The Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle's Board of Directors has announced a decision to close down the Yle Puhe (Yle Talk) radio channel.
The decision was made to reflect the changing way in which people consume media.
"It's not worth our while to have the [Yle Puhe] radio station anymore, because it's quite expensive. The money could be better invested in content," said Ville Vilén, Head of Creative Content and Media at Yle.
Yle Puhe is the smallest of Yle's Finnish-language national radio channels, with a weekly audience share of just a few percent.
"Instead, listening to podcasts on Areena has increased significantly," Vilén noted, adding that podcasts make up one fifth of Yle Areena's listenership.
Although the decision to close down the station was made on Wednesday, Yle Puhe will continue to broadcast for one more year — eventually falling silent in 2024.
"When we use resources — tax money — we need to think carefully about how we spend it. In this case, it is better to invest in content creation rather than distribution," Vilén said.
Yle Puhe has also long been a home for sports broadcasting, and the future of Yle's audio coverage of sporting events is still to be decided.
"It is likely that sports content will move to Areena and Yle Radio Finland. There is still a year to think about this," Vilén said.
Yle Puhe was launched 17 years ago as a platform for Yle's talk-only programmes, and the station operated for a long time entirely without music.
Yle will retain five national radio channels on the FM wavelength: Yle Radio Suomi, Yle Radio 1, YleX, Yle Vega and Yle X3M.
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