Unity FM. With the rise of internet stations, Birmingham now also has independent radio stations like Brum Radio, serving local, independent and alternative music and arts which doesn't fit the commercial radio format. History Birmingham was the first British city outside London to have a radio service from the newly formed British Broadcasting Company, with the Birmingham station 5IT starting regular broadcasting from its Witton base at 17:00 on 15 November 1922, one day after 2LO started daily BBC broadcasting from London and one hour before the 18:00 launch of Manchester's 2ZY. 5IT pioneered many innovations in early broadcasting, launching Children's Hour in 1922, developing sophisticated methods of programme control and employing the first full-time announcers in 1923. The station's first announcer on its opening night was its general manager Percy Edgar, who was to be the dominant figure in Birmingham broadcasting and the BBC's most influential regional director until his retirement in 1948. 5IT moved its studios from Witton to a former cinema in New Street in 1923, moving again in 1926 to a completely new building in Broad Street with two studios – one of the largest the country. 1927 saw the low-powered city station 5IT replaced by the BBC Midland Region – the first of the BBC's regional services – broadcast from the new Borough Hill high powered transmitter near Daventry. The Broad Street studios now controlled and made programmes for a region stretching across central England from The Potteries to Norfolk. As Director of the Midland Region Percy Edgar fought against the efforts of Lord Reith to increase control over the BBC from London, writing to Reith in 1929 that "the ever growing policy of centralisation in London has clearly gone a good deal further and more rapidly than public opinion here is prepared to accept" and positioning himself almost as an independent entrepreneur within the wider organisation. By 1935 the Midland Region was producing 40% of its broadcast material locally, more than either of the other English regions or even the national regions of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. With 14 producers it was largest BBC department outside London. Notable programmes included the detective series Paul Temple which was produced in Birmingham and broadcast nationally from 1938 until 1968. and Midland Parliament, which broke new ground in allowing the on-air discussion of controversial topics by members of the public. On 30 October 1988, The Asian