Radio is not what it used to be. Sure, the roaring ninties and zero zeros (or whatever you call this decade) where great for the owners. They sold, bought, consolidated, laid off, installed automation, made redundant, and so on. Those that got out before summer of 2008 made a lot of cash.
They also left the industry hurting. Our competition is keen on erroding what ever revenue is still left in radio. And the competition is large and multiple. Not only are I-pods, I-phones, PCS phones, and whatever other wireless mobile device they thought up 5 minutes ago, trying to gain our listenership. We also have satellite radio, which is more like Meh, who cares. But worse than all of that, we have ourselves.
And it is from the inside out. Everyone is looking to cut expenses. The easiest way to do that is automation. Those stations that have not already automated are likely to, which will further exacerbate the radio loosing listeners problem. I mean really, how many more crappy bland “mix” formats, or satellite syndicated talk radio formats do we need. We are already swimming in a sea of mediocrity. And who gets to take care of all this high tech gizmos that keep the stations on the air? Usually the Engineering Department. So, we get more work, for the same, or less (by the time inflation is calculated in) money.
That trend has to stop.
It is not irreversable (yet). The station that stands out, can win, and win big. That is all for now, I look forward to writing about radio engineering.
Compare radio broadcasting to Juke Boxes. It used to be a mechanical marvel that played records, kept track of selections (for the goozy royalty crowd), and displayed flashy dressing to capture attention. The people who maintained them had to be pretty sharp as the machines were largely mechanical and electrical. Nevertheless, vinyl is unheard of by today’s youth, and the CD Jukebox came in and now it, is almost extinct! The Juke business today requires a high-speed Internet connection, the box contains nothing but a computer interface (NIC), money grabber, and audio amplifier. No more records or CDs! The music comes from a central server as a mp3, the selection is recorded for the goozy royalty, and that is about it! Really Neat and Tidy! The Juke Box operator these days has to be a computer geek! Radio could go this way if a fire isn’t lighted under the regulators and the management of today’s stations.