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DEATH OF RADIO

B

BogusBoy

From time to time, someone will doom and gloom over the dimise of terrestrial radio at the hands of technology. Somone always rasons that radio will be around forever. The one thing I'm sure of, is that while radio has a robust future, the future of the people involved with it is grim indeed.

Satellite radio, i-pods, automation, Internet, etc. Fads? The biggest threat, in my estimation, is HD! And corp radio is complicit in the crime. Each station will have up to four HD bands. Clear Channel in NYC alone could have over 30. Sounds great for terrestrial radio. But nobody seems to worry about how this will further fragment the audience for the existing stations. Theoretically, for the owners, it's smaller pieces of the same pie, and more oportunities to sell to specialty markets. But while it may be good for radio, and perhaps listeners, I fear it may be disatrous for radio's most expendable commodity. It's people. Many of us will get to celebrate radio's survival from the side lines.
 
BogusBoy said:
From time to time, someone will doom and gloom over the dimise of terrestrial radio at the hands of technology. Somone always rasons that radio will be around forever. The one thing I'm sure of, is that while radio has a robust future, the future of the people involved with it is grim indeed.

Satellite radio, i-pods, automation, Internet, etc. Fads? The biggest threat, in my estimation, is HD! And corp radio is complicit in the crime. Each station will have up to four HD bands. Clear Channel in NYC alone could have over 30. Sounds great for terrestrial radio. But nobody seems to worry about how this will further fragment the audience for the existing stations. Theoretically, for the owners, it's smaller pieces of the same pie, and more oportunities to sell to specialty markets. But while it may be good for radio, and perhaps listeners, I fear it may be disatrous for radio's most expendable commodity. It's people. Many of us will get to celebrate radio's survival from the side lines.
Click to expand...

You could be right. Most HD stations are nothing more than little JACK stations, jukeboxes with no air talent. Myself, I'm the only voice heard on the HD-2 channel of the station I work for. It's just music and me, canned me that is with liners I recorded sometime early last year. There's nothing compelling going on at most HD-2 or HD-3 channels. Like I said on another post, HD channels are currently being treated by most companies the way FM's were in the 50's and 60's. If they truly want to these channels to take off they'll need to staff them, make them "live" and compelling. But since most companies are going in the opposite direction for their main channels, I don't see the secondary and tertiary HD channels getting much better. Hope I'm wrong...

By the way, when I tune in to XM and Sirius, I hear many of their channels being treated the same way...
 
Great post. There is also potential for great expansion and creativity. Look at some of the stations out there which are allowing their HD signals to be programmed by kids in high school! They are the future of radio, not us. There is also potential for people to still be involved in radio but just not be able to earn a living from it. That is going on everywhere. There are TONS of talk radio guys out of work due to syndication. They moved on to other things. But, would they go back for a weekly slot for a few hours where they could interview people and talk about issues? I would bet they would. These signals could allow for that. It will hopefully also allow more liberal commercial broadcasters the opportunity to get on the air in bigger markets where they wouldn't otherwise have a chance to get on the air. No need for the fairness doctrine if one of the HD signals of a talker gives liberals the chance to broadcast on the other channel. In addition, it could go right up against NPR stations, by drawing business away from those stations which tend to garner the liberal audiences.
 
You said, "I fear it may be disatrous for radio's most expendable commodity. It's people. Many of us will get to celebrate radio's survival from the side lines."

Yes - you are RIGHT! waaa, waaa!

So, you could always sell Edsels or Hudsons, or buggy whips, or Encyclopedias (replaced by Google), or high button shoes, or 8 track players or 78 rpm records.

You could be a railroad conductor or even a RADIO STATION RECORD TURNER!

WOW, what a gloom and doom boy you are. THE FUTURE OF RADIO COULD BE YOU IF YOU GET OFF YOUR DEAD BUTT.

Haven't you noticed that the WORLD is changing. It's NOT 1959 any more, or even 1989. You MUST "get with the times." In the radio business (and in most other businesses) THINGS CHANGE. NOBODY listens to Amos and Andy on NBC Radio any more. Nobody listens to the Lone Ranger on the Mutual Radio Network any more. Eddie Cantor and Jack Benny are dead.

You could learn RADIO SALES and ALWAYS have a job!
 
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