James Cridland’s Future of Radio: Lazy Buggles Headlines, how to never go into the station again, and radio is not dead
James Cridland
James Cridland is Managing Director of media.info, and an Australia-based radio futurologist. He is a consultant, writer and public speaker who concentrates on the effect that new platforms and technology are having on the radio business. Find out more or subscribe at http://james.cridland.net
James Cridland’s articles
Lazy Buggles headlines are the subject of my AllAccess column, where I ask what we’re doing about these inaccurate, false headlines. (Spoiler: not much.)
Love this from Radio Ink, particularly since I’ve just written the very same thing for my AllAccess.com column: Radio Is Not Dead.
“People love intimacy of radio and the human connection” vs another presenter let go without being able to say bye – in this case, from iHeart’s WDFN in Detroit. What does it say about our industry when radio presenters have to use social media to say good-bye?
As Search Costs Increase, AM/FM Radio Is A Smart Way to Grow Customers, says Westwood One. I’m a bit confused why nobody else in the US radio industry is a visible cheerleader like Pierre Bouvard from Westwood One is here.
Celador moves all Anglian programming to Norwich – five stations now sharing programming. These stations all compete with Heart and Capital, who share most programming out of London (with regional breakfast/drive); and, of course, the national BBC Radio 2. Disappointing, but as Heart/Capital/Radio 2 shows, “local” isn’t a reason to listen.
Eleven times radio stations have made a beer – the radio blog Earshot knows how to get me to link to one of their stories. Splendid research: I wonder if Steve taste-tested every one?
Survey shows Radio as most trusted media – this isn’t the only country where trust in radio is strongest: radio is also the most-trusted media in most EU countries.
Ouch – libellous phone call on a radio station costs the broadcaster dear. A reminder that the dump button is a good thing, as is not always believing a caller if they claim a story is in the newspapers.
Audiograms and the future of social audio – the ABC take us through “audiograms”, the kludge that turns great audio into shareable video, and what they’re doing to make them better. I like the ones OmnyStudio put together for my podcast, which I put on YouTube.
Elsewhere
South Africa: At Radiodays Africa this week, there was a talk on podcasting for niched audiences and advertisers. It’s very clear that podcasts, particularly, benefit from narrowcasting to communities of common interest. (It’s one of the reasons I launched podnews.net to monitor the goings-on in that space: have you subscribed?)
Germany: SoundCloud slashes 40% of staff as financial reality hits hard – very sorry for these folks, and hoping they pull through. A contact tells me that SoundCloud is particularly popular with black artists, and tries to tell me that it’s Silicon Valley’s inbuilt racism. Not sure I agree, but it’s certainly a viewpoint.
Norway: Six months in, some stats on Norway’s FM “switchoff”. Radio is still holding up nicely: and weekly 2.1m Norwegians listen to new stations that aren’t carried on FM (with a 22% share). Population of Norway is just over 5m, to put that in context. I’m concerned about cars: only 38% have DAB installed. That’s a lot of potential lost listening.
