Here's the thing about podcasts: Money is also an issue there. You need at least 10,000 downloads to start. Until then, you're working for free. Actually losing money, since there are costs involved in podcasts. With 10,000 downloads, you can buy a cup of coffee. The issue in podcasting is getting people to download and subscribe. And you're one podcast among 10 million. A needle in a haystack. So the answer isn't podcasts. All we're saying is the game is different. You're not playing to Nielsen ratings. Instead you're playing to downloads and subscriptions. I've seen dozens of out of work DJs start their own podcasts and give up in 6 months.
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NBC Talknet - Could it work today?
- Thread starter KilowattKat
- Start date
Here's the thing about podcasts: Money is also an issue there. You need at least 10,000 downloads to start. Until then, you're working for free. Actually losing money, since there are costs involved in podcasts. With 10,000 downloads, you can buy a cup of coffee. The issue in podcasting is getting people to download and subscribe. And you're one podcast among 10 million. A needle in a haystack. So the answer isn't podcasts. All we're saying is the game is different. You're not playing to Nielsen ratings. Instead you're playing to downloads and subscriptions. I've seen dozens of out of work DJs start their own podcasts and give up in 6 months.
It was a network radio show, even if it ran (predominantly) overnight. The audience "out there" didn't want to hear someone who decided to call in but wasn't focused enough to have their idea thought out, their comment organized and, at minimum, jotted down on the back of an envelope. No one wants to hear some random caller, regardless of age, start out their call sounding like they just realized they'd interrupted their grandkid's sleepover. Those kinds of caller were a huge tuneout, and King and his producers knew it.
TalkNet isn’t exactly new is it? 😊
But let’s insert another product into that thought process. Don’t bother to come up with new ideas for buggy whips. Just let them wither away. Well…yeah. Do.
There seems to be this intractable idea that broadcasting is somehow this magical thing immune to business realities. Radio waves are just a transmission method. It’s a content business. And the audience doesn’t give special deference to content that comes over radio receivers vs streaming delivery. They want their content, their way.
Stranger Things is still a TV program, even if it’s not on a traditional TV station. That same thing applies to audio content. Podcast, curated channels, customized channels….it’s the same thing to end users, whether you call radio or something else. Audio content is far from dead. It’s just split into ever smaller pieces of the pie, and the economics follow suit.
The criticism is that there are no new ideas. But how about Black Information Network. There's an example of a linear 24/7 network, just like TalkNet, just like Sheriden and Mutual Black networks from the 80s. It's not political talk. It's not sports. They found sponsorship in a different way. Because it's iHeart, they found a way to get it on hundreds of AM stations around the country. So a radio company created a talk network, they built it, but listeners haven't embraced it. Could an 80s-style network work today? In this case, no. You can't blame radio for not trying.
"Los Angeles, hello...."
BIN has a few problems, as I see it. It's content intended to air on AM stations. (How many of them are iHeart's own that they otherwise had no good content for?) So they're still subject to all the problems of AM's everywhere: noise, poor sound quality, narrow audio bandwidth, noise, low-power signals, directional patterns, crappy receivers, oh did I mention NOISE?? But the biggest problem is the content panders to the target audience, and they're smart enough to realize that fact after not too many minutes of listening.
All of those same problems would also apply to a redux of NBC TalkNet. That's the topic of this thread. Thus the answer to the question is no.
Until the FCC compensates broadcasters that want to hand in their AM licenses. It's not hyperbole inasmuch as admitting there's really no other alternatives available that are workable, let alone viable, given the AM band's many handicaps.
Talk radio (more specifically, the Rush derivatives) and AM are keeping each other alive at this point.
Nope! I listened to many other hosts and NOT ONE did that and with all due respect, none of what you said justifies being an a$% to your listeners.
There's really not that much Christian talk out there. Mostly it's sermons. On the Catholic stations there are a couple, but the ones I've heard don't treat Trump that way. They favor his party because of one issue in particular, but don't see the man in the glowing terms you've described.
They may worship Trump in your region though. Obviously, I don't live in the Bible Belt, so Christian stations may be a bit different here. There are a few local Christian programs are seem to be pro-Trump (one in particular), but mostly it's the national sermons and the like that I hear whenever I tune in.
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The big problem we're seeing is that the Radio platform is eventually going away, both AM and FM. They have a lifetime. Personally, I don't like it. I don't think anyone who grew up with over-the-air radio does. But it's the reality. The internet has changed everything. It's killed a lot of things. Newspapers, magazines. Newer technology like the internet and AI has made older technology more and more vulnerable. Even movie studios are now wondering if they'll have a purpose once AI kicks in bigtime. Why have a studio and highly paid actors and extras, and fancy props, when an AI program on a good computer can do it all more cheaply?
I worked for a company that believed in radio. They spent I don't know how many thousands of dollars preparing and creating a radio show, including building a complete studio in the new host's house. The show failed miserably. I don't think it lasted even 6 months. Big loss of money -- but hey, they tried. One of the higher management went on to form a company which intention was to create radio for women -- a talk network for women. It was a great idea, on paper. It also failed miserably, but not for lack of trying. So radio historically has always had people with ideas. But so did vaudeville. So did the 'theatre'.
A lot of creative minded people work in the radio industry today, but if the money isn't there to back the ideas, they aren't going to be put on the air, or -- if they're put on the air, they may still fail because there won't be advertising money to keep the shows on the air. Because radio needs money to operate. And the money -- from advertising in most cases -- has other places to go, i.e. the internet. Before the internet was a venue for advertising, Radio had less competition for the advertising dollar. The internet changed all that.
Then you have other entertainment platforms taking screen time away from Radio and TV. Internet gaming is a very big deal, especially to Zoomers and Millennials. Every hour they spend online gaming is an hour they're not using traditional media like Radio and TV.
It's a multifaceted problem but the main part of it is the platform is slowly fading. Also, I don't think younger demos are as into talk shows -- any talk show -- as much as the Gen X'er and Boomers are. Their idea of mass communication is different. One reason talk radio was a cool thing in decades past was there was no instant communication, en masse, even like we have on this forum. I can type this out and when I hit 'Post Reply' it will be read by others within minutes probably. That was an impossibility in 1978, or even '88. People got their mass communication served to them via Radio, and call in shows were popular because of that. So the issue is complex but it involves everything that's changed about what we used to call 'mass media'
I don't think there really is a 'mass media' anymore. There's just media, and it's all worldwide in nature, theoretically. Joe Podunk down the block with his IPhone and internet connection with a TikTok account theoretically has the same potential audience as Joe Rogan. In reality, no one will watch Joe Podunk's TikTok clip, but a lot of them eventually do get views and become mini-Joe Rogans. Platforms like TikTok and similar apps have replaced talk radio like what used to be on Talknet. It's replaced a lot of other things as well.
I've listened to BIN, I don't hear pandering. I hear a network trying to serve their target audience, not pandering. It's like a combination of the Mutual Black Network, CBS Radio News, and NPR in its purpose and delivery. When more FM's die if BIN is still around it may migrate to some of them. Almost half the BIN stations are on FM already, actually. And you can hear them online.
I have no idea how big their audience is. But they're outlasted some other format flips in cities where they started.
Nice subject thread!
Ohhh that jingle....
I miss it terribly! I really do. We have two national, non-sports shows, RedEye and Coast to Coast, I do wonder what overnight talk radio would sound like if Art Bell would have just remained a police dispatcher. It's been about a decade since the last solid attempt was made with Jon Grayson's Overnight America.
Which tells you why one is a legend, and the rest are forgotten.
Listeners appreciate being respected by the host.
For those who don't remember, the King show had prominent and interesting guests for the first two hours (Al Gore, Louis Farikan, Ronald Regan, Jon Bon Jovi, General Westmorland, John Denver, James Mitchener, Skylab astronauts, etc.) that listeners could put questions to. Only the last hour was open phones. How many chances did people have to ask questions of these guests?
That's what made the show interesting and, I believe, what made it popular.
That's what made the show interesting and, I believe, what made it popular.
I seem to remember they gave out the phone number and since it was a "long distance" call back then, that cost the caller money, they said "we'll answer when it's your turn."
Did they just ask where they were calling from or did the producer prescreen the calls to make sure the caller would make sense?
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