Friends All Over The World
Every week, Robbie Shepherd sends me a copy of all the e-mails he has received from listeners. It's really useful because the comments that people send to their favourite programme presenters are very different from the e-mails that come directly to me as a "faceless Â鶹Éç manager". You can imagine!
Robbie's e-mails are usually full of warmth and praise and about half of them come from listeners outside Scotland. This week, for example, I see comments from listeners in New York, Ottowa, California and Australia.
His programmes have always had a loyal following from ex-pat Scots, but now I'm noticing a new audience who are enjoying Radio Scotland on their broadband connections, where the quality is great and less prone to buffering problems. That's why the Â鶹Éç Radio Player is becoming so important to us.
But this international praise always reminds me of that line from the Tony Hancock programme, The Radio Ham, in which Tony extols the virtues of his new short-wave radio set as "the best ten bob I ever spent. I have friends all over the world...all over the world. I mean, none in this country, but all over the world!".
I'm sure that's not true of Radio Scotland.
To read comments on this post, click here