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I really don't care about radio anymore

J

jimbo

OK, I care enough to read about what people say about it but I hardly ever listen to AM or FM anymore.

It used to be the most important part of any car I owned was the radio. Living in North Dakota back in the olden days, the true test of any car radio was its ability to tune in WLS. It's a real shock to discover I don't care about radio. I was in radio for a few brief years but (depending on your viewpoint) I either wised up or chickened out over the low pay and frequent moves that are part of the business.

But I had always been a fan of radio since I got my first transistor radio when I was 5 years old.. I had always turned on the radio for the company, a friendly voice to go with the music, not to hear 10 in a row with no talk. I can get that from my mp3 player.

So it's kind of a shock to discover I don't care about terrestrial radio anymore. I get nearly all my music from Sirius and XM. The more my local stations drop their local programming and use satellite the more inclined I am to cut out the middleman.

My local stations have almost no local content. Nearly all the music stations are voicetracked or it's Bob and Tom or John Tesh or Deliliah piped in. The stations have trained me not to depend on them for breaking weather or news. Hell, I can't even get a decent weather forecast from radio anymore, sunny with a high near 50.

Radio has only itself to blame for people flocking to Ipods or XM or whatever. Stations remove all their local flavor, fire their live jocks, increase the spot load and expect us to keep tuning in? Today radio stations are about as relevant to me as my local TV station, just a carrier of programming piped in from some place else.
 
> [It used to be the most important part of any car I owned was
> the radio. Living in North Dakota back in the olden days,
> the true test of any car radio was its ability to tune in
> WLS.

> But I had always been a fan of radio since I got my first
> transistor radio when I was 5 years old.. I had always
> turned on the radio for the company, a friendly voice to go
> with the music, not to hear 10 in a row with no talk.]


I'm sure that most radio listeners, like you and I, started listening at an early age. It became a habit, a way of life. It's just amazing to me that commercial radio has been unable, or unwilling, to hold on to that audience. Any other business would sell their soul for that kind of loyalty.
 
This is one of the first posts that makes more sense and down to the point with exactly the way I feel. What's interesting while many American consumers make the shift in our direction, why are there so many of these postees continue to act like virtual program directors trying to revive a dead horse. Gossip or chat how this sounds and this should flip to this when I feel most Americans don't care or listen intensively like you and me, they are finding other better alternatives, and these postees chat and rave and hype about these terrestrial formats like they were born yesterday. I hardly ever listen to FM even though a few stations in my market has made an attempt to clean up their act, and challenge satellite.
Both of these stations had dips in ratings this last book because I think they have been a Johnny come lately. Plus when I happen to not bring have an external device with me, I'll listen to FM until a commercial comes on, and I react offended how dare you stop my music, because I've been brainwashed the last few years by Satellite and the internet. No commercials.
Plus I have an internet station I programmed professionally, and it does everything plus voice tracking if I wanted to. When the morning alarms goes off with my station, it scares me because it sounds like the real thing. I feel like I'm listening to a real FM station. It does evereything automated that a live jock does (But without commercials).
So I don't care eithier.






> OK, I care enough to read about what people say about it but
> I hardly ever listen to AM or FM anymore.
>
> It used to be the most important part of any car I owned was
> the radio. Living in North Dakota back in the olden days,
> the true test of any car radio was its ability to tune in
> WLS. It's a real shock to discover I don't care about
> radio. I was in radio for a few brief years but (depending
> on your viewpoint) I either wised up or chickened out over
> the low pay and frequent moves that are part of the
> business.
>
> But I had always been a fan of radio since I got my first
> transistor radio when I was 5 years old.. I had always
> turned on the radio for the company, a friendly voice to go
> with the music, not to hear 10 in a row with no talk. I can
> get that from my mp3 player.
>
> So it's kind of a shock to discover I don't care about
> terrestrial radio anymore. I get nearly all my music from
> Sirius and XM. The more my local stations drop their local
> programming and use satellite the more inclined I am to cut
> out the middleman.
>
> My local stations have almost no local content. Nearly all
> the music stations are voicetracked or it's Bob and Tom or
> John Tesh or Deliliah piped in. The stations have trained
> me not to depend on them for breaking weather or news.
> Hell, I can't even get a decent weather forecast from radio
> anymore, sunny with a high near 50.
>
> Radio has only itself to blame for people flocking to Ipods
> or XM or whatever. Stations remove all their local flavor,
> fire their live jocks, increase the spot load and expect us
> to keep tuning in? Today radio stations are about as
> relevant to me as my local TV station, just a carrier of
> programming piped in from some place else.
>
 
Such is the experience with all regulated industries after a period of time. Some say radio is not regulated enough. NO. This is what happens when radio, garbage collection or healthcare is regulated. It stagnates and dies. The solution is deregulation. Buying a radio station should not be any more complicated than buying a house or a piece of land. If you got that bucks than you should be able to make a deal without the nanny state getting involved in the transaction.



> Radio has only itself to blame for people flocking to Ipods
> or XM or whatever. Stations remove all their local flavor,
> fire their live jocks, increase the spot load and expect us
> to keep tuning in? Today radio stations are about as
> relevant to me as my local TV station, just a carrier of
> programming piped in from some place else.
>
<P ID="signature">______________
[email protected]</P>
 
What is the URL for your station?


> This is one of the first posts that makes more sense and
> down to the point with exactly the way I feel. What's
> interesting while many American consumers make the shift in
> our direction, why are there so many of these postees
> continue to act like virtual program directors trying to
> revive a dead horse. Gossip or chat how this sounds and this
> should flip to this when I feel most Americans don't care or
> listen intensively like you and me, they are finding other
> better alternatives, and these postees chat and rave and
> hype about these terrestrial formats like they were born
> yesterday. I hardly ever listen to FM even though a few
> stations in my market has made an attempt to clean up their
> act, and challenge satellite.
> Both of these stations had dips in ratings this last book
> because I think they have been a Johnny come lately. Plus
> when I happen to not bring have an external device with me,
> I'll listen to FM until a commercial comes on, and I react
> offended how dare you stop my music, because I've been
> brainwashed the last few years by Satellite and the
> internet. No commercials.
> Plus I have an internet station I programmed professionally,
> and it does everything plus voice tracking if I wanted to.
> When the morning alarms goes off with my station, it scares
> me because it sounds like the real thing. I feel like I'm
> listening to a real FM station. It does evereything
> automated that a live jock does (But without commercials).
> So I don't care eithier.
>
>
>
>
> <P ID="signature">______________
[email protected]</P>
 
> What is the URL for your station?
>
>
Intersoul.net





> > This is one of the first posts that makes more sense and
> > down to the point with exactly the way I feel. What's
> > interesting while many American consumers make the shift
> in
> > our direction, why are there so many of these postees
> > continue to act like virtual program directors trying to
> > revive a dead horse. Gossip or chat how this sounds and
> this
> > should flip to this when I feel most Americans don't care
> or
> > listen intensively like you and me, they are finding other
>
> > better alternatives, and these postees chat and rave and
> > hype about these terrestrial formats like they were born
> > yesterday. I hardly ever listen to FM even though a few
> > stations in my market has made an attempt to clean up
> their
> > act, and challenge satellite.
> > Both of these stations had dips in ratings this last book
> > because I think they have been a Johnny come lately. Plus
> > when I happen to not bring have an external device with
> me,
> > I'll listen to FM until a commercial comes on, and I react
>
> > offended how dare you stop my music, because I've been
> > brainwashed the last few years by Satellite and the
> > internet. No commercials.
> > Plus I have an internet station I programmed
> professionally,
> > and it does everything plus voice tracking if I wanted to.
>
> > When the morning alarms goes off with my station, it
> scares
> > me because it sounds like the real thing. I feel like I'm
> > listening to a real FM station. It does evereything
> > automated that a live jock does (But without commercials).
>
> > So I don't care eithier.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
 
>
> My local stations have almost no local content. Nearly all
> the music stations are voicetracked or it's Bob and Tom or
> John Tesh or Deliliah piped in. The stations have trained
> me not to depend on them for breaking weather or news.
> Hell, I can't even get a decent weather forecast from radio
> anymore, sunny with a high near 50.
>
And thank goodness XM and the like keep you up to date on your local weather, (and they are voiced tracked/piped in)....it's the radio you hate that you have to pay for.
Good move.
 
> > [It used to be the most important part of any car I owned
> was
> > the radio. Living in North Dakota back in the olden days,
>
> > the true test of any car radio was its ability to tune in
> > WLS.
>
> > But I had always been a fan of radio since I got my first
> > transistor radio when I was 5 years old.. I had always
> > turned on the radio for the company, a friendly voice to
> go
> > with the music, not to hear 10 in a row with no talk.]
>
>
> I'm sure that most radio listeners, like you and I, started
> listening at an early age. It became a habit, a way of
> life. It's just amazing to me that commercial radio has
> been unable, or unwilling, to hold on to that audience. Any
> other business would sell their soul for that kind of
> loyalty.

The point everyone seems to be missing is that anyone old enough to remember WLS as a decent music station (60s & 70s) goes back to a time when radio was pretty much it for entertainment. Times have changed and there are more options today. Even discounting other sources, there are more stations today than ever before making each one's share of the pie smaller. We'll never see the day again when stations like WLS, WABC, WBZ, etc. had 30 shares. You can't survive in the 21st century doing ANY business the same way you did it 30 years ago...radio is no exception. If we had the sheer number of choices available in 1975 we have today, does anyone believe that WLS would have been a 30 share station?

I don't see what the hype is about XM & Sirius...it's still someone else's choice of tunes (albeit narrower in scope), still voicetracked & generic-sounding. And the audio quality sucks. About the only thing it has going for it is you could drive coast to coast & never have to change the channel. Better seats on the Titanic, that's what it is. Not worth $13/mo to me. As for webcasting...99.999% of it is amateurish-sounding, and besides how many people are gonna boot up the computer every time they want to listen to the "radio".

It may be trendy on broadcast-oriented boards to bash commercial radio, but I'd bet it'll be top dog for many years to come.
 
It won't be going anywhere for awhile. Also don't forget, even in my teen years, for everyone who liked the DJs, someone else was all too happy to listen to the TM Stereo Rock outlet, or the more laid back presentation of progressive rock stations. Don't asssume that if we could bring back screaming Q format jocks, the teens would give up their iPods.<P ID="signature">______________
Have a Happy New Year!
http://www.thebig8.net/have_a_happy_new_year_with_cklw.mp3</P>
 
> Such is the experience with all regulated industries after a
> period of time. Some say radio is not regulated enough.
> NO. This is what happens when radio, garbage collection or
> healthcare is regulated. It stagnates and dies. The
> solution is deregulation. Buying a radio station should not
> be any more complicated than buying a house or a piece of
> land. If you got that bucks than you should be able to make
> a deal without the nanny state getting involved in the
> transaction.


Deregulation is how we got schitty post-1996 radio in the first place. And it won't stop the same big corporations from pricing out potential buyers closer to the communities the radio stations serve. Clear Channel et al are all bad enough a making big metro stations bland...we don't need them moving more small market & small town stations away, nor programming them from hundreds of miles away. <P ID="signature">______________
"I have the feeling about 60% of what you say is crap."--David Letterman underestimates Bill O'Reilly</P>
 
> OK, I care enough to read about what people say about it but
> I hardly ever listen to AM or FM anymore.
>
> It used to be the most important part of any car I owned was
> the radio. Living in North Dakota back in the olden days,
> the true test of any car radio was its ability to tune in
> WLS. It's a real shock to discover I don't care about
> radio. I was in radio for a few brief years but (depending
> on your viewpoint) I either wised up or chickened out over
> the low pay and frequent moves that are part of the
> business.
>
> But I had always been a fan of radio since I got my first
> transistor radio when I was 5 years old.. I had always
> turned on the radio for the company, a friendly voice to go
> with the music, not to hear 10 in a row with no talk. I can
> get that from my mp3 player.
>
> So it's kind of a shock to discover I don't care about
> terrestrial radio anymore. I get nearly all my music from
> Sirius and XM. The more my local stations drop their local
> programming and use satellite the more inclined I am to cut
> out the middleman.
>
> My local stations have almost no local content. Nearly all
> the music stations are voicetracked or it's Bob and Tom or
> John Tesh or Deliliah piped in. The stations have trained
> me not to depend on them for breaking weather or news.
> Hell, I can't even get a decent weather forecast from radio
> anymore, sunny with a high near 50.
>
> Radio has only itself to blame for people flocking to Ipods
> or XM or whatever. Stations remove all their local flavor,
> fire their live jocks, increase the spot load and expect us
> to keep tuning in? Today radio stations are about as
> relevant to me as my local TV station, just a carrier of
> programming piped in from some place else.
>


So you go to a voice tracked, non-local satellite feed and pay for it??? You go to exactly what you are complaining about. Something rotten in Denmark here........
 
> > Such is the experience with all regulated industries after
> a
> > period of time. Some say radio is not regulated enough.
> > NO. This is what happens when radio, garbage collection
> or
> > healthcare is regulated. It stagnates and dies. The
> > solution is deregulation. Buying a radio station should
> not
> > be any more complicated than buying a house or a piece of
> > land. If you got that bucks than you should be able to
> make
> > a deal without the nanny state getting involved in the
> > transaction.
>
>
> Deregulation is how we got schitty post-1996 radio in the
> first place. And it won't stop the same big corporations
> from pricing out potential buyers closer to the communities
> the radio stations serve. Clear Channel et al are all bad
> enough a making big metro stations bland...we don't need
> them moving more small market & small town stations away,
> nor programming them from hundreds of miles away.
>


So help me here.....

What would satellite radio be? Talk about non-local, and programming from THOUSANDS of miles away. And talk about bland...... I can run my CDs/MP3s/Minidisks for free and get a better mix of music and not pay for it (and not listen to the constant XM or Sirius self promotion ads).

A number of people whine about local radio, then say they are going to satellite. They are going to exactly what they are complaining about and PAYING FOR IT. Help me with the logic here......
 
> What would satellite radio be? Talk about non-local, and
> programming from THOUSANDS of miles away. And talk about
> bland...... I can run my CDs/MP3s/Minidisks for free and get
> a better mix of music and not pay for it (and not listen to
> the constant XM or Sirius self promotion ads).

Your opinion. I get bored hearing music I've heard a hundred times before, and in what world are CDs free?

> A number of people whine about local radio, then say they
> are going to satellite. They are going to exactly what they
> are complaining about and PAYING FOR IT. Help me with the
> logic here......

No prob. The original poster's preferences can be summed up like this:

1. Local radio
2. Good satellite radio
3. Bad satellite radio

Now that the poster's local stations have switched from #1 to #3, he's sought out #2.

But you have a point in that localism isn't the key to the switch. Unique, compelling content is. The poster's local stations used to provide this, giving the poster content he couldn't find anywhere else. That isn't the case anymore, so he made the switch.

Not all radio stations have to be live and local. Take any Jack station or satellite Talk station for proof of that. But when every station abandons locality, radio loses some of its unique flavor and makes itself vulnerable to other media.
 
Philosophical questions

> No prob. The original poster's preferences can be summed up
> like this:
>
> 1. Local radio
> 2. Good satellite radio
> 3. Bad satellite radio
>
> Now that the poster's local stations have switched from #1
> to #3, he's sought out #2.

But the original poster said "I really don't care about radio anymore" which begs the question of whether or not he (and others who are pro-satellite) consider XM and Sirius "radio" ... and if not, what do they call it? "iPod shuffle via satellite" perhaps?

The other point, as has been discussed before, is that -- regardless of delivery method -- we are all still listening to what someone <u>else</u> programmed (and that means, regardless of delivery method, there are still potential "tune out" songs). If someone programmed a local radio station with a music mix that was closer to a pro-satelliter's tastes than what the two satellite services are programming, would they prefer it or would their bias still cause them to reject it?<P ID="signature">______________


</P>
 
My TWO Cents

I think that there are two phrases from the previous discussions that need to be emphasized:

1) Commercial-free.

2) Compelling local content.

There are people who find that 35 cents a day is a small price to pay to dispense with 12-16 minutes of commercial content per hour on terrestrial radio. In many cases, 2 6-8 minute stopsets per hour - with multiple stations counter-programming by running their commercial sets simultaneously - means that music comes to a grinding halt twice an hour for a significant period of time.

The saving grace of terrestrial radio should be compelling local content. That's the one element that really can't be voice-tracked ahead of time and/or from hundreds or thousands of miles away. Too many radio stations have given up live and local broadcasting in the interest of "saving money".

What I can't seem to understand is the idea that voice-tracking really saves money. Good heavens, if having a live local jock means that you can provide up-to-date weather and information, how much of a salesman do you have to be to SELL that service? One or two additional spots an hour will pay for that local air personality. If the performing in that timeslot can't deliver content that will bring in an extra commercial or two an hour, fire THAT performer, not ALL performers.

In the meantime, the live and local performance will almost invariably bring in more listeners than canned content. Look at the market leaders across American. More than 90% of the time the stations with the greatest amount of live, locally-produced content have the best ratings.

Those are also the stations that will survive the onslaught of satellite, iPods, and the soon-to-come music streams via your wireless digital access device which is now known as a cell phone.
 
If you don't really care, then please stop posting your negative thoughts. This forum is for people who still love radio and still love to discuss it.
 
>> The solution is deregulation.

If that's the case, then how come radio is just as bad now than before consolidation, deregulation, etc.?
 
> If you don't really care, then please stop posting your
> negative thoughts. This forum is for people who still love
> radio and still love to discuss it.
>

OK, I won't post negative thoughts and you keep your head buried in the sand.
 
> So you go to a voice tracked, non-local satellite feed and pay for it??? You go to > exactly what you are complaining about. Something rotten in Denmark here........

I'd say it says something about the commercial load on radio today. I'm paying to get non-local, voice tracked radio with no commercials.
 
>>> And thank goodness XM and the like keep you up to date on your local weather, > (and they are voiced tracked/piped in)....it's the radio you hate that you have to pay for. Good move. <<<

Why thank you. I thought it was an excellent move myself. If both local radio and satellite radio are providing the same non-local content with voice tracking it's worth it to me to get rid of the 20 spots an hour.

I wonder if people like yourself said the same things about HBO when it first started up? Pay for TV? Only an idiot would pay for something you can get for free!
 
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