On This Week's Behind the News s2

BtN: Episode 15 Transcript 5/6/12

On this week's Behind the News

 The massive Aussie science project that could unlock the secrets of the Universe.

 With more people streaming songs for free we look at how musicians make their money.

 And we join the researchers trying to solve the mystery of the missing quoll.

Hi I'm Nathan Bazley, welcome to Behind the News. Also on the show today we visit a school that's using soccer to teach kids about maths and English. But first today, let's get a quick wrap up of what's been making the news this week. Here's Sophia with the Wire. The Wire

There's been lots of celebrations for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, which marks 60 years since she became Queen. A thousand boats made their way along London's famous River Thames for the largest river pageant in more than 300 years. It was followed by the Queen's barge which was greeted by a 41 gun salute at the end of its journey.

Around one million people packed the riverbanks to catch a glimpse of the Queen including some very excited Aussies!

VOX 1: It's a once in a life time opportunity 'cause in our lifetime, there's not gonna be another Queen who was on the thrown for 60 years.

VOX 2: We're living in London and we're not royalists, we just want to see the Queen!

And it's been 20 years since one of Australia's biggest court decisions was made. In 1992, Eddie Mabo and a group of Murray Islanders challenged a law and won a court case to recognise them as the legal owners of their land in the Torres Strait. The

1 decision's now remembered as the start of Indigenous rights around Australia. And to mark the 20th anniversary, people have been celebrating across the Torres Strait Islands.

Diamond Jubilee Reporter: Natasha Thiele

INTRO: Let's get more now on those celebrations we just saw for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee. 60 years is a long time to have been the Queen in fact it's a long time in any job. Tash takes a look back at her life and some of the ways her role has changed over the years.

NATASHA THIELE, REPORTER: She might look like an 86-year old grandma, who wears matching outfits and posh hats and really likes corgis. But in the 60 years she's been Queen, she's done a lot of stuff you might not even know about! So let's go on a journey back to when it all began.

Princess Elizabeth was born in 1926. She was the eldest of two girls and because she didn't have any brothers, it meant that she would one day become Queen. In 1952 her dad King George the VI died. Here she's just 25. This is called a coronation, the formal ceremony where she was officially crowned Queen.

QUEEN ELIZABETH II: My whole life, whether it's been long or short, shall be devoted to your service.

Elizabeth wasn't just crowned Queen of England, she was Queen of the entire British Empire, which included lots of countries like Canada and Hong Kong. But the Empire's become a lot smaller over the years, as many countries became independent. Countries like Australia are still part of what's now known as the Commonwealth of Nations, so the Queen is still our head of state. Her representative in Australia is the Governor-General. But that doesn't mean the Queen tells the government what to do, her role is mainly ceremonial. This is one of her traditions, the annual Christmas Message that was first televised in 1957.

QUEEN ELIZABETH II: And so I wish you all, young and old, wherever you may be, all the fun and enjoyment and the peace of a very happy Christmas.

She also supports more than 600 charities and organisations and makes regular visits to countries like Australia.

QUEEN ELIZABETH II: I am able to meet my Australian people as their Queen.

2 It might sound like a pretty cool job, but the Queen's also had to face some tough criticism. When Will and Harry's mum Diana died in a car crash in 1997, some people were upset at the Queen's reaction. She was criticised for staying low-key during the days before Diana's funeral. But the Queen's popularity slowly came back up, after making a public appearance and giving this live TV broadcast.

QUEEN ELIZABETH II: First, I want to pay tribute to Diana myself, she was an exceptional and gifted human being.

Despite the criticism, the Queen has pushed on with her job and she's moved with the times, especially with communication. There's a Royal YouTube channel and she, or at least someone working for her, uses Twitter, Flickr and Facebook to reach out to fans. So while the Queen celebrates 60 years on the throne, we can see that a lot's changed in the world and she's had to change with it. And if the monarchy survives another 60 years, who knows what it will look like by then!

Presenter: Why don't you let us know what you think it'll look like in 60 years or if it'll exist at all? You can do that by hitting the guest book on the BtN website. Super Telescope Reporter: Nathan Bazley

INTRO: Now to an Australian science project that's out of this world. You might have heard that Australia won the right to host part of the biggest radio telescope ever built known as the Square Kilometre Array. Let's take a look at what great secrets this big project could uncover.

NATHAN BAZLEY, REPORTER: The outback is about to be overtaken. Out here, in the middle of nowhere, one of science's biggest experiments will soon be taking shape. It's called the Square Kilometre Array.

This project will be made up of 3000 dishes all hooked up together. And the surface area of them, will add up to a square kilometre; hence the name. That will make it ten thousand times more powerful than anything like it on earth.

DR KARL, SCIENCE GURU: This is important because it's the next big step. We're going from radio telescopes to big ones, to huge ones, to absolutely overwhelmingly enormous telescopes and this is the absolutely overwhelmingly enormous one.

Two countries had been bidding for the right to host the huge project, South Africa and Australia. And just like your mother would do, organisers have announced both countries will share it and the 2 billion dollar investment that it will bring. That's big bickies, but really, everything about this massive experiment is big.

3 The array will be so powerful; it will be able to detect an alien airport radar, should they exist, from about 473,036,523,629,040 kilometres away. Wow.

Should it happen to find an alien airport, we sadly won't be able to take a peek at what they look like with the SKA though. And the reason for that is because of the type telescope that it is. All of these dishes and other bits of equipment aren't designed to see light; they're designed to pick up invisible radio waves.

Stars and galaxies far away all send out radio waves of different types. A radio telescope collects them in the dish and the information goes into a computer. From there, they can use the data to make pictures, or listen to the sounds coming through.

Cities emit lots of radio waves too. So that's why the plan involves putting the SKA right out in the middle of nowhere. The less interference from all our everyday electrical stuff, the better the results they'll get. But what results are they expecting?

DR KARL: What we're going to find is stuff about the universe, and we're going to have spinoffs. The stuff about the universe - we'll have tests for the theory of relativity, find out more about black holes, how the universe began and the search for life!

Yep, we're talking aliens!

So the Square Kilometre Array has a pretty cool job to do. And even cooler, by the time it's built you could have the same job too, because they'll be looking for techs from here to help run it.

DR KARL: The people in the schools today in Australia should get excited about this because this is going to be a place where they can work, and if they don't work there, the discoveries coming out of it can change their lives.

So if you've ever dreamed of running a 2 billion dollar search for the secrets of the universe, or just dreamed of life on other planets, this project could be your chance!

Presenter: How cool is that? OK, let's see if you're a bright star here's our first quiz. Quiz 1

The question is:

Which is the closest planet to the sun?

4 Mercury

Neptune

Saturn

Answer: Mercury

Presenter: On average it's about 58 million ks from the Sun. Music Money Reporter: Sarah Larsen

INTRO: Now music has changed a lot over the years and so has the way we listen to it from records to tapes to CDs to Mp3s. Recently Australians got another option too. It's called Spotify and it lets you listen to songs for free. Some artists are worried that it's going to make it even harder to make money in the music industry. But how do musicians make money? Sarah finds out.

SARAH LARSEN, REPORTER: Lots of kids dream of becoming rock stars but these guys are a lot closer than most.

Elliott, Matt and Huy are the Radicalities and, while they're still at school, they've made a name for themselves on the local music scene.

ELLIOTT: At one thing we played at there were some girls that we didn't really know but they were singing along to our song.

One day they hope to do this as a living but, as another great Aussie band once said, it's a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll.

Matt: I think it's really, really difficult to make money as musician. The bands that do make money have to be really, really big but otherwise it's just a part time job.

So where do famous rock stars get all their money?

REPORTER: In the old days a lot of it came from places like this. Fans like me would save up, go to the music shop, and fork out 20 bucks for their latest album.

But not all that money goes to the band.

5 Most of the musicians that you hear on the radio are signed to a record label - they organise the recording, get the album into shops and on the radio and basically help to make artists stars.

So, say the Radicalities made it big and got signed, of my $20 half or more would go to their label.

The shop has to make a profit. They get about 30 percent, which leaves the artists with 10 to 20 percent or few dollars an album.

But CD sales have dropped in a big way since music went digital.

Now there are heaps of ways to listen to what you want, when you want at the click of a button and it's changing the way the music business works.

Recently Aussies got another online option called Spotify. You can stream any song you want for free, as long as you don't mind ads. If you want your music commercial free there's a subscription fee. Artists get a small percentage of the profits depending on how much their song is played but some say it's not enough. Some musos have said their share is so tiny they might as well be giving music away.

But others see the plus side.

HUY: I think Spotify a great way of getting your music out there with other smaller bands who aren't big with labels and stuff.

Lots of young musos are using new technology to their advantage, encouraging streaming and even downloading so they can get an audience without relying on a label.

HUY: I know a lot of musicians who are making six figures just on You Tube, putting their videos up there and making money from the ads

And selling songs isn't the only way bands make money. Concerts are a big earner. And then there's merchandise. And bands can get a lot of money if their song is used in a movie or an ad. But for most bands money isn't the most important thing.

HUY: You're first goal shouldn't be to make cash; it should be about making music. Play well and practice and eventually you'll get there.

Fame and fortune might come one day but for now these guys are happy to just keep making music.

Presenter: OK let's make that our poll this week.

6 Online Poll

The question is:

Should people pay more to stream music from websites? To vote just head to our website.

And last week we asked you if vaccinations should be made compulsory.

60 per cent said yes and 40 per cent said no. Thanks for voting. Quoll Search Reporter: Nathan Bazley

INTRO: Now to a mysterious disappearance. We're not talking about a missing person though but a missing species the Eastern quoll. You can't find them in mainland Australia anymore but they were fairly common in Tassie. But lately they're disappearing. So we joined some detective researchers as they went in search for the Eastern quoll.

NATHAN BAZLEY, REPORTER: These little guys have gone missing. They've been missing from mainland Australia for ages. But the Eastern quoll used to have a safe haven in Tasmania, where it enjoyed the nightlife. But all of a sudden, they're starting to disappear here too.

It's got researchers pretty worried, so they've gone all CSI on the AWOL Eastern quoll.

These researchers are combing the forest to find out 'whodunit'.

The last confirmed sighting of the AWOL quoll on mainland Australia was 50 years ago. And the perpetrator responsible for its demise was never found, although scientists think poisoning, predators and disease all may have had a hand in the crime. But that's a cold case they certainly don't want repeated in Tassie.

PETER MCGLONE, RESEARCHER: This is just the latest of a series of disasters over the last 20 years, we've seen pretty much all of our carnivorous large carnivores in Tasmania become endangered, sea eagles, wedge tailed eagles, tiger quoll, Tasmanian devil, masked owl and now Eastern quoll.

7 Ah, so we know this isn't an isolated case! But there are more clues out there as well.

Researchers are trapping the remaining quolls to weigh, measure, and collect blood and dropping samples. And all these clues have gone some way to helping narrow down the culprit. But a night vision camera attached to a trap confirms it.

Last year they found 18 quolls around this area, this year there are just four hanging round. And the cat factor seems to explain it.

BRONWYN, RESEARCHER: Today we've actually sadly trapped two feral cats on this property, we've never seen any feral cats here before we've never trapped any feral cats before, we have had issues over the last couple of months where we're had something stealing our baits while we're trying to trap quolls and it does appear we've now discovered what that is.

Cats compete with quolls for food because they eat the same things. But if cats are still hungry, they often just eat quolls as well! So they're a double threat. But on top of that, they also spread a disease which can kill quolls too. Making these moggies suspect number one. But there are other felons in the line up too.

One is habitat loss. Another is possible poisoning from rat or fox baits. But with cats looking the most guilty of the three the researchers will be looking at ways of removing this offender from the area. And unfortunately, most of the cats that have gone wild out here have been dumped by people.

So hopefully they'll think twice before letting a serial killer like this loose in the wilds of Tasmania. Then the mystery of the disappearing Eastern quoll might finally be solved. Quiz 2

OK, let's have a quiz. The question is: What is a baby quoll called?

Answer: Pup

And female quolls usually only breed once a year. Let's move onto sport next. James has the sports headlines in the Score.

8 The Score

The Melbourne Vixens are back at the top of the Trans-Tasman netball championship ladder.

They beat the Adelaide thunderbirds by eight goals. Ex-Adelaide player Kate Beveridge starred for the vixens shooting 12 goals.

Aussie tennis player Sam Stosur has reached the final eight at the French open.

She beat young American Sloane Stephens in straight sets and is now through to the quarter finals.

Samantha Stosur: "she came out playing very aggressive and kind of got me off guard, I think. I went down that break and got a little bit mad with myself and then recomposed.

Stosur will play against 15th seed, Dominika Cibulkova later this week. Soccer School Reporter: Sarah Larsen

INTRO: Ever find yourself in class looking out of the window dreaming that you could be playing sport instead? Well, first up, stop it. And then you might want to check this story out. It's about a class where soccer is used as a tool to teach kids a whole variety of subjects. Sarah checks it out.

SARAH LARSEN, REPORTER: Soccer. It's the most popular game in the world; watched and played by billions. But ask a fan and they'll tell you it's much more than just a game

JACKSON: Soccer is like a way of life for me. I can't explain it. It's like, I can't go a day without soccer.

JIMMY: Well, like football, it means a lot of things to me. I really want to make it far in life because I want to play for Arsenal when I get older if I am very skilled and stuff.

9 Underdale High School in South Australia is a specialist soccer school and a lot of the students here are football fanatics.

Jimmy: Like 'cause we mostly like do soccer, like, every time. We have a cage here to play whenever we want at recess and lunch every lunch and sometimes, like, the year 10, 11, 12s, we will all play together.

But it's not just on the field that soccer rules.

TEACHER: Man, this is brilliant. Robert Van Percy is a brilliant player he has great ball skills he has that is a perfect paragraph.

Here in the classroom soccer is being used help kids with their English and maths.

REPORTER: If you think about there's a lot you can learn from sport, writing match reports takes English skills, analysing the stats takes maths know-how and there's a lot science behind kicking that ball around a field.

Right now they're studying maths by creating fantasy football teams with soccer cards.

This is part in a program being run by the local A-League team, Adelaide United, to improve kid’s literacy and numeracy. The idea came from English club Arsenal, which sends players out into schools to get kids more excited about learning.

They've let Adelaide adapt the program to help kids like these. A lot of them have come to Australia from other countries and adapting to school life here hasn't always been easy.

JIMMY: It was very hard and like very different because I didn't know anybody

JACKSON: Oh it was hard, because like, people didn't understand me and stuff.

Soccer has helped them to connect with their classmates and with their school work.

Nigel Gill, Principal: It's about connecting the kids with what they're interested in. And if they're interested in and passionate about what you're involved in we're more likely to see positive attendance and greater achievements.

JACKSON: Doesn't only develop your soccer skills, it, like, also develops your mental skills and stuff.

But for most kids the best bit is this; getting time to practice their skills on the field.

10 As part of the program they coaching and mentoring from A-League stars like Lloyd Owusu.

Lloyd Owusu: To do this kind of concept where you have a bit of study with football too; it's every kid’s dream, you know? These guys have come from a very difficult background some of them so if someone like me with alt experience and knowledge of the game can bring something to them and change their perception and knowledge and attitude and just life skills if I can help them I'm more than happy to help them.

A lot of these guys dream of being professional soccer players.

But they know to achieve their goal they'll need to work hard both on and off the field.

And who knows? One day we might see these guys in the big leagues, helping to teach other kids all the stuff they need to know.

Closer

That's it for the show. You can jump onto our website if you want to get more info on any of the stories. You can send us your comments and don't forget to vote in this week's poll. I'll see you next time.