No Room For Originality On The Radio

from the why-I-don't-listen-to-the-radio dept

A few months back we had an article about how a radio DJ in San Diego pretended to be the local DJ from Boise, despite never having been there. That should give you an idea of what's happening to radio stations these days. The Washington Post is now running their own story about the business of radio stations. They focus on (of course) Clear Channel, and their "formula" radio programming. They basically try to own most of the stations in an area, consolidate all the operations, and then put on the blandest, lowest common denominator of programming - with no thought towards originality. Apparently, originality costs too much money. Of course, we could turn to online stations for original programming if the RIAA wasn't working so hard to put them all out of business too...
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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 30 May 2002 @ 12:40pm

    No Subject Given

    What a sad article! Zier seems like a smart guy who genuinely likes radio, and even has some decent ideas for fun stuff that might work (I think the "Vegas Radio" idea sounds pretty workable.) But he's grimly resigned to the notion that changing all of radio to the same homogenized pap is inevitable and that "change is good!" even when he's talking about the sort of change that's designed to eliminate any sort of variety or innovation. I suppose I probably shouldn't, since the guy's probably making a bundle, but I feel kinda sorry for him....

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Adam Barr, 30 May 2002 @ 9:25pm

    the future of radio?

    Clear Channel just redid a station in Seattle so it only plays 7 seconds of each song, the songs are all numbered and you go on the web to see the titles. Honest to god, the station is here and you can listen to a webcast (and yes it is also going out over the airwaves).

    This is being discussed on a discussion board and the betting right now is it is just a short-term stunt, so we'll see!

    - adam

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Mike (profile), 30 May 2002 @ 10:44pm

      Re: the future of radio?

      That's hilarious. I'm listening now. It must be a stunt of some sort, but it's a good example of why I don't listen to the radio (though, admittedly, from their site I've just learned who sings a few random songs that I always hear, but have no clue who sings).

      link to this | view in chronology ]


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