We are in a sense living in the final days of the traditional AM/FM radios. For decades the radio has been an instrumental tool for entertainment, informative information regarding bad weather, or news concerning local and or world events.
In an industry where the majority of radio broadcasters yearn for live and local radio personalities, the future doesn't look to bright.
As technology advances we will soon be seeing the birth of wifi in all homes and vehicles.
So what does that mean? With over half of all radio listening done within the car, internet radio companies such as Tim Westergren's Pandora Radio are eyeing into moving their internet radio stations into all automobiles. This will also act as a promotion to those who are still not aware of internet radio services like pandora which provides hundreds of stations tayloring to different musical taste.
Pandora isn't alone in this revolutionary movement either. Other online radio companies are also in the business of looking into putting their services into the automotive industry as well.
Pandora, which has over 40 million subscribers has also tapped into other high tech devices such as blu-ray players and flat screen televisions. So it is only logical they want to continue to expand.
In a recent interview Mr. Westergren has claimed that he is actively working with car manufactures that will put wifi and his beloved internet radio service into every single car that rolls off the assembly line.
So what does this mean for live and local radio? Hands down a global range of listeners beats the limited local listeners that terrestrial radio provides. Advertisers can now advertise their business on a global level instead of just a local one. A perk that many businesses would love to benefit from.
Not only would this be a huge advantage to businesses, it would most likely be cheaper as well. There will still be a need for the smaller local businesses to advertise, but it is most likely the demands for the bigger businesses will overshadow them.
I speculate that the local businesses is what will keep the terrestrial radio stations afloat for a time being. However in the end, I do not see terrestrial radio surviving.
Musicians would also benefit from this global platform. While promoting any given album, promoters usually travel to different radio markets to promote their music to the local radio stations. Scoring spins on a global radio service would surely eliminate the need to do this. So off the bat the live and local terrestrial radio stations lose advertisers and the interest from record labels.
Surely this change will not happen overnight. I estimate this will take place within the next 5 years and the death of the traditional AM/FM radio somewhere between 10 to 15 years. Again this is all speculation, however the potential of such internet services cannot be denied.
