 months earlier wrote to her over the years, and whenever she referred to me, I was off working. I missed a lot of family time because I was reporting or producing or attending some kind of network meeting. These things can be painful. They have a sense of shaking you a bit — checking to see if your priorities are right. And I began to feel like I didn’t always have those priorities straight, so it felt like the right time to realign.

I’ve been in this job for five years and I had specific things I wanted to achieve; I haven’t done everything I wanted to, but I did get to a lot of it. I knew when I took the job there likely wasn’t anywhere to move afterwards but I wanted the opportunity to try out my ideas. Robert Rabinovitch gave me that chance and I will always be grateful for thr opportunity. But the bottom line was pretty clear. We’re going to have a transition [with a new President] and I’d have to make a firm commitment for another three or four years, As I looked inside, I realized that I just don’t have the same kind of energy. These jobs demand a lot of commitment and people in the radio service have a right to expect that.

What kind of commitment will your successor have to make?
I travel most weeks, quite often worked on weekends writing speeches or preparing and even on days off, the radio is on. It’s a full-time commitment. [CBC Radio has] 37 stations, 1,100 employees, and 185 programs. And then we’re doing a lot of development work. I leave home at 7:00 a.m. and usually don’t get back there until 6 and often 7 at night. My neighbours joke with me — they see me drive up and ask ‘Are you ever home?!’ But I don’t see how you can do the job anyother way. it’s important that you’re out and about in the regional stations to listen to the shows, talk to my colleagues, provide feedback and hear what support they need from us. It’s important to talk with listeners in those communities to get their views on our performance. It’s essential. It’s a big country.

You mentioned there were specific things you wanted to achieve. What were they, and did you achieve them?
Before I give the list, I want to make it clear that our success is really possible because of the leaders and our programmers inside Radio. This has truly been a team effort.

First, I wanted to put the emphasis back on creativity and risk- taking. I’ve always believed that if you can work collaboratively with creative people, you can produce great results. I wanted our people to dream about opportunities and their ideas. We turned Program Development into a research-and-development exercise — a lot of emphasis was put on training people, mentoring, consistent feedback and creating working partnerships with different people and different skill-sets across the system. That system led to a lot of new programing and the summer schedules. Making great radio is all about nurturing creativity. We are blessed with an exceptional work-force. So, I hope change isn’t seen as threatening any more. People don’t lose their jobs by trying new things’or when shows don’t work. We celebrate our successes and learn from our experimentation.

Second, I wanted to put the emphasis back on the importance of our regional stations. We increased local programming time and gave regions the ability to unilaterally take the network off and put their local programming on air when it was necessary [for local breaking news, emergency broadcasts, etc.]

I’m surprised they couldn’t do that before.

Not easily, no. So they can do that now, they can make that call, and just let me know after the fact. They know what’s going on in their community and they’re smart and responsible people, so I trust them.

We must give people the freedom and ability to shape programs central to their community. That said, it’s not just about local. Getting it right in communities also informs our choices in network shows. We must always remember that our listeners experience our networks from the perspective of where they live. That’s how we build relevance.

And it’s also how we’ve created more network programs in the regions. I’m really proud of that.

Third, we are braver. More confident. Radio One has become a place where we’re consistently developing our shows, introducing new programs, redeveloping drama and comedy, and we’re showcasing more talent and ideas from the outside. I think it’s a more creative place for our programmers and for listeners. Our listening share is growing – we’re in the top three in most markets – and our national and international awards are at record highs. We’re re-developing Radio Two, expanding our core strength in classical music to more forms of Canadian music-making. Radio 3 with a focus on contemporary music and innovation has really grown and prospered.

Fourth, I think our local radio expansion plan is well on its way. We’ve already moved to FM in a number of markets and we’ve been talking with politicians and meeting with residents in those communities that are growing at a rate much greater than the Canadian population. Do you know that 6-million Canadians in large markets have no local service? These people deserve a local CBC Radio station — there’s a lot of support for the expansion plan. It would bring 12 new stations online’and 3 more for francophones’ if we can bring the plan to fruition. It would require $25 million operating money each year, but that would increase our listening by 100 million additional hours per year. That’s good bang for the buck.

The need is clearly there. The challenge is to get the funding.

Finally, I wanted to build stronger international partnerships and we’ve been very aggressive in that regard. We’ve been getting our shows sold and listened to in the U.S. As It Happens is in more than 100 U.S. cities, Quirks, Wiretap, Ideas, the Vinyl Cafe are making inroads. Our concerts and the Massey Lectures are featured around the world. We feel it’s a really important part of our mandate to expose Canadian talent and ideas internationally.

What do you think CBC’s radio network will look like ten years from now?
I think we’ll be over the air still, but that said we’ll be much more into content on demand and looking at whatever those new platforms are to make sure our programs are on them whenever and in whatever form people require. We’ve already got news on mobile phones, R2 streaming concerts, Sirius Radio etc. We’re looking at more opportunities with our television colleagues. Together, we evaluate every digital opportunity, so it’ll be a mixed bag like it is today, but we’ll be on more platforms.

I can also foresee real potential for high definition radio which will allow us to create new Networks — I dream of a Radio Four or Five — leveraging our content assets to provide Canadians with even better service and choice.

We’re also looking at new kinds of business models, because it’s important people out there understand that while our [over the air] radio service has to remain pure and non-commercial, we’ll have to look at partnerships to pay for providing the extra content, and we’ll have to make sure the partners don’t dilute the meaning of our brand. The public has to know we make the content and it’s not influenced by those partners. I mean, our podcast research shows demand. 1-milion downloads each month and growing. The research also demonstrates smart content appeals to a wide variety of age-groups and backgrounds’in Canada and around the world. We can provide that. A program like Ideas, for example, is finding a brand new audience — the average age [for Ideas podcast listeners] is in their mid-20s. Our content can live anywhere, but we have to get it there and it’s that delivery that’s costing us money from our program budgets. That’s a big challenge.

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	CBC Radio 1, CBC Radio 2, CBC Radio 3, Executives, The Exit Interview	Posted at 5:20 pm (10 Nov 2007)

1. Why are you leaving? (No, really… why?)
I’m leaving because it feels like the right time to leave. I don’t feel stale yet but that has recently been a fear of mine. Seven and a half years is a long time. This job is too demanding, and important, to risk that. Events since 2000-01 have been challenging in all sorts of ways – from the aftershocks of September 11 to the pressures of integrating the CBC News operations. What this job needs now is someone to commit for several years in the future. After nearly eight years serving in this role, I concluded that this isn’t me.

2. What are your immediate (i.e. next 12 months) plans?
I’m very excited about the future. I have as much energy, enthusiasm and ideas that I’ve ever had. And I’m open to new directions. I have some possibilities already but I’m in no hurry to make a decision. I want to spend the summer reading, decompressing and recharging my batteries. I’ll know more in September.

3. Would you ever consider working for a private broadcaster?
It’s too early for me to shut any doors, but I doubt if there’s any possibility of me wanting to work for a commercial news organization in Canada. My tribal passions for CBC News are too strong. I respect CBC’s competitors but now is not the time for me to switch horses. However, there is a lot to private broadcasting than simply ‘news’ so I’m always open to stimulating, intriguing ideas and initiatives.

4. Is the current trend toward citizen journalism (blogging, etc.) generally good or bad for the practice of journalism?
I think the trend is generally good – in fact, very good. More power to the audiences is a good thing, in my view. ‘Citizen journalism’ provides a range of perspectives – and genuine diversity – that would otherwise be missing. Over time, readers are becoming discriminating between what is meaningful and what is not. And let’s never forget there is already much in the so-called mainstream media that is absolute nonsense.

5. Ten years from now, how do you think CBC News will be different, both on-air and online?
I think we are seeing the shape of it now. CBC News will be everywhere. It will be on devices and in new media services that have yet to be invented. I expect our coverage strategies will be more seamless from ‘platform to platform’ than they are now. With new technology and more efficient news gathering, we’ll have more ‘pocket bureaus’ throughout under-served parts of Canada and in countries we now rarerly hear from. And more than other news organizations in Canada, I think we’ll see CBC’s evolving relationship with its audiences turn into a genuine ‘partnership’ that will expand the range and depth of CBC’s content.

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	Executives, The Exit Interview	Posted at 3:51 pm (19 Jun 2007)

What are you most proud of from your career at CBC?
I think what I’m most proud of is the strong connection to the community that we managed to achieve with a live segment I helped introduce in the early nineties (I think ’91). It was called Karl’s Community. We were able to showcase a lot of talent and stories that otherwise may not have made it onto a suppertime news program. There were also opportunities to introduce folks who would later become major stars in our region, like the Ennis Sisters, a fabulous group of singers, songwriters and musicians. They were just teenagers when they appeared on my segment in 1997.

And, the most embarassing moment?
The most embarrassing moment was when a seagull shat on me during a live broadcast from our St. John’s dockside. I was wearing a brand new Labrador jacket that had been made for me after a trip to Labrador. I think everyone in the province with a television saw that one. It happened well over a decade ago but people still mention it and my indignant reaction!

Any plans yet for your retirement?
In the future? I plan to do some food journalism. I have been a restaurant critic for The Telegram (Newfoundland’s daily) for the past three years. I’d also like to do some writing for magazines. In April I had a piece published in EnRoute magazine about St. John’s. I’ll be taking my website in more of a foodie direction since that’s such a passion. It already seems to be the place many turn to for resto reviews. And, whatever else comes along I’ll certainly take a look at.

P.S. Ah well. It was worth a shot.

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	Personalities, The Exit Interview	Posted at 12:59 pm (29 May 2007)

On Friday, I told you about how CBC Radio’s Lorna Jackson would be retiring from the Corporation. Her last shift was this past weekend.

Lorna was kind enough to answer a few questions for the InsideCBC.com Exit Interview.

What single interview, piece, or show episode from your career are you most proud of and why?
I am inordinately proud of getting a cattle breeder to admit he dyed his champion steer black to increase his chances of winning . But after hearing a montage of some of the many programs I have had the privilege of working on to tweak my memory, I can’t say there was one interview that stood out. However, I am enormously proud of being able to work with the newsroom on live specials– of being able to grab some wire copy, run into the studio and talk to someone in the midst of a breaking story to make some sense of it. The newsroom calls this “rock and roll” and I love it. Or loved it…

And, in the last several years there has been so much mindless drivel on the air I loved the chance to talk to someone on the radio with real ideas and intelligence. This is what we can do in public broadcasting. This is our duty to do as public broadcasters.

What was the most embarrassing thing to happen to you while on air?
Once, during the weather forecast after an hourly newscast I gave the “HIV level” instead of the “UV level”. How dumb.

What do you plan to do in your retirement?
So, far — nothing. Except — we are moving into a brand new condo in the fall and I am looking forward to working with Johnson Chou on its design. I’m big on design.

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	Personalities, The Exit Interview	Posted at 9:35 am (28 May 2007)