Radio : The TWILIGHT DAYS

[joshzz]

Are we in the twilight days of radio? We continue to own & manage radio stations but are we approaching the final apex, the last opportunity to sell before the bottom really falls out?

My daughter posted a video on teachertube.com and more than 2,000 people watched her video in less than two days. I couldn't believe the response she received! These online sites (this isn't a radio station site) continue to erode our listnership. For radio there's pseudo radio Pandora.. it's nothing more than a juke box and then there are thousands of legitimate radio station websites.


Is our audience being fragmented so much, that we'll have to work harder and harder to reap a small profit. For live games we'll have to simultaneously broadcast it to ustream ( I saw some stations already doing that) otherwise kids just won't listen..

Technology is changing so fast.. Sometimes I wonder if I should have just hooked up with one of the political parties, secure a job in government, write letters to commend our party leaders prior to every election to ensure I keep my job, and then retire with a Fat Pension.. Oh well. josh

 

[gr8oldies]

Social media is what is growing, and this is the ground floor. No towers, no transmitters, but its a whole different mindset. Major corporations are redirecting their dollars away from advertising in the traditional way. Radio isn't dead but music radio could die off.

 

[joshzz]

now you're making me cry. :'(

 

[ok walters]

That is a funny post from a guy who was urging people to buy silent radio stations at rock bottom prices a few weeks ago. It was their big chance just a month ago and now we are in the "twilight days". Time moves fast in the radio business I guess.

 

[joshzz]

I write the topics that make the whole world sing
I write the topics of love and special things
I write the topics that make the young girls cry
I write the topics, I write the topics

 

[joshzz]

I should give credit where credit is due to avoid any lawsuits-- from Barry Manilow's "I Write The Songs"

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Maybe owning radio stations is like owning stock in public companies.

Some will make you money. Some will take the shirt off your back.

So from the exotic of investing in and reviving "dark stations" to asking if the industry is dying, simply paints the picture ( or it that writes the song?) of life.

Maybe one of the problems faced by radio is that too many people buy into the industry (as opposed to buying into A station) and enough people do this blindly which keeps the bad (failing) stations going when they should vanish into the great tower site in the sky or something.

One could make the argument that shares of public stock are different than radio stations in that you cannot affect the failure or success of the shares you own... they will simply take you for a ride in whatever direction they choose to go... where as you can through operational and management skills make a station a success or make it a failure.

I would point out that it appears there are certain stations that are doomed by their community, their frequency (in the case of AM stations) and their competition.

 

[amfmxm]

Maybe owning radio stations is like owning stock in public companies.

Some will make you money. Some will take the shirt off your back.

So from the exotic of investing in and reviving "dark stations" to asking if the industry is dying, simply paints the picture ( or it that writes the song?) of life.

Maybe one of the problems faced by radio is that too many people buy into the industry (as opposed to buying into A station) and enough people do this blindly which keeps the bad (failing) stations going when they should vanish into the great tower site in the sky or something.

One could make the argument that shares of public stock are different than radio stations in that you cannot affect the failure or success of the shares you own... they will simply take you for a ride in whatever direction they choose to go... where as you can through operational and management skills make a station a success or make it a failure.

I would point out that it appears there are certain stations that are doomed by their community, their frequency (in the case of AM stations) and their competition.

Nicely stated, GRC.

I wonder sometimes whether some of us confuse our own "twilight days" as representing radio's "twilight days." It is easy to do.

Things change, as always. But as the pace of change quickens (as always) our own clocks are slowing down--even if only incrementally. Just this morning one of our jocks was showing me his new Droid--and suggesting that I would need to trade in my "antique" BlackBerry, now an entire year old! I told him that I'd consider it, if-and-when he ever actually figures out how to work his Droid!

As you know, I see radio continuing to wander through the maze of change by trial-and-error, but generally see the industry as a whole in reasonably decent health--particularly in comparison to print media.

I also see television on the verge of chaos--when the wealthy, locally-powerful affiliates get cut loose by the Big 4 networks as soon as the networks determine that (between cable, satellite & the web) there's no longer any reason to divert the signal through affiliates when they can go directly to the viewer. It will happen within the next 2 to 5 years. Bye-bye, Channel 2, Channel 6, Channel 13.

Radio has no such serious threat staring it in the face. The audio "new media" alternatives are having very little impact on terrestrial radio. Taking small bites... but no "Jaws" scenario on the horizon.

So, radio's "twilight days" may be some very longgggggggggggggggggggg days, indeed. Call Vegas and put $100 on a hundred years... then call your grandchildren and tell them that they'll need to pass the bet to their grandchildren...

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

I wonder sometimes whether some of us confuse our own "twilight days" as representing radio's "twilight days." It is easy to do.

Things change, as always. But as the pace of change quickens (as always) our own clocks are slowing down--even if only incrementally. Just this morning one of our jocks was showing me his new Droid--and suggesting that I would need to trade in my "antique" BlackBerry, now an entire year old!

/// snip ///

Radio has no such serious threat staring it in the face. The audio "new media" alternatives are having very little impact on terrestrial radio. Taking small bites... but no "Jaws" scenario on the horizon.

Here's a morbid bit of humor.... not as funny as time goes on... as it was when I first heard it!

"Life is like a roll of toilet paper. The nearer to the end you get, the faster it seems to spin."

For some of you, print that one out and put it aside for 20 years and then read it again. It may ring a bit louder with you then."

I also have a vision of radio being around for a long time. It may go through a painful transition. Maybe we need to see the population of stations cut in half or something.

The whiz-bang designers and inventors who could bring us a new generation of receivers have apparently found more lucrative assignments designing game machines and other widgets. One bit of good news for broadcasters: when I go shopping for an mp3 device that I can live with, I see the designers and marketers of those products are also suffering from a lack of creative thinking in design and invention.

Some people talk of phasing out AM and taking all audio to FM. Maybe even FM eventually needs to move on to another layer of spectrum that would allow us to escape the fading, the tunneling and other issues that plague those of us who do not live and work at the base of the tower.

But the idea of having somebody's voice and other sounds follow my ears around while I weed the flowers, while a transit from point A to point B and while I walk or exercise never has been diminished by the aging process. What I want to hear, and what I am unwilling to tolerate changes over time.

 

[Nostalgia]

I should give credit where credit is due to avoid any lawsuits-- from Barry Manilow's "I Write The Songs"

Trivia question most radio people probably already know: Barry Manilow did not actually write this particular song. It was written by Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys.

 

[TheBigA]

And Bruce wrote it about....


Brian Wilson

 

[amfmxm]

I also have a vision of radio being around for a long time. It may go through a painful transition. Maybe we need to see the population of stations cut in half or something.


Some people talk of phasing out AM and taking all audio to FM. Maybe even FM eventually needs to move on to another layer of spectrum that would allow us to escape the fading, the tunneling and other issues that plague those of us who do not live and work at the base of the tower.

I agree. The AM dial has been clearing itself out for the past 20 years, and the pace has quickened. In my hometown, the first station I worked at immediately out of college--an AM daytimer--disappeared in 1991. Since then, three more fulltime AM stations in the area have knocked the towers down and sent the licenses back to DC. Not one of those silencings drew as much as a mention in the local papers. No, AM is not dead--the KGO-WGN-WBZ (et al) ratings & revenue provides ample evidence--but those AM rigs that were marginal at the start are fast going dark.

FM is fine, for now. There is certainly very real danger that the FCC will screw up the FM band by relaxing interference rules too much--especially in response to the LPFM community-licensee movement. Frankly, I think they should be allocating those services to the AM band. But, thus far, the commission has not yet killed off FM and I'm hopeful that wisdom will prevail...

 

[joshzz]

I could be wrong but isn't it possible to delete AM altogether put everything on FM, allocate new positions for all translators, LPFM and noncomms so that they're altogether on the band and don't interfere with full powers. Do the same for all former AM stations - allocate positions for them on the FM dial and satisfy everyone...

Coudl this work?

I guess things could be worse --- you could own a short wave radio-- listenership on short wave has plummeted & it may soon be extinct. josh

 

[TVradioguru]

Canada and Mexico have already been allowing certain AM stations to move to FM channels. The problem is here in the U.S. is that there isn't enough places to put them in an already crowded band.

There are several proposals before the FCC to reassign some former VHF TV channels to an expanded FM radio band, but the idea hasn't seemed to gain any traction with the FCC nor Congress, who are focused on auctioning off UHF or other spectrum to cell phone or the promise of wireless broadband.

Assuming the FCC were to finally allow expansion of the FM band, the largest hurdle is replacing all those existing FM radios in cars and portable consumer products. Assuming an AM station owner were to commit a move to an expanded new FM band, how would one predict for the length of time before they had any listeners? It could be a while.

I just bought a 2010 Lexus for my wife and realized that as with my car, the radio is nothing more than part of a screen menu in the dashboard. I doubt replacing the radio in that car would be a simple or inexpensive task.

The facts are that unlike what has been presented in this discussion, music-intensive radio listening is up, WAY up. It's the economy and advertising that's down, no matter what portion of the media business you're in.

 

[TheBigA]

I just posted this on the FCC board:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/business/media/13fcc.html?hp

The FCC isn't going to expand the FM band. It doesn't need to. And the FCC doesn't care about the companies that own AM & FM stations. It's up to them to determine their destiny. For AM stations, the best short termj strategy is obtaining an FM translator (if available), and the other is to begin the transition to other platforms.