James Cridland is Managing Director of media.info, and a U.K.-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.nets
This week James Cridland begins with a few of his articles, then moves on to the international roundup.
- Apple’s new Beats 1 – who are the DJs? – my weekly radioinfo.com.au article
- …and a more focused piece for the UK about Beats 1 on media.info
- I review Rivet Radio, a personalised news radio app which is a bit like NPR One – but not quite
- Norway Explains Digital Switchover Reasoning in Radio World International – I love writing for this publication
Beats 1 and Apple Music
- Last Monday was the announcement from Apple that they’d invented this new form of radio. The press release says: “Listeners around the globe will hear the same great programming at the same time.” – revolutionary. Why haven’t we thought of this before? Why did it take Apple to invent radio over the internet? Shall we call this new invention ‘internet radio’? It might catch on. (Note: the preceding paragraph is not very serious).
- “Internet Radio isn’t really radio; it’s just a playlist of songs.” – according to Apple, no less. I’ve been saying this for years. I’m delighted Apple agree. Where do I send the cheque?
- There’s plenty we don’t know about Beats One and the Apple Music offer, says J Herskowitz. Not that it’s stopping anyone from having their say. Here’s what the CEO of TuneIn thinks.
- Chris Price reckons we can steal stuff from webcasts like Beats One. Perhaps one thing is that human beings are actually good for something, according to Bob Kernen.
- Not everyone likes it. Niko Batallones says that it’s awfully western. Gizmodo says it’s a terrible executive vanity project (and I think there’s some validity in that). I find it disappointingly linear, at a time when linear radio is – on mobiles – failing.
- Interesting comparison here with Beats 1 & BBC Radio 1 – their business model and appetite for innovation is surprisingly close (no advertisers to please, remit to innovate)
- The Fader has a focus piece on Julie Adenuga, Apple’s New DJ in case you haven’t heard of her – you’re not alone.
- Beats killed the radio star? This is an ironic lazy Buggles headline. XAPP’s Brett Kinsella says Apple Music’s Biggest Threat May Be to Broadcast Radio (not sure I agree), while Voizzup’s Tommy Ferraz reckons it’ll kill traditional audience research in radio – not sure about that one either. But online streams have the capability to kill music research, and partially replace the PPM. Probably.
United States (well, the non-Apple bit)
- Live streaming is slowing, on-demand is growing for NPR. But this is a trend I’m seeing everywhere. If anyone wanted to know the trend for the next five years, it’s this headline.
- Ignoring Pandora, can anyone see an increase in online radio in these US stats? I certainly can’t. Shouldn’t there be?
- Why is podcasting so broken? One podcaster responds to my tweet with an observation that 50% of his traffic comes from people hitting the play button on his website, which explains his reluctance to hand the keys to a third-party provider like iTunes. This post also entirely ignores Android, which has no inbuilt podcasting tool. I hope Google hurries up and buys either player.fm or PocketCasts.
- Most radio listening is out-of-home, but most audio listening is in home. This is interesting – particularly since in the UK, most radio listening is in home.
- Data: radio-like streaming services measured on customer satisfaction – is live radio on decline?
- How well can you hear audio quality? A quiz to test those golden ears of yours, from NPR (via Mike Russell)
- Serial – the stage show – as Larry Gifford said in a tweeted comment, it’s amazing extra value for P1 listeners.
- Stats showing male/female balance of top 40 songs, from Sean Ross – very interesting indeed…
- This week, Larry Gifford is looking at the PPM. UK people – if you think diary systems like RAJAR are old and that we should get electronic: listen.
- Is Cisco’s Chambers Talking About Radio? I like Eric Rhoad’s view of the radio world in the US.
- iHeartRadio Has Grown To 70M Registered Users – that’s all very well, but weekly actives is what we should be measuring, and they’re tiny in comparison to Pandora. Speaking of which… AM/FM is eight times bigger than Pandora, says Pierre Bouvard
Canada
- Music listening is up 20% in Canada in just two years.
United Kingdom
- This is AMAZINGLY GOOD. Listen: early website mention, 20 years ago
- Is this the fittest radio presenter in the world? – forces radio presenter ends up doing some proper work for a change (and getting rather closer to his audience as a result – good for him)
- Welsh language radio station BBC Radio Cymru’s “thing they take out to promote themselves” is an old-fashioned analogue radio. (I know, DAB coverage in Wales is patchy, but even so…)
- Interesting – a ‘summer songs’ format: UTV to launch three new DAB radio stations
- For the interest of non-UK folk, here’s digital radio being promoted at my local car dealer in London. It is at least nine months out of date, but still nice.
- The UK announces some short-term trials for cheaper DAB broadcasting equipment. Some great stations on the DAB trial – congrats, among others, Steve Penk Chris Stevens and London Greek Radio
The rest of the world
- Mali: A Music-Sharing Network for the Unconnected – music piracy on the streets
- South Africa: New app (Recast) set to give DJs a run for their money – and a lazy Buggles headline! Yay!
- Germany: I was unaware of Podlove, but if you do podcasts on a WordPress platform, you should check them out: lots of goodies. I saw them speaking (in German) in Cologne this week, but don’t panic, the website’s in English.
- Global: Android vs iOS stats. Still surprised how second-best many radio Android apps are.
- Denmark: How the Danish listen to the radio – FM: 68%, DAB 17%, Internet 9%, Cable 6%. Unusually, online is growing.
- Australia: One of my favourite radio duos are returning to drivetime radio.Strange concept for their TV ad though.
- Nigeria: BBC World Service radio now available on any mobile phone (just another platform you could be on…)
- Norway: Five years ago, P4 broadcast one radio station – P4. Now, they broadcast all of these on digital.