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Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt announced today that Norwich is a potential location for one of the first local TV stations in the country. Ofcom will now consult on these areas and its proposed licensing process.

“I am confident these new stations will provide local communities with programming which is relevant to their daily lives, will support local democracy, boost the big society and enhance local communities,” said Mr Hunt.

Simon Wright, MP (Lib Dem, Norwich South) wrote to the Culture Secretary in September to endorse Norwich as a location for local TV. He welcomed today’s announcement: “I was keen to explain to Jeremy Hunt that as a regional media hub Norwich already has many organisations and individuals with particular creative, production and technical skills, as well as business expertise in delivering television services.

In October 2011, one of the groups interested in bidding for the licence ran an online tv pilot to test out what local people might want from a local TV channel. Three potential operators have expressed an interest to the Department of Culture, Media and Sport in running the local TV station here in Norwich.

The Government is taking a number of steps to create a statutory framework for licensing that will allow for transmission infrastructure to be built. It expects the programming to be broadcast on a Freeview channel and suggests each station should provide at least one hour of news each day.

As part of the license fee settlement in October 2010, The BBC agreed to commit up to £25 million towards the capital investment for local tv. The BBC has also committed to pay for content that the local tv stations provide for the first 3 years, totalling £15 million.

The first tranche of local TV licenses are due to be awarded by the end of 2012.

The 16-24 year olds were given the chance to meet successful digital entrepreneurs and try out workshops in film, animation and radio.

Run by Norfolk Network, the event at EPIC aimed to give young people a taste of the cutting edge, growing digital industry in Norwich.

The participants heard from entrepreneurs, such as the young co-directors of Ping Media, Aaron Bradley and Tom Clarke, who set up their own web development business in Norwich and “Entrepreneur in Residence,” Joel Sieale who runs independent record label, Interim Records.

The talks were followed by a morning of workshops with industry professionals, in areas such as animation and film, giving students the chance to discuss their own ideas and ask questions about how to get a head start.

A virtual newsroom, run by Culture Works East, allowed students to learn how to live blog, upload images and video, while also running social media accounts. Harry Matthews, a 21 year old who gained a work placement with them said: “For me the best thing is the hands-on experience. This is my 4th workshop. Every one you do, you build your confidence up and build up networks.”

Graphic designer, Billy Thorpe, was helping run the newsroom. He said the event had given students a chance to think which direction they should take: “Don’t think you’re going to finish Uni and someone’s going to offer you a job. You’ve got to have a Plan.. and a Plan B.”

The blogs about the event were written up by students onto a tumblr account and updates posted on Facebook and Twitter.

The man behind the pilot, the MD of Eye Film and TV,  argues a new channel could be run using students and media professionals.

As local TV will be coming to Norwich, Charlie Gauvain reflects on what they’ve learnt from thisislocal.tv in our Opinion section.

Norwich has been identified as one of 65 cities in the UK which will be getting some form of Local TV.

It was a chance to see what could be achieved with a young talented team in a live situation. Here’s what we found…

Week 1:

Began with a brainstorming session. What types of ideas should we focus on, who would watch them… what was achievable?.  The look and feel of the brand was achieved extremely quickly.

All the ideas were short form, mostly 3 minutes and under. Soon we’d come up with some simple ideas such as The ‘Taxi Rant’, ‘What are you wearing?!’, ‘Giz’ a job’ which had appeal and could be done on a daily or weekly basis.

Week 2:

Press releases, meetings with local media moguls (including South Norwich News) and a social media campaign got under way. We got noticed.

Our stint in the Forum for ‘Sixty Second Soapbox’ had over 50 members of the public venting their spleen. We doorstepped Alan Partridge and  secured an exclusive interview with Adam Buxton. The number of hits on our website were increasing day by day. Overnight, the look and feel of our site went from a student project to a professional,  smart layout.

Week 3:

It was important that we attempted something big.  When we discovered that the official ‘John Peel Day’ fell on the last Thursday of the project,  it seemed only natural that this was what we needed.  As a fan of John Peel and having worked with him, this was the perfect opportunity to start some of the John Peel projects we had been discussing with John’s family. With less than 36 hours to put it all together, the pressure was on everyone to arrange an event to take place outside the Forum.

We were overwhelmed by the response and despite most of the production team being too young to remember him,  they did a fantastic job.  Once again ITV picked up the story and this time BBC Radio and the Evening News ran articles.

Looking back I cannot help be proud of what has been achieved in such a short period of time.  My biggest regret is that more people did not hear about what we were doing or visit the site.

It clearly shows that despite trying hard with social media, there’s a lot to say for traditional marketing and getting out onto the street to make people aware of things.

I’m also conscious that politics are at play here.  Archant are one of several companies who have bids in with the government to provide Norwich TV and much of the BBC, perhaps unsurprisingly, kept their distance.

What I believe we have shown is that, as and when Local TV comes to the city, it could be run as a student project, mentored by professionals in the industry.  Whether that is in conjunction with one of the universities or colleges, or as its own project, remains to be seen.  Anyone interested in joining in?

Livewire 1350 run interviews with many of the big name bands who play the Univeristy’s LCR, as well as a range of music from pop, indie to alternative music.

Interviews are available to ‘listen again’ to on their website. Over the summer the station re-launched its website as well as increasing its following on social networking sites, such as Twitter.

Joe Levell, who helps run the student station said: “We offer a real mix of music and a range of presenters. One of our former station managers, Greg James, is now a well-known presenter on Radio One.” Tune in online.

A television team will be out and about filming in Norwich over the next two weeks, finding out what people think of the idea of local TV. The government has picked Norwich as having the potential to support TV on a very local level.

This research project, managed by Eye Film and TV with the support of EPIC Studios, aims of define TV content that’s engaging, entertaining and relevant to people living and working in the city. Norwich is among 65 cities which will be eligible to bid to provide local TV. Other companies or media consortia are also considering bidding for the license to provide local TV in Norwich.

Ideas for what local TV might look like are being showcased on a specially designated website where you can view short taster films, and add your comments, ideas and opinions.

Charlie Gauvain, Managing Director of Eye Film and TV, said: “Our initial research showed that people already felt well catered for in terms if local news.  As a result we decide to run a project- to test out ideas and see what local people thought.  Themes we will be trying out include Food, Norwich Life, Music and the Arts. We’re also looking to showcase short films, presenters, comedians and musicians who are from Norwich.”

He added: “We are trying to get as many people’s opinions and ideas as possible over the next two weeks and will be asking for feedback in the street when filming, and on our blog, Facebook, Youtube and Twitter pages. Our aim is to develop a model for Local TV in Norwich, based on what people want.”

The team behind thisislocal.tv includes nine students and five media professionals with experience in filming and editing, film production, writing, blogging, social media, presenting, photography and graphic design.

The project will be visible in Norwich over the next two weeks: look out for them across the city or get involved:

Wednesday 5^th October, 11.30-14.00, The Atrium, The Forum.

Members of the public and local politicians will be given 60 seconds to talk to camera in a soap-box style booth. It’s called ‘Vent Your Spleen.’- Talk on any issue in Norwich that you feel strongly about.

A large fire at a tower block on Monday, which has their FM transmitter on top, caused the power supply to be switched off.  For health and safety reasons, power had to be cut following an extensive fire at Markham Towers in the north Norwich on Monday night.

Station Manager Terry Lee and his team have been working since Monday to resolve the situation and are delighted to announce that Future Radio is back :  “Future Radio’s FM signal reaches 140 000 listeners across Norwich and we had taken dozens of phone calls from worried fans who have been asking  where their radio station had gone.” He added: “We were told it could have been weeks before power was restored, so yesterday we started setting up a temporary transmitter on top of our studio.”

The station, which broadcasts from studios in West Earlham, continued to broadcast online.

Future Radio was recently listed top in an independent Ofcom survey as the station whose listeners were most engaged with. In the report, Ofcom said: “Although listeners may not listen to their small-scale stations for long periods of time, the level of engagement listeners have with these stations is higher than with most other stations.”

Cinema City is screening a double bill of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which will see the culmination of ten years worth of filming.

For Harry Potter fans, this could be the perfect way to see the final film in the Harry Potter series. On offer is Part 1 of the Deathly Hallows, screened at 8.40pm, followed by Part 2 in 3D at midnight on Thursday 14th July.

In Part 1, Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emma Watson) face their greatest challenge yet. Voldemort’s (Ralph Fiennes) power is growing and his grip on the Wizarding World is beginning to tighten. With Professor Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) out of the frame, it’s up to Harry and the gang to conjure up a way to defeat the Dark Lord once and for all.

Tickets are available in person at the cinema box office, by calling 0871 902 5724 or by visiting their website.