• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Internet wifi coming to GM cars next month!

T

taylorengineer

Just as predicted....internet is coming very soon to your automobile. And that may mean an end to the corporate grip on content distribution - radio is going to find a brand new big,fat pipe to get music, news, and other programming to you in your car. The number of stations is only limited by the number of IP addresses available.
Big question. Will Obama reach out to grab control of the internet to stop people like Matt Drudge who dare criticize the chosen one? And in the process put all media and contemt delivery systems in the vise grip of governmental control? Will there be an "internet commission".....much like the politically charged FCC....that will play internet czar?
And most importantly.........
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
How does this affect Q100?
 
I can see this hurting satellite radio. The ONLY reason I listen to satellite radio is

1. Because it comes with my cable channels, and
2. BBC RADIO 1 (UK's top 40 station) is on there.

BPM could do a bit better..

I'm excited about this Internet Radio coming to cars finally happening, which I've been talking about for quite a while now. It will hurt radio to some degree, but I see this mostly affecting Satellite Radio, especially when full internet radio service becomes available in all cars.
 
Perhaps the dumbest idea in decades. Just what we need, one more thing to distract drivers. Now millions will be spent settling lawsuits and passing legislation to outlaw Internet use while driving.
 
Chancethegardner said:
Perhaps the dumbest idea in decades. Just what we need, one more thing to distract drivers. Now millions will be spent settling lawsuits and passing legislation to outlaw Internet use while driving.
Click to expand...

I disagree - this is one of the best things to happen to humanity!
I don't think people will be "surfing the internet" while driving down the road - at least the driver won't be. Passengers will be able to be online which will improve productivity tremendously! With the combination of neural networks(intelligent computing)and mobile connectivity there is a wealth of possibilities for traffic control and management not requiring human intervention. You will know where your teenage kid is every minute while he's driving your new BMW....you'll know where your wife really is when she's supposed to be working late.......the possibilities are limited only by immagination.
For us radio enslaved folk.....it means unlimited choices for listening to music and gathering information. Everyone who wants to broadcast will have the ability - the rich and poor alike.(Although the folks with money will still be the ones who can afford the bandwidth and marketing.)
 
You think PPM was wild...this is going to change everything. Everything. Atlanta stations aggressively deconstructing their product and going for a no-cost "win with music only and have no local connections" strategy is like a kid on a little bike playing chicken with an oncoming bullet train.

The question to debate here and now is, are there enough advertising and/or subscription dollars to support local programming, be that local talk or local music, on Internet stations?
 
jaxradidio said:
You think PPM was wild...this is going to change everything. Everything. Atlanta stations aggressively deconstructing their product and going for a no-cost "win with music only and have no local connections" strategy is like a kid on a little bike playing chicken with an oncoming bullet train.

The question to debate here and now is, are there enough advertising and/or subscription dollars to support local programming, be that local talk or local music, on Internet stations?
Click to expand...

Exactly Jax! And the game has already changed. Businesses that embrace social networking and customer contact programs are seeing results that paid media (digital and traditional) can't match. Here's a Main St. example: Custom clothing store spends $1500 a month on radio in a small market - then they engage FB and Twitter. Immediately inventory starts to sell out on pre-orders through these social connections - with no advertising expense.
These dollars are not coming back to paid media.

The challenge to paid media sellers: Use your expertise to help businesses embrace and succeed through these new consumer contact channels and spend less time pushing cume and share as relevant. How many you reach is moot compared to how many you engage.
 
1.There is a new paradigm emerging and those who figure it out first will bring home the bacon.
2. With technology changing so quickly it is difficult for us over 50 types to keep our eyes from glazing over.......
3. Radio always has been a young man/woman's business. Time for the fossil relics of programming to pass the torch
to a new, younger generation.
4. I wonder what the new face of radio will be in 20 years.....
 
The infrastructure for this to be effective does not exist yet. I assume GM is banking on the government expanding wireless broadband services now that the analog television spectrum is freed up.
 
One big limitation is the availability of 3G+ wireless broadband throughout the country. Until it gets well rolled out, satellite will retain the upper hand. But once it does, satellite is reduced to a niche product not unlike satellite broadband (Hughes DirecPC).

Terrestrial radio will remain viable due to the installed base of receivers. In fact, we may see stations "move out" to rural areas not well covered by wireless broadband, reversing decades of "move-ins" from rural areas to urban.

I would imagine that software-defined radio sets will require the car to be stopped to program stations. Once you do, you can have at it through presets.
 
Small community AMs and FMs will have another reason to deliver more local news, sports and public affairs. (Just as one example, how cool will it be to listen to your grandkids' high school football game out-of-state and in your car?) Streaming radio all of a sudden equalizes 1kw Ams and 50kw AMs, assuming the programming on the 1kw is relevant.

I think this is a win for the radio labor pool outside the big city.
 
It's a good step in the right direction for the options we will have in general. Unfortunately, the iphone apps streaming radio station's music across the country still sounds terrible to really enjoy any of today's music stations over them. But in a few years maybe it will be there.

The working sales people on the road during the day will love having wi-fi in the car as much as the iphone/blackberry itself.
 
trig said:
What's really sad though is that most new cars don't even have HD Radio as an option.
Click to expand...

The sad part about HD is how much time and energy was wasted hyping it while rarely, if ever, investing in the product. Here are two examples of where the focus needs to be directed for the future: Podcasts and blogs. Take a look at www.WNYC.org. My vote goes for on demand content winning over streaming the terrestrial signal and having the station home page dominated by self promotion.
 
trig said:
What's really sad though is that most new cars don't even have HD Radio as an option.
Click to expand...

There's NO demand for HD radio. Go to your local Best Buys and see if you can find ANYONE who knows what HD radio is. Most of the time they direct you to a XM/Sirius display.
Listeners don't care because there is plenty of vacuous programming already available on the radio channels we have now. Most "Entertainment Tonight" listeners- which is MOST radio listeners - are quite satisfied with the current offering. They are oblivious to the potential HD offers.....
Most of us have to be shown first - we are not open minded or creative enough to see the possibilities. And that's where the current leadership in corporate radio is lacking - there is NO understanding of the product they sell(SHOWBIZ!!!) and there is an amazing lack of creativity and innovation. You would think the base desire to earn profits would demand creativity and innovation - it's possible we have become so sloth that we find it impossible to even raise the bar.
The real potential of internet broadcasting is narrowcasting - serving the niche. No longer will you need to find the programming equivalent of the lowest common denominator. And no longer will we have to depend on public school educated nimrods who serve up our "Entertainment Tonight" flavored radio - we will have an infinite variety of choices - stuffy intelligentsia to bourgeois "dumb as a box of hair".
The two flies in the ointment - corporate greed and governmental incompetence. Which will be the first to squish the internets budding potential??
 
I think government is going to throw everything it's got support-wise into getting quality broadband and Internet radio into cars as soon as possible. It's the best and surest path of least resistance to blowing up radio as we know it, thereby ending the power conservative content has via AM talk radio.

Yes the conservative talkers will be available via Internet channels too, but significantly weakened by the end of the broadcast radio business model and by the environment of limitless choices they'll be competing in. Plus it might be easier for government to cherry-pick and shut down a single Internet show or station than to shut down a radio show or station.
 
jaxradidio said:
I think government is going to throw everything it's got support-wise into getting quality broadband and Internet radio into cars as soon as possible. It's the best and surest path of least resistance to blowing up radio as we know it, thereby ending the power conservative content has via AM talk radio.
Click to expand...

But you still can't make chicken salad out of chicken scratch.
 
taylorengineer said:
There's NO demand for HD radio.
Click to expand...

Why doesn't CC plug their HD subchannel stations more instead of filling up breaks with two, three, even four back-to-back PSAs? Maybe offer subsidized advertising to HD radio vendors.
 
jabba17 said:
taylorengineer said:
There's NO demand for HD radio.
Click to expand...

Why doesn't CC plug their HD subchannel stations more instead of filling up breaks with two, three, even four back-to-back PSAs? Maybe offer subsidized advertising to HD radio vendors.
Click to expand...

CC innovate? They can't get terrestrial programming right in this market.
HD? No tuners. No demand. It's dead.
 
Does live streaming music/programming matter anymore? Except for in progress sporting events, does it really matter if we are listening to a live broadcast or a prerecorded production? Why not just subscribe to your favorite shows such as Adam Carolla and listen to it when you want to? Pause it, back it up if you missed something, keep it for later.

My point is, I don't think live streaming over wifi is an improvement over podcasting.
 
An on-demand culture for media is solidly established.
Remember the Outer Limits TV show intro... "we control the vertical and horizontal....." Not any more!
As to radio - Adam's Podcast is just the beginning.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom