To serve the public

[stan]

There are many ways that radio can serve different segments of the public - different genres of music, for example. The tired old topic of news came up again in the wake of what happened at Santa Fe Friday. IHeartRadio chose to stay with its syndicated programming with brief news at the top of the hour - perhaps it shouldn’t be called Newsradio 740 after all. As Tom Taylor reported -

“The school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas prompted Entercom to drop the sports on Houston-market KIKK/650, and run the news feed of Channel 2/KPRC-TV. One report was that no other radio station was going wall-to-wall, so Entercom market manager Sarah Frazier put daytimer KIKK into service, to provide information to listeners on the local radio dial.”

 

[TheBigA]

Keep in mind the most listened-to news station in Houston is KUHF. So there are other options besides what's on AM.

 

[Mrtejano]

KNTE was reporting all morning too, well that’s the only station I was listening to. I can’t say anything about other stations.

 

[BamaTX]

There are many ways that radio can serve different segments of the public - different genres of music, for example. The tired old topic of news came up again in the wake of what happened at Santa Fe Friday. IHeartRadio chose to stay with its syndicated programming with brief news at the top of the hour - perhaps it shouldn’t be called Newsradio 740 after all. As Tom Taylor reported -

“The school shooting in Santa Fe, Texas prompted Entercom to drop the sports on Houston-market KIKK/650, and run the news feed of Channel 2/KPRC-TV. One report was that no other radio station was going wall-to-wall, so Entercom market manager Sarah Frazier put daytimer KIKK into service, to provide information to listeners on the local radio dial.”

For tragedies that don't compromise our infrastructure (cell phone towers, power, internet, etc), radio makes very little sense as a breaking news source. We are in the digital age were the news arrives on our cellphones and smarthome devices.

 

[davideduardo]

For tragedies that don't compromise our infrastructure (cell phone towers, power, internet, etc), radio makes very little sense as a breaking news source. We are in the digital age were the news arrives on our cellphones and smarthome devices.

But when you get major hurricanes, large earthquakes, extensive flooding and even large scale power outages, radio is still the most effective manner to communicate emergency information. If you look at the case of Puerto Rico, radio is still the only way to get news for hundreds of thousands of persons even nearly 8 months after the storm.

 

[TheBigA]

For tragedies that don't compromise our infrastructure (cell phone towers, power, internet, etc), radio makes very little sense as a breaking news source. We are in the digital age were the news arrives on our cellphones and smarthome devices.

Of course the news you get that way isn't going to be traditional news, but more personalized by the person putting it out. If you want to know the real story, without commentary, it may take a while.

 

[BamaTX]

Of course the news you get that way isn't going to be traditional news, but more personalized by the person putting it out. If you want to know the real story, without commentary, it may take a while.

Just about every news station and website had videos of the scene up within minutes of the tragedy.

 

[tb_]

The CBS stations were the only Houston radio stations doing *any* regular coverage of the shooting... I scanned around and everyone else was just playing music.

 

[BamaTX]

But when you get major hurricanes, large earthquakes, extensive flooding and even large scale power outages, radio is still the most effective manner to communicate emergency information. If you look at the case of Puerto Rico, radio is still the only way to get news for hundreds of thousands of persons even nearly 8 months after the storm.

Which is why I said...

For tragedies that don't compromise our infrastructure (cell phone towers, power, internet, etc).

But even for Hurricane Harvey, our wireless infrastructure remained mostly intact. Most of the towers were designed to withstand hurricane force winds. A few towers did sustain damage, power outages, or backhaul loss, but nothing major. Towers that lost their backhaul were quickly fitted with satellite backhaul for basic communication needs. Any tower that sustained damage was quickly replaced by a COW (cell on wheels) while the damage was fixed. And most towers run on a combination of backup batteries and on-site generators, which makes loss of power manageable.

What happened in Puerto Rico was a combination of terrible infrastructure, intensified weather, poor preparedness, bad economics, and terrible timing. At&t, Sprint, and T-Mobile all offer service to the island. But none of them invested heavily in their network like they do back in the States (mostly because Puerto Rico isn't considered a priority market). Many sites lacked generators and backhaul fallback. Those wireless carriers had to fight for the same resources that hospitals, government agencies, and the general public we're also fighting for. Puerto Rico sadly set itself up for service disruption by having such poor infrastructure. I don't think we will ever see the level of service disruption Puerto Rico saw here in the states.

 

[TheBigA]

Just about every news station and website had videos of the scene up within minutes of the tragedy.

Sure and KTRH had stuff on their site as well, with updates on Twitter, and they referred listeners to that. Sure, no problem.

 

[BamaTX]

Sure and KTRH had stuff on their site as well, with updates on Twitter, and they referred listeners to that. Sure, no problem.

Traditional over-the-air radio isn't as useful as it once was. It's a decent fallback for when you home ISP, cell service, and TV stations fail. But that's it. Better technology has just about made radio obselete. It's a dying industry.

 

[TheBigA]

Better technology has just about made radio obselete. It's a dying industry.

Depends. The internet requires something to push you to the site. Radio is one of those things that pushes people to places. So that's why, as you say, traditional radio, which assumes that people only listen to it, isn't as useful. But radio in conjunction with online can be a powerful tool. So you tell people what's happened, route them to the site, where they can see video, which is a huge draw, and get more specific information than any announcer could ever give. In Washington DC, the radio website owned by WTOP is the #1 source for news in the news capital of the world.

 

[BamaTX]

Apps have push notifications. That's what pushes information to people. People don't need (nor use) radio to know something is happening.

 

[TheBigA]

People don't need (nor use) radio to know something is happening.

I understand that. Radio is one of many things people use. And they use it. The 92% figure isn't fake news.

You'd be surprised how many people still think the shooting happened in New Mexico.

 

[stan]

As I’ve said before, it’s not usually considered safe to use my smartphone apps and read them while driving. I can listen to radio fairly easily.

 

[davideduardo]

You'd be surprised how many people still think the shooting happened in New Mexico.

And then there is the large number of people who think "New Mexico" is part of Mexico, the country.

 

[BamaTX]

I understand that. Radio is one of many things people use. And they use it. The 92% figure isn't fake news.

Those figures are a bit misleading. Those are figures of people who owned a radio. It doesn't take into account the time people spent listening to the radio and/or if they stay tuned in for the ads.

Radio is facing a slow death. There are too many (and better) alternatives in the market today. Radio just isn't the beast it once was and will never return to that status.

 

[davideduardo]

Those figures are a bit misleading. Those are figures of people who owned a radio. It doesn't take into account the time people spent listening to the radio and/or if they stay tuned in for the ads.

No, that is not the case. The 92% figure is the percentage of persons in the country who use radio at least once a week. 30 years ago, the figure was 95%, so the change is minimal considering all the new options.

The time spent listening, adjusted for the PPM (which showed lower listening times as it could take into account interruptions and was exact to the quarter hour) was about 12 hours a week. Today it is about 10 hours, and again a remarkable figure considering all the options available today.

Radio is facing a slow death. There are too many (and better) alternatives in the market today. Radio just isn't the beast it once was and will never return to that status.

But it is still the best reach medium available. As long as it offers such extensive reach and very efficient costs, it will be viable. No growth, but certainly valuable for many years.

 

[TheBigA]

Those figures are a bit misleading. Those are figures of people who owned a radio. It doesn't take into account the time people spent listening to the radio and/or if they stay tuned in for the ads.

It has nothing to do with if people owned the radio or not. Statistically, people spend more time listening to OTA radio than Pandora. That's a fact. And the PPM monitor doesn't differentiate between types of content. Just that you're listening.

Radio is facing a slow death. There are too many (and better) alternatives in the market today. Radio just isn't the beast it once was and will never return to that status.

Radio isn't a monopoly anymore. It hasn't been since TV became popular in the 50s. And yes, every new device dilutes the pool. But yet it's still there. The big issue for all content devices, and that includes the phone, is monetization. Until they somehow include music subscriptions with the monthly cost of your phone, the streaming companies will continue to lose money. You can't lose money forever. That's something radio has already learned.

 

[willdav713]

But when you get major hurricanes, large earthquakes, extensive flooding and even large scale power outages, radio is still the most effective manner to communicate emergency information. If you look at the case of Puerto Rico, radio is still the only way to get news for hundreds of thousands of persons even nearly 8 months after the storm.

That's right, and when all the power is down, internet, cable TV, and cell phone towers, the only option to get news comes from radio. Yet another reason why when I bought my smartphone, I made sure it came with FM radio. Now if only they had a way to carry AM radio on it as well.