James Cridland’s Future of Radio: new stations, podcasts and… Amazon?

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 sends us his weekly links as he continues settling into his new Australian homeland.

James Cridland’s articles

• How many people really listen to the podcasts they download? The answer will surprise you… (in AllAccess)
• Not really an article, but the UK’s latest radio listening figures are all on my website media.info
• Impressive advertising from an Australian radio company for their stations. So much better than a pointless music positioner, which offers nothing that you can’t get from Spotify or YouTube.
• Fun Kids Radio first to commit to a permanent (and national) DAB+ channel in UK – great news for the team, who are committed and sound great.

United States

• Why radio will never die, according to Jad Abumrad, one half of RadioLab. This is an excellent piece, exploding the transmitter mindset and highlighting where radio’s going.
• Amazon are spending big money in radio – producing their own. Great opportunities.
• Hot Pod — a newsletter about podcasts from Nicholas Quah. This is really good: you should subscribe to it. The latest edition, incidentally, picked apart work done by public radio in the US to standardise podcast measurement, which sounds like rather a good thing. However, this work ought to be international, not just from the US. Particularly – where’s the UK? The EBU? The CRA?

United Kingdom

• RAJAR radio listening figures came out last week. The raw data is all on my website media.info. Adam Bowie gives them some analysis: I like the overlaps. Matt Deegan posts about Chris Moyles’s breakfast show on Radio X, which returned its first figures this week except actually didn’t really (you’ll need to read the piece).
• Earlier last week, the announcement of 18 radio stations to broadcast on new UK DAB multiplex: some surprises, including a second new Magic brand extension. Can’t say I’m overly thrilled about much of this, with the exception of the new stations from talkSPORT and UTV.
• Lovely piece in The Guardian about Terry Wogan’s career.
• Imagination Technologies climbs on talk of possible Pure radio sale – if the radio industry’s clever, they’d buy a bit of this company. Unlike competitors Roberts, they don’t just slap their brand on sets available elsewhere, and actually design and build every single model themselves. The UK radio industry owes this company much.
• Making up your own listening figures appears to backfire if you then report on them in the news…
• Classic FM boss tells ‘patronising’ Radio 3 boss to stop ‘aping’ his station – oooh, good spat.
• DAB reception went all fuzzy in the UK – thanks to the US making some changes to GPS. I’m told by a BBC engineer that most of this story is rubbish: but I’m also surprised that the entire transmission platform is apparently susceptible to this kind of failure.
• Fun Kids Radio first to commit to a permanent (and national) DAB+ channel in UK – great news for the team, who are committed and sound great.

Australia

• Things never heard at a radio station… fun video from someone who appears to work at SC Austereo
• What do listeners want from radio and are you providing it?
• Impressive advertising from ARN for their radio stations. So much better than a pointless music positioner, which offers nothing that you can’t get from Spotify or YouTube.
• Infographic: record numbers tune in to Australian commercial radio in 2015 – we probably shouldn’t forget that radio is in great health, which makes it all the more frustrating when the industry talks itself down
• Whooshkaa aims to help podcasts make money, run by a former radio sales guy.
• Bauer Media is just a magazine publisher in Australia – and having a horrid time. Analysis from mUmBRELLA
• Radio star reveals just how ‘cutthroat’ the industry really is – ouch, this is a bit of a strange piece. Insecure?
• This is a great web page to back up a TV documentary. Lots of clever tools used here. We could learn from this.