satradio said:
I think you're all right to some extent. Radio isn't going to die, but it is going to be a much smaller, less relevant medium...imo of course.
I don't think terrestrial radio is going to go away anytime soon - and I actually think it will actually outlive broadcast television which I think is far more doomed in the short term. And I think there will always be a demand for most of the sort of
programing that is currently being offered by radio and television.
But if one simply projects current and established technological trends out far enough into the future, I think is almost a given that the vast majority of today's broadcast type programing - be it on radio, television, satellite, cable or Internet radio - will eventually move to on-demand forms of delivery.
This transition is already
well underway for television and has been ever since the introduction of programmable VHS recorders. The days of people rearranging their schedules and rushing home in order to sit in front of an electronic box to get their one and only chance to view a particular program is pretty much a quaint, and, for most people, a not so very fond memory. Broadcast and cable television survive because they are still the most efficient method of distributing the content to a wide audience. But it is certainly not the most convenient method from a consumer standpoint as remembering to set a recorder is a hassle and, if one forgets to set it, one is limited to a choice of only the programs that are on at that particular moment.
From a consumer standpoint, the most convenient method of accessing content is to be able to pick from ANY program without any time or day of week limitations and without having to anticipate and remember to record it in advance. Once the necessary bandwidth becomes widespread enough and cheap enough,
that will be the obvious way people will choose to get most of the content they currently get on television. And they will have their choice of any episode of any program they want going back to the infancy of television and will be able to watch it based on
their schedule, not some station or network's. The
only thing that is stopping it from fully happening right now is the speed of technological development and deployment.
I think that trend will actually take much longer to take hold in radio programing despite the fact that the technological barrier is much smaller. And the reason why radio will survive longer is the same reason why television will die sooner: consumer convenience.
There is no greater fan of Internet content than myself - and there is precious little on modern terrestrial radio stations besides news/talk programing that is of any interest to me. But if I am taking short trips around town, I almost never bother with tuning in Internet stations on my smartphone or mess with an mp3 player. If I don't like what is on WBAP at the moment, I usually just shut the radio off. Messing with a smartphone or mp3 player and selecting the content I want is not something that is particularly easy or safe to do while driving. And while it is not all that difficult or time consuming, it is still a bit of a hassle to do when one gets into a car and is in a hurry to get going. Much easier just to turn on the radio.
Operating a radio is ridiculously simple - you simply twist a tuner or hit a preset and forget about it. A lot of people listen to the radio in a rather out of focus manner and simply use it as background noise or something to keep them company when they are driving. They are not exactly indifferent about what they listen to - but, on the other hand, they usually aren't all that picky either.
Someone who is EXTREMELY picky about the content he is listening to is probably ALREADY listening to CDs, mp3s, podcasts or Internet streams. For such a person, the minor hassle of bringing along CDs, downloading mp3s and podcasts or contending with clunky smartphone Internet radio aps is not a particularly big deal. But most people aren't all that picky, especially if they are not going to be in the car for very long. And most people listening to the radio at work don't even WANT to listen to programming that they find to be TOO compelling - otherwise, it will actually become a distraction.
Yes, tea drinkers can get dozens of varieties of much higher quality specialty teas at Central Market and even more at online tea merchants for not too much more money - but most people don't want to bother with the hassle and are perfectly content with the pedestrian mass market Lipton type stuff they pick up at Wal-mart. Yes, you can get tens of thousands of stations and far greater selection and quality on Internet radio - but most people don't want to go through the bother and are perfectly content with the pedestrian mass market type stuff on AM/FM.
Television will die sooner because people make a far greater investment of time and attention span into a TV broadcast - and, as a result, they are far more selective about what they watch and far more willing to invest a little bit of time and effort in weighing their options and making a decision. If you find daytime TV options boring, you are probably not going to suffer though them when you are home from work sick if you have better on-demand options open to you even if they do require a little bit of effort on your part to tune into. On the other hand, many people who drive home from work at 8:00 PM and listen to Laura Ingrahm on WBAP would probably prefer to listen to Rush Limbaugh instead - but how many to the degree that they would be willing to go through the hassle of downloading Limbaugh's podcast, even if it was available to them for free?
Because people tend to listen to radio while doing other things, the path of least resistance is very often to simply put up with what is on rather than seeking out alternatives. Since a TV program is more demanding of time and attention, people are necessarily more choosy.
What will eventually kill radio as we know it today will be when the day comes that accessing on-demand audio content will be as easy and convenient as it currently is to listen to the radio. That day will come when wireless broadband is dirt cheap and ubiquitous and our radios, televisions, telephones, mp3 players, video players and PCs will all morph into a single device the size of today's cell phones that can simultaneously plug into multiple peripherals such as monitors, keyboards, printers, audio systems and handsets on an as-needed basis. One of those peripherals, which will be the end for radio as we know it, will be an audio tuning device just as easy to operate as today's radios.
Someday, we will all be wirelessly connected at all times to a handful of huge music databases, most likely operated by performance rights organizations such as ASCAP or SoundExchange, where one can, for a small fraction of a cent, instantly access as many times as one wishes pretty much any musical recording that has been issued to the public since the 1890s.
Prefer for someone else to pick out the music for you? No problem - just open up a playlist that someone else has put together for you which will automatically stream the chosen recordings from the database. There will probably be a small industry of people who publish such playlists for every sort of musical taste imaginable. In such a world, why would an mp3 player or a music radio station ever be necessary for most people? Pandora is nothing more than a very crude and primitive step in that direction and it, too, will become obsolete.
Prefer a real live human disc jockey personality to introduce musical recordings and engage in chit-chat? No problem. Such programs will most likely still exist - but they will do so on an on-demand basis. Why waste a really good dj's talents and all of one's production expenses by limiting one's audience by geography and only to those are in a position to tune in at a particular time of day? By going on-demand, the program will be available around the world to listeners at any time of day. It benefits both consumer by making more choices available and the content producer by making a wider potential audience available.
Those same advantages for both consumer and producer will probably also cause most talk show type programs to find a way to adapt to on-demand delivery. Many such programs are already successfully aired on a time delay - so there is no reason why most cannot be made to work on-demand.
You are driving along on the freeway and wish to listen to your favorite talk show host. Just punch a pre-set and his most recent program will stream - or pick out the program from earlier in the week that you missed. Find yourself at your destination when the host is about to make an interesting point? Tune back in at the same spot when you get back in your vehicle. Want to listen to country music? Press a preset and the latest playlist file by some playlist writer you have subscribed to will instantly download and start playing. Want to catch up on the news or weather? Just press a preset and the most recent update of either will stream from your news organization of choice. Want a traffic report? Program the device to automatically interrupt whatever you are listening to if a traffic situation emerges along your route of travel.
When that day arrives, an AM/FM station will be little more than just another potential preset option that must compete with an endless number of on-demand preset options. When that day arrives, any type of programing that CAN be successfully consumed on-demand WILL move to on-demand. When that day arrives, all that will be left of radio and television type programing as we know it will be content that does NOT lend itself towards on-demand. For example, people prefer to watch sporting events live. How many people are interested in last week's game when they already know what happened? Same with BREAKING and UNFOLDING news coverage which, by its very nature, has a shelf life which expires almost immediately. THAT is the where the long term future of radio and television is - assuming that they will even have a long term future.
The question is, once everything that can be moved to on-demand has made that move, will there be enough demand for live programing to keep a station or channel supplied with around the clock content? And will there be enough demand to support the very expensive infrastructure needed to broadcast terrestrially? Or will such programing itself go "on demand" in the form of streams that are active and available only when specific sporting events or breaking news stories occur?
If I owned a TV station, I would be asking myself how I could create compelling local programing for the day when the national networks and syndicated programing distributors decide that there is more money to be made in distributing their content themselves on an "always-on" and "forever-on" basis rather than messing with a bunch of local stations each demanding their cut and only airing the content once at a specific time thereby limiting the number of potential viewers.
Radio will still be around for a good number of years. But the first stations to fade away will be those that carry little besides national and syndicated programing and cookie cutter music formats heard in every market. The producers of such content will be the ones who will have the most to gain when on-demand becomes widespread, convenient and viable. Such individual programs will become another preset that will compete on the listener's dial with the presets of the stations which once would have been their affiliates.
The stations that manage to remain standing will be those that are very live and very local. Those will be the only ones which have any chance at all of being able to compete with and stand out amongst the flood of extremely diverse and compelling on-demand options which will be every bit as convenient and effortless to access.
Anyhow, I have zero experience in radio beyond operating an amateur Internet station. I regard it as a serious endeavor - but that does not make it any less than amateur. I do not pretend for a moment that I am especially knowledgeable about broadcasting or the industry - because I am not. But I have eyes and an active mind and am observant. I have watched with delight and glee the emergence of the Internet and the flood of wonderful content that was previously unavailable to people like myself with unusual tastes and zero interest in today's pop culture offerings. All I am doing here is projecting existing trends that I, as an intelligent layman, have observed to their logical conclusion. That is the only way anyone can predict the future - to project existing trends. And, of course, there is never any guarantee that existing trends will continue or that new and radically different ones will not emerge. If something comes along that causes bandwidth prices (adjusted for currency inflation, of course) to significantly rise rather than fall then all bets are off and radio and television will have a new lease on life.
