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Is Radio Headed For Extinction?
The radio industry is terrified of the Internet, with good reason. If it doesn't embrace new technologies — fast — it will go the way of the dinosaur.
The radio industry is in shock. An absolute coma.
Radio sees the enemy bearing down and closing in, but it doesn’t know how to respond. It’s frozen in place, unable to move. No defense is being offered, no counter attack.
I’d like to share the story of my industry’s panic, because I think there are lessons for everyone about how to respond, and not to respond, to change.
The foe that has radio folks terrified is the Internet. New technologies are encroaching on radio’s traditional domain with the same speed that the auto and airline industries once pounded the railroads into near extinction. And radio is mimicking the railroad industry’s response to its death knell — whether from arrogance, fear, or institutional inertia, radio is failing to see that it must embrace the future rather than resist it or run from it.
The story my father always told me about the railroads was that they didn’t realize what business they were in. If only they’d known they were in transportation rather than the railroad business, they would have understood that they should be investing in new methods of transportation — embracing, not ignoring them.
Radio is like that. We’re obsessed with our transmitters and towers. They make us think we’re in the broadcasting business. To be a broadcaster means having a transmitter, and it means having a license to use it. Since there are a limited number of licenses granted by the FCC, owning one has generally made broadcasters feel pretty good about themselves.
But audio distribution over the Internet is something anyone can do. With 50% of American homes now estimated to have broadband, listening to Internet audio is becoming a common activity. A recent survey indicated that 10% of radio listeners had tuned into a stream in the prior 30 days. No transmitter, no tower, no license required — which leaves radio facing the same confusion that the railroad guys suffered back in the 1940’s.
The radio industry needs to learn that it’s in the audio distribution business. In talk radio, my part of the medium, we need to understand that we’re in the spoken word programming business. We’re not inexplicably linked to transmitters. We can create our programming for whatever distribution tools come along. Really, what do we care how it gets to your ears?
The new options for distributing our material should be viewed as good news by the owners. After all, they’re the ones who know the business of creating and distributing programming, and who have contracts employing those of us who are good at creating content.
And the new technologies should also make programmers and their talent happy. More audio distribution methods should mean more demand for our entertainment in the long run.
But the fear that radio feels over the encroachment, and the revenues lost to the Internet, are causing radio to pull back rather than to be aggressive. In the short term, this means tighter budgets and fewer jobs. This is exactly the wrong response, of course.
Over recent years, radio has lost audience among those who listen at work or at home. The one place its audience hasn’t dropped is in the car. That’s radio’s domain. Sure, you can listen to an iPod or a CD while in the car, but most people still choose radio, because in the car you want that live connection, especially on the way into work in the morning.
This final frontier is being pierced by other distribution methods that will challenge radio’s control. GPS devices are starting to offer traffic reports. Weather, traffic, sports scores and news are available on cell phones. iPhones and other cell phones can already play audio feeds.
How much longer will it be before WiFi, cell technology or some other method of distributing sound will make it possible to listen to an Internet radio in the car, just as I now do at home? Two years? Three? Maybe five? It’s hard to know how long it will be, but that day is clearly on the way.
Online radio options, such as Live365 and Pandora are already abundant. And new tools will change the landscape of who can have a radio station, just as the blogosphere has altered our notion of news distribution.
Visit Blog Talk Radio or Web Talk Radio if you want to know how far things have come. This remarkable destinations let’s one become a talk host in a matter of minutes, with the needed infrastructure provided for at no charge.
The struggles of the radio industry aren’t your concern, of course. It will continue to survive in one form or another, just as the railroads still chug along in a supporting role.
But the exciting part of all this radio industry news is that it isn’t about the radio business at all. It’s Internet news. All of the tools to have your own radio station, or your own radio show, now exist online. This will lead to the transformation of how we conceive of websites.
The old fashioned concept of a website went something like this — “a web site is a set of documents (called ‘web pages’) that you can view via a computer network called the Internet.”
While factually accurate, this description hardly tells the story.
I think of websites as community centers. Like a Starbucks on the Internet. You drop into an environment where you can sit and feel comfortable. Stay as long as you wish, enjoy music that you like in an environment that’s designed to match your tastes. It’s your home away from home. Social networking is the hot thing because people are looking for community.
Whatever sort of business you are running, I believe your approach to your website will soon have audio as a vital element.
Consider a garden shop.
The website now might contain the normal directions, phone number and branding information, an online store and maybe some literature on how to plant. Imagine how much more interesting and compelling the site becomes when it adds an audio blogging component from Convocast that allows visitors to listen to a prerecorded tip on planting from the garden shop owner, then record questions in their own voice with the click of the mouse.
The owner of my hypothetical garden shop can do a weekly podcast in which he discusses with members of his staff techniques for planting or other seasonally appropriate topics. These podcasts will sit online as a permanent resource for shoppers.
Imagine the power that a Realtor will gain by distributing short audio messages on new listings to customers who sign up online using the tool offered by Foneshow.
Talk radio will become nearly as common as blogs, making websites more powerful and enticing.
Perhaps I should have seen all this coming. But for me, newly cognizant of the power of the web for distributing audio programming, this is a profound discovery that is shaping my sense of where my industry, and my career, are headed.
While I understand the fear of many in my industry, the model for how not to respond is right there for us to look at in the history of the railroads. The fact that our world is growing bigger, and spilling out into a much larger, more accessible domain, isn’t grounds for concern, its motivation to get moving.
Can you say “All Aboard!”
Todd Feinberg is a nationally syndicated radio talk show host. He blogs at Barackswhitelies.com.
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16 Comments
1. Pundit Review » Blog Archive » Todd Feinburg on Barack’s White Lies:[...] of the blogosphere, Todd finally has the fever, and he is blogging up a storm. He’s even writing columns for Pajamas [...]
May 3, 2008 - 5:28 am 2. John Benson:I listen to hours of radio every week, but all of it via my iPod. What is ironic is that I listen to more radio and talk show now then I did before my iPod 3 years ago. The great advantage is that I can listen to what I want, when I want. And if the phone rings, I can stop it, then return to it without loosing a single word. And if there is a part I want to hear again, I can rerun the section.
Here is a list of some of the material that I automatically download daily. There are many others that I listen to, but not as time sensitive.
CLASSIC TALK SHOW FORMAT
May 3, 2008 - 7:56 am 3. Dave Barnes:Rush Limbaugh – paid subscription
Dennis Miller Show
Townhall.com Dennis Prager
Towhhall.com Hugh Hewitt
WRKO – Howie Carr
Todd wrote: “Sure, you can listen to an iPod or a CD while in the car, but most people still choose radio, because in the car you want that live connection, especially on the way into work in the morning.”
Uh, no.
My daughter is 21. She has never listened to the radio in the car while she was driving. She never listened to the radio her entire 4 years at university in NYC.
During her high school years, she listened to CDs in the car. The 6-CD changer that came with her first [used] car was the most important feature to her.
Now, she listens to music on her iPods. She owns 3 of them. She has not used the CD changer in our family car in over 4 years.
I have done non-scientific surveys of her friends and her behavior appears to be typical.
I personally think that music radio will die within the next decade.
May 3, 2008 - 8:34 am 4. kender:Internet radio (and TV) in the car is already possible with KVH Industries TracNet mobile internet receiver. Last time I checked internet radio has alot more listeners than sat radio and is growing so fast that by 2015 it will rival terrestrial stations in number of listeners.
Exciting times.
May 3, 2008 - 9:20 am 5. Todd Feinburg:Young people are a different ballgame, no doubt. But as people get into their late twenties or early thirties, they generally start to acquire an interest in the outside world. They care about politics, community, or at least are commuting and want to hear a traffic report. Also, they realize they’ve been listening to the same songs for 15 or 20 years, and they decide to go out exploring.
This phenomena brings people to things like talk radio or all news radio. Whether it will impact your daughter’s generation in a way that will get them to broadcast radio remains to be seen, but it’s hard for me to imagine that when people get older and their lives get busier that they can maintain their devotion to their own music sources.
Radio still does well in the car. But I would still argue that the key moment will be when it no longer has an exclusive on broadcasting into that domain.
May 3, 2008 - 9:32 am 6. Kevin:I think talk radio has been making a slow but positive transition with today’s technology. It may not always be noticeable, but like John Benson commented above, more and more people are finding it a bit more enjoyable to listen to talk radio shows via iPods and the like.
The transition of the radio industry certainly has a long way to go, but I don’t think it’s as gloomy as some might think.
May 3, 2008 - 12:17 pm 7. Dave C:I disagree about radio being in the audio distribution business. Radio is in the entertainment business. Entertainment can take many forms, talk radio, news, or music. Just like the railroads are in the transportation business, and competes with all other forms of transportation, radio competes for the listeners ears as an entertainment.
Certainly radio can’t offer time shifting, as Mr. Benson uses his Ipod for, but obviously those potential listeners who use Ipods or multi-disk CD changers are telling radio that they do not like or care to listen to the product the radio stations are delivering.
So,like the railroads, radio does need to learn how to compete for listeners ears now that the listener has more options.
May 3, 2008 - 7:58 pm 8. Todd Feinburg:We can compromise it and call it the audio entertainment distribution business instead. The point is still the same – that we have to view our entertainment as being adaptable to different platforms. That way, we can say yes to things like time shifting, because the tolerance for linear programming will diminish quickly if, for example, Sean Hannity fans can get his latest show delivered into the car in mp3 format each day and he can listen whenever he turns the car on.
May 4, 2008 - 5:36 am 9. Armyvet:Is the author ignorant, stupid or just dumb? Radio transmission and reception has more talkers and listeners than ever before. How do I know this? Because a “cell phone” is really a low powered, high frequency transmitter and receiver communicating with a nearby tower transmitter and receiver.
May 4, 2008 - 3:23 pm 10. john:Perhaps, I’m not typical, but I don’t know anyone from my college who listens much to the radio anymore. My news I get from the internet and my music and most everything really. For example, with the recent Coachella concert out in California, I went to their website and there are links of all the bands and their websites or myspace. Then, I listen to the songs there. I don’t even watch Colbert and Jon Stewart on television anymore, only internet for news and comedy.
May 4, 2008 - 9:15 pm 11. Gregory:Armyvet: probably neither of the above, and you are just being a troll.
You know, and I know, and Todd Feinburg knows exactly what is meant by ‘radio’ – the four-character stations (like WKRP) that transmit audio via one-way FM or AM transmissions to receivers. Or using satellite technology to deliver the same. Commercial radio, as opposed to cellular communications or ham radio.
Don’t be an ass.
May 4, 2008 - 11:21 pm 12. Novathecat:I have no choice but to use radio at work because my employer does not allow the use of streaming media. I imagine that there are many office drones in the same position nationwide.
May 5, 2008 - 6:48 am 13. EDW:Internet radio in my car? I like it. Gimme 1,000,000 channels and 0 interference from the FCC. Everything on the local airwaves is now hip-hop, top 40(which is mostly hiphop), country, and classic rock. Talk radio is overrun with commercials; Rush and Sean only work about a 1 hour each day when you subtract out the ads. This and $4/gallon gasoline is making me take a hard look at that bicycle in the attic.
May 6, 2008 - 9:39 am 14. Whitehall:I’m listening to FM radio more than ever. I never listen over the internet either.
How could that be? I’m really impressed by two things – sound quality and imaginative programming. Funny, but I get neither off of “commercial” FM or even the government-subsidized (NPR) stations.
I’m very fortunate to have a local station (KKUP) here in silicon Valley that is a owned and operated by a club! Completely supported by listener donations with no commercials.
Their sound quality is the best that FM standards will allow – unlike the commercial stations with their compression for car radios. When they do studio broadcasts, the quality EXCEEDS that of CDs.
The content is chosen by real people, volunteers all. Of course, some of it is wacked but for many hours of my listening day, it is revelatory in breadth and scope – and enjoyment.
If the FCC will allow the bandwidth to stay unmolested, a declining value of licenses could allow this model for broadcasters to spread.
Of course, a BIG if.
May 6, 2008 - 10:27 am 15. William:How can you not mention Sirius or XM in this article????
May 7, 2008 - 1:43 pm 16. Larry Rasczak:I too listen to Live356 and my “Yahoo Radio” streams at work. However I also use streaming to listen to conventional Radio while at work, just not LOCAL radio. I doubt I am alone in this.
Thanks to streaming I can listen to radio stations from all over the country, or even all over the world. Although I now live in Texas, over the years I’ve lived in Florida, Kansas, New Mexico, and Arizona. If I want to see how things are going in my old hometown, or at my old college, or if I am just feeling a tad nostalgic, I can google up the radio station I used to listen to “back in the day” and listen to it from my desktop. My favorite classical station is still KHFM, and I don’t mind the fact my local Smooth Jazz station is gone, because I still have WSJT.
In this respect streaming media is a lot like the shortwave radio my Dad had when I was a kid. Then I could listen to Radio Australia, several different services of the BBC, or even Radio Moscow. Yesterday I was listening to a classical music stream from Greece.
However, given that most American talk radio stations now draw much, if not all, of their programing from the same dozen or so national shows, (WMAL and KKOB AM are interchangable for much, if not most, of the broadcast day, for example) there is, at least as far as streaming is concerned, a decreased need for talk radio stations. It matters not to me if I hear Hugh Hewett on KNTH or KRLA or WGKA. One assumes it matters to the managment of those stations, at least it should, but from where I sit, there is literally no difference at all.
In that respect Mr.Feinburg is right on target. When you are dealing with over the air radio the physical limits of what a transmitter can do means you must have dozens, or hundreds, of stations if you want to have nationwide reach. With streaming media, all you need is one website.
May 8, 2008 - 10:37 am