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DETAILS OF HOW TO START A LOCAL TALKING NEWSPAPER

This section is to assist anyone interested in setting up a local Talking Newspaper. It is based on the combined experience of past and present members of the Executive Committee. By following the procedure, it is hoped that newcomers will be able to avoid the headaches and hurdles encountered by the pioneers.

It is hoped that the information provided will help you set up a local Talking Newspaper in your area quickly and easily. There are now more than 500 voluntary groups operating Talking Newspapers and Magazines throughout the UK and both they and the potential recipients of your Talking Newspaper will welcome you and wish you every success. If you encounter any problems not dealt with here, do not hesitate to get in touch with the TNF Executive Committee. Contact should first be made to the office on enquiries@tnf.org.uk or telephone 0871 226 5506 or write to :

Talking News Federation

Manor House.
Wootton Bassett.

SN4 7AF.

WHAT IS A TALKING NEWSPAPER?

A talking newspaper is local news recorded onto audio format such as cassette tapes or CDs. The service is primarily aimed at blind and visually impaired, but it is often extended to the physically handicapped and others who find reading a strain.

A cassette containing local news and sometimes a magazine is packed in a special wallet and is delivered by free post under an 'ARTICLES FOR THE BLIND' label to all registered blind and partially sighted persons or by a band of volunteers to the handicapped listener.

After listening to the tape on their cassette player or on one provided on free loan by the local Talking Newspaper Association, the label is reversed and the cassette returned to the Talking Newspaper in the same way, for re-use before the next edition.

HOW IS A TALKING NEWSPAPER PRODUCED?

A talking newspaper is produced by teams of local volunteers who share the tasks of editing, reading and recording the news from the local newspaper and often compiling a magazine onto a master cassette. This is copied on a high speed cassette copier to produce one for each listener. The volunteers get together to form a Talking Newspaper Association.

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?

The average cost of establishing a Talking Newspaper providing a weekly tape to around 200 listeners is probably between£5,000 and £10,000. But do not let this put you off; a very good TN service can be started for as little as £2.50 per listener i.e. the cost of a good quality cassette and special postal wallet, plus another £1.00 per edition for a new master cassette. Many of the existing TNs have started in this modest way. The wide range of estimated costs of established TNs arises from the increasing cost of equipment over the past few years and the decreasing number of cassette players which TNs have to provide on free loan as they come to be regarded as essential as radio.

In order to start on this minimum capital cost basis, one assumes that you, or a colleague, have a good quality cassette recorder or music centre and that you are prepared to use it for making the weekly recording until funds become available to purchase one for the new TNA. One assumes that you start by supplying those listeners who possess their own cassette players and compile a waiting list those who need players on loan. It has been found that many listeners are prepared to buy their own players when it is explained to them how easy they are to use and what a wealth of material is now available on tape especially for them. A waiting list of those who cannot buy their own is a powerful inducement to all fund-raising organisations to come to your aid. Finally, this 'cold start' assumes that you are able to arrange to borrow fast copying facilities from a nearby established TN or educational establishment with spare capacity. This should be much easier than it used to be in the early days, because there are now more than 500 TNs in operation and most use their copiers only 10% of the available time.

Once some experience has been gained and the service started and publicised, fund-raising will become easier and the funds rapidly accumulate to enable you to purchase your own equipment and if you wish, set up your own studio. What follows is a step-by-step description of how to set about starting your own local Talking Newspaper.

However, nowadays more and more established TNs are going over to digital recording for producing master recordings, with the high cassette speed duplicators being driven direct from the recording computer via special software, thus producing excellent quality copies. Hence, any group considering starting up a TN now, should consider recording digitally from the start rather than producing a master tape on a cassette machine and then using this to produce the copy tapes.

In addition, most TNs which have changed to recording digitally, also offer their listeners CDs as an alternative to cassette. But there are a number of problems with supplying CDs as against cassettes......

1. larger wallets are required, which cost more.

2. only CD-R type CDs can be used as not all CD players will play re-recordable CDs. This means that the CDs cannot be reused and have to be thrown away after use, meaning more cost for the TN.

3. the maximum running time for a CD is 80 minutes. TNs which offer CDs as well as C90 cassettes, have reduced the running time to 80 minutes for the cassette so as not to have to produce two versions of the spoken paper.

4. the extra cost of purchasing a CD copying stack.

You will have two copies of your local paper so that you can cut the odd numbered pages from one copy and the even numbers from the other. Cut out all major news items. Do not censor items to protect your listeners from local horror stories - they will not thank you for that - you are supposed to be keeping them informed! Measure the column length of the items and tot them up; usually about 140 column inches will fill 40 minutes of one side of a C90 tape, leaving enough room for signature tunes, introductions and a few readers' letters. Provide a good balance of news - parish council, county council, local stories, church news, WI news, local sport. Avoid political news unless it is a factual statement of local election candidates and give a fair balance of time to each political party.

Recording

Initially before you are able to acquire your own recording equipment it is useful to find two or three people willing to use their own recorders and capable of making a good recording.

Newsreading

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