PANDORA - not radio - STOP REPORTING ON IT!

[joshzz]

It seems that certain media magazines are intent on communicating Pandora as radio when in fact it is not radio.

I have complained numerous times to the various online media magazines such as Inside Radio that Pandora is not radio. However, they continue to promote Pandora as radio. The bottom line is, they are getting paid to do so.

What a sad state we are in, when an application gets as much as attention as real radio. All of it is garbage hype.

It's no wonder that GMs, PDs, owners etc., are becoming more aloof from the so-called reporters. All too often, key note speakers at media events don't deserve being there.

Pandora like a record player, mp3 player, cassette player, etc., is a device that plays music. We don't call these devices radio and we should remember that pandora is likened to them.


pandora is a garbage fad that will live a sohrt season.

 

[landtuna]

Like Pandora or not it is a competitor for broadcast radio to some degree and as such deserves to be heard here. If for no other reason than to itemize the number of competitors taking radio's audience.

And no, I am not a Pandora fan. Tried it. Didn't like it. Dropped it. Won't go back.

 

[davideduardo]

It seems that certain media magazines are intent on communicating Pandora as radio when in fact it is not radio.

The question is simple: if an AM or FM station streams, is the stream "radio."

I think we know the answer.

Another question: Is the prerequisite for having a radio station the possession of an FCC license and the generation of RF between 540 and 1700 kHz or 88 and 107 MHZ? Or is it related to the delivery of audio content to listeners?

Another question: when people, randomly recruited, tell about listening to KXXX or WXXX less and Pandora more, and use the term "radio" for both, what is Pandora.

it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck.

I have complained numerous times to the various online media magazines such as Inside Radio that Pandora is not radio. However, they continue to promote Pandora as radio. The bottom line is, they are getting paid to do so.

Isn't there a new Men in Black movie coming out?

What a sad state we are in, when an application gets as much as attention as real radio. All of it is garbage hype.

Well, the huge percentage of under-50 listeners i've done research with in the last year or so that indicate usage of Pandor is not hype, it's reality. Listeners think it is radio. Ad buyers think it is radio.

It's no wonder that GMs, PDs, owners etc., are becoming more aloof from the so-called reporters. All too often, key note speakers at media events don't deserve being there.

Keynote speakers you don't like are there because they represent the technologies or services that are taking terrestrial radio's listeners.

Pandora like a record player, mp3 player, cassette player, etc., is a device that plays music. We don't call these devices radio and we should remember that pandora is likened to them.

When the FCC mandated that, by January 1967, all simulcasting of AMs on FMs be ended, 75% of the FMs in the US sounded like "record players" that played music with nothing more than an occasional sweeper or ID.

Pandora takes a sample of your taste, and creates a station just for you. You can give additional feedback and it becomes more and more your station. In the future you will be able to pick DJs and entertainers, specify an interval, and "your" station will have jocks or personalities in between the songs, too.

Things change. KOWH was not KDKA, and pandora is not KISS-FM or Z-100. But it's radio.

pandora is a garbage fad that will live a sohrt season.

It's success will bring competition. And the best ones will win.

You don't really think Clear Channel brought in Bob Pittman to tell them where to put the stopsets, do you?

 

[triadradionewsman]

I'm not sure if Pandora is "radio" or not. I do listen to it and enjoy it and they play the music I want to hear. I wish I could say the same for the real "radio" stations in our area. As someone said earlier, if it walks like a duck.........Most folks listen to a medium for entertainment and/or information. Pandora entertains me. i like it.

 

[landtuna]

Pandora takes a sample of your taste, and creates a station just for you. You can give additional feedback and it becomes more and more your station.

Admittedly, it has been some number of months since I last experienced Pandora but I didn't find this to be the case. I would select certain songs belonging to a well-identified genre but Pandora would come back with music not anywhere related to where I was. After trying for a period of time I gave up.

You have continually said that listeners will abandon a station quickly if they hear unfamiliar music. This was exactly my experience with Pandora.

 

[KeithE4]

Pandora takes a sample of your taste, and creates a station just for you. You can give additional feedback and it becomes more and more your station.

Admittedly, it has been some number of months since I last experienced Pandora but I didn't find this to be the case. I would select certain songs belonging to a well-identified genre but Pandora would come back with music not anywhere related to where I was. After trying for a period of time I gave up.

You have continually said that listeners will abandon a station quickly if they hear unfamiliar music. This was exactly my experience with Pandora.

There must be some trial and error involved, at least right now. I haven't had those kind of problems with Pandora, although I don't use it often. I hear more repeats if I listen a lot.

It may not be "radio" in that it doesn't broadcast on frequencies between 540 and 1700 kHz or 88 to 108 MHz, but it is aural broadcasting, just like conventional radio is, and just like streaming services like iHeartRadio, TuneIn.com., Shoutcast, and Live365 are.

Sometimes I listen to these services over a radio transceiver device built into my smartphone (sorry, Luddites, but 3G and 4G services do transmit over radio waves, therefore they are "radio"), so in a sense, it's still "radio" for at least part of the circuit. Just not on broadcast bands.

 

[joshzz]

PERSONALITIES + MUSIC + LOCAL COMMUNITY CONNECTION = RADIO

RECORD PLAYER = NOT RADIO

DAVID EDUARDO SINGING = NOT RADIO

PANDORA = NOT RADIO THOUGH A BETTER CHOICE THAN DAVID EDUARDO SINGING

 

[davideduardo]

PERSONALITIES + MUSIC + LOCAL COMMUNITY CONNECTION = RADIO

So, by your standards, Schulke, Marlin Taylor, Darryl Peters... did not do radio. Great stuff to hear.

RECORD PLAYER = NOT RADIO

And the average of 1000 FM stations on the air from 1946 to 1960 were not doing radio, either.

DAVID EDUARDO SINGING = NOT RADIO

Not only is that not radio, it would be a miracle. I can't carry a tune in a bucket.

PANDORA = NOT RADIO THOUGH A BETTER CHOICE THAN DAVID EDUARDO SINGING

100 million people strenuously agree with the second part of that statement.

 

[SirRoxalot]

Radio ignoring Pandora is like radio ignoring TV in 1950. Ignoring it won't change its impact. Point goes to David.

The answer is to offer what Pandora can't. Point goes to Josh.

Let the match continue.

 

[TheBigA]

Technically speaking, radio refers to transmission. That's what Marconi was talking about. Wireless transmission is radio. Content is not what defines radio.

 

[SirRoxalot]

So, you want to split Pandora's listeners between wired and wireless?

 

[TheBigA]

No...I'm just providing a definition.

 

[landtuna]

Technically speaking, radio refers to transmission. That's what Marconi was talking about. Wireless transmission is radio. Content is not what defines radio.

While I was raised believing your quote I think times, and definitions, have changed.

When someone in common everyday conversation is describing content on television, the TV itself is totally out of the conversation. The content is television. It has been that way for a long time. Television, as originally defined, was the wireless transmission of video and the receiver that became ubiquitous in every home in the land. Today though, "TV" is the content and not the technology.

Radio is very similar. "Listening to the radio" might mean AM, FM or XM. Or it might mean a podcast that was never broadcast over the air. It could mean cable or satellite (yes, technically they are also OTA but no one describes them that way). There are other forms of radio as well although nobody describes them that way. Why not? Because microwaves and xrays are not in the entertainment/information business. Again, content, not technology. Cell phones seem to be the remaining radio technology described as such and not by content.

Marconi is dead. So, it seems, are the old definitions.

 

[TheBigA]

Marconi is dead. So, it seems, are the old definitions.

I'm not restricting radio to broadcast. Cell phone and wifi is radio under my definition. A walkie talkie is a radio.

 

[KeithE4]

Cell phones seem to be the remaining radio technology described as such and not by content.

A cellphone and a smartphone are still phones. So is a SIP/VoIP phone, a digital phone connected to your office PBX, a 900 MHz cordless analog phone, or an old-fashioned AT&T model 2500 connected to a twisted pair that goes to your local phone company. They all make phone calls, therefore they are phones. The content is a two-way conversation with the person of your choice (and sometimes not of your choice. ), and is called a "phone call," regardless of the physical devices or transmission methods being used.

If you are watching American Idol on DirecTV, the local news on rabbit ears, or a ballgame via MLB.TV on the interwebs, you are watching television.

If you are listening to Rush Limbaugh on your local AM station, Morning Edition on FM, the Rolling Stones via Pandora on your Blu-Ray player, or WCBS on a smartphone in Los Angeles, you are listening to radio. It may not be the absolutely correct definition (like the misuse of the word "bandwidth" when "data rate" is more correct, or "core memory" in a computer, when there hasn't been a toroid core in a memory device in close to 40 years), but it is the common one.

It is all about the content. Some people need to get over it.

 

[davideduardo]

Technically speaking, radio refers to transmission. That's what Marconi was talking about. Wireless transmission is radio. Content is not what defines radio.

To a listener, content defines everything. The technicalities of delivery are not important.

 

[TheBigA]

To a listener, content defines everything. The technicalities of delivery are not important.

Hooray. I'm not talking about "to a listener." I'm providing a professional definition.

Listeners sometimes can't tell the difference between one artist and another. That doesn't make their misidentification correct.

Some people call all carbonated drinks "coke." So a soft drink to them is a coke. Regardless of the flavor or brand. It's a coke. So what?

Content is content and it can exist outside of the confines of radio. Good content can translate to multiple circumstances, as a great song can exist on a radio, in a concert hall, and in a movie theater. But a movie theater isn't a radio. The talent of an announcer can translate to multiple platforms, far beyond radio. One of the biggest problems that can hit air talent is they only see themselves through a single dimension. This is not to say that a radio doesn't also suffer from this problem. Some researchers asked a group of Gen Xers what a radio was, and they said it was something you heard in a car. They hadn't experienced the transistor age. Others do their listening via computer or phone. But radio isn't just about the content, because the content is broader than radio. Or should be. The goal of content creators now is to create content that CAN exist on multiple platforms. Because that's the way it will get sampled. So you're not a radio creator, or even a media creator, but a content creator.

 

[davideduardo]

To a listener, content defines everything. The technicalities of delivery are not important.

Hooray. I'm not talking about "to a listener." I'm providing a professional definition.

I'm sure the relatives of Davis Tutt are still wondering about the technicalities of a "fair fight" and the definition of same... but the real issue is that Tutt fell over dead after running around for a while. Just like terrestrial radio.

Listeners sometimes can't tell the difference between one artist and another. That doesn't make their misidentification correct.

But their perceptions drive listening. If I think Garth Brooks was part of Brooks & Dunn, and I love all "their songs" I still am cuming the country station. It's about the feelings the content evokes, not the distribution system.

Some people call all carbonated drinks "coke." So a soft drink to them is a coke. Regardless of the flavor or brand. It's a coke. So what?

If you are Pepsi, that's a real problem. If you are terrestrial radio, and believe that pureplays are not your competitor, you have an even worse problem. The www.atemylunch.com site probably would be a good place for them to visit.

But a movie theater isn't a radio.

Unlike streams on computers and smartphones, which listeners agree are "radio," nobody outside the psych ward would call a theatre a radio station.

But radio isn't just about the content, because the content is broader than radio. Or should be. The goal of content creators now is to create content that CAN exist on multiple platforms. Because that's the way it will get sampled. So you're not a radio creator, or even a media creator, but a content creator.

We may be saying the same thing in different ways. Good content is channel independent. And since one channel is dying, it's obligatory to achieve a presence in other channels or the content and the original distribution method will die together rather than moving on.

 

[Tom Wells]

I think new media pays quite a compliment to radio in trying to present itself as such.

I also think such media would do better to promote itself with a name that distinguishes itself from radio.
A Podcast is what it is. Same for a webstream. I expect these to be packaged and delivered
in "some kind of time" by various digital "services" to this laptop.

The walkie-talkie is/was the last common simplex mode radio that didn't try to hide its underlying
"radio-ness" as cellphones attempted to.

Once there's an IP address, it's not radio unless it eventually gets to the broadcast bands via some station.

I'm not saying all the paid modes are not indeed relying on rf technology, but it's kind of like putting water
in a pipe and just watching it come out the other end and you're paying for the pipe.

With my oscope displaying my AM modulation envelope next to this laptop,
and as much as I am dependent on computers for my livelihood and modern connectivity,
I still insist on making the distinction between radio and the newer modes.

Radio is > right there< on the every clock radio, kitchen radio, and car radio.
The more modern modes can be set up to seem almost as transparent, but having your preferred listening choice
available by default on standardized receivers available over the past 50 years is a great advantage.
Especially when the infrastructure is already in place.

I have schematics encoded in my dna at this point, and cannot ignore circuit values,
wavengths, modes and delivery.

I remember well when I last saw working toroid coil woven mat 24 bit memory in a GE 4010 in 1986.

Radio is when it squirts out magically and invisibly, and when humans have no input into the primary term of the equation.

 

[TheBigA]

Here's the real question:

Is iCloud radio? Should radio folks be worried about iCloud?

Apple is giving $50 million advances to each of the four cash starved major record labels, while radio pays them nothing.

Hmmmm. My money is on Jobs, not Westergren. Westergren's revenues don't even add up to $50 million. Who cares?