The Gold Coast will play host to hundreds of community radio broadcasters for the next few days as broadcasters converge on the iconic Queensland holiday destination to discuss future trends on radio, important issues for the community sector, funding, regulation and more.

Recent political moves around media reform have leveraged some additional government funding for the sector for specific projects, which will be outlined at the conference, beginning tomorrow morning.
 

CBAA Community Radio Conference Early has extended its early bird rate until Sunday.

Register now and save $110 before next Monday.

This year, the program is filled with special guest speakers and workshop sessions. 

Keynote: Voices of Innovation - The Power of Positive Human Collisions

In community radio, every voice matters. Tania de Jong, knows this too and is passionate about the power of voices working together.

The latest listener survey for Australia's community radio sector shows the highest national listenership on record – 5.362m listeners per week.
 
The survey also shows an increase in people listening to community radio exclusively each week, now up to 5%.
 
"This new record listenership figure reflects the value that Australians place on community radio and its role in providing locally produced, diverse content and a voice for under-represented communities.
 

The Community Broadcasting Station Census is a comprehensive report into the activities of stations in the Australian community radio sector. The latest census covers the 2015/2016 financial year and is the eighth data collection.

The data was collected in 2016/17.

In previous years, a single census provided a snapshot of the community radio sector covering programming, program sources, finances, staffing, volunteers, subscribers, sponsorship, training and technology.

The Community Broadcasting Association of Australia (CBAA) is inviting submissions from those interested in running a workshop at its annual conference.

Being held on the Gold Coast from 9 - 12 November, it is seen as the premier event for community broadcasting and the sector's largest annual gathering.

Technorama, the conference supporting technologists in community broadcasting has revealed some of the topics to be covered next month at TR17.
 
Community Radio Engineering Policy Update:
Jon Bisset  
CBAA's CEO explains the implications of the recent funding announcements and its importance for expansion of regional DAB+  Hear updates on policy activities affecting the sector's technology community, including the 800MHz bandplan amendments.

Kim Napier
 
Recently radioinfo shared the story of Wilcannia River Radio after reporter Kim Napier called in during a road trip from Adelaide to Sydney. This is part two of Kim’s profile on the radio station that is ‘Keeping It Alive’ in the middle of the desert.

In this two-part series, radioinfo's Kim Napier visited one of Australia's most remote community radio stations, spending time with the announcers and learning about their love for community broadcasting.