Note: So I've decided to begin a series of essays - with no specific idea for topics yet - as I find myself inspired by something. My plan is to write a little on the subject every now and again when inspiration or information comes to light.
Comments, feedback, etc. are very much welcomed through out the posts. I hope they'll make for interesting conversation, and maybe lead us to new topics, ideas or information.
That being said, I present to you the first in the series:
The Radio Debate
Part One - Introduction
The Radio. At more points in our lives than we can remember, we listened to it intently. Its an invention that has kept you up, put you to sleep, kept you sane, driven you crazy, and been a staple in nearly every one of your lives.
I've been obsessed with radio from a young age. I work in radio. I live and breathe it. I love it. But so often, I find myself wondering what the future holds for it.
TechCrunch just posted an article about the online streaming service Pandora doubling its user registrations in the past year, and it got me thinking about what use there would be for terrestrial radio in the infinitely increasing WiFi/3G world we live in today. I really want to take a stance on the issue, but I'm one of the people that stand on both sides of the line: I'm an iPhone owner with a car radio hookup, I use Pandora and Last.fm both at home and on the iPhone and I subscribe to SiriusXM (both in my vehicle and online), I listen regularly to terrestrial radio, and work in the radio and media production industry.
Maybe the problem for me is that I was raised with a radio on in the background. I enjoy the presence of the jock in the studio between songs, and am a huge fan of talk radio as well. Working in production, commercials, promos, liners and station imaging is interesting to me on some level, even if for no more reason than to critique and learn from dissecting them. And on top of everything else, I'm a music addict: I literally listen to just about everything.
A while back, a friend and I were talking about how much we were both enjoying the Pandora experience. We agreed that the best part of the service was the ability to give feedback in likes and dislikes so it would get to "know" your taste (Pandora calls this the "Music Genome Project"). After tweaking your station, it truly is a completely customized musical experience... but its not personal. And for me, that's the rub. The local jock, the morning show crew, your favorite talk radio program: you know these people! On a very personal - and sometimes intimate - level, you feel a connection with these voices. These (generally) "face-less" people on the other end of the dial you somehow consider your friends. You're strangely comfortable with them. Pandora and Last.fm can't give you that. Not even your iPod can give you that. Which then brings us back to the question of where you find that personal connection, and the great radio debate: Is talk radio the future of FM, and thus, is AM dead? And even more, what will become of satellite radio? And what does it all really mean anyway?
Understandably, these questions may not mean much to some people. Though its difficult for me to contemplate a world without AM/FM radio (and after 5 years, Sirius as well), I'm sure there are those wouldn't care if it were gone tomorrow (take away the obvious references to power outage / end of the world scenarios, etc). But what about those of us who still see the radio as an integral part of our daily life? What future awaits us?
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