Grüße Deutschland!

It’s been an eye-opening day. I’ve been at RadioDay 2008 in Cologne, a really very large get-together for the German radio industry. Over 2,000 people come every year: three separate tracks of conference speakers, and a quite wide-ranging amount of corporate stands.

The overwhelming impression, for someone who doesn’t understand the German radio market well, is one of disunity and pluralism. Everyone takes advertising here, whether “public” or “private”. There’s no equivalent of the RadioCentre, a place where the UK commercial radio industry gets together - instead are two sets of advertising companies, one with a logo that on first glance reads “ASS Radio”, which was hugely amusing for at least twenty-five minutes. There are almost no national radio stations either; and virtually no networking. The NRJ group apparently does do some networking (for two hours a night) but the NRJ station in the old East Germany - and yes, to my surprise, people here still do refer to it as such - doesn’t take the shared programming, since they’re owned by the Polish NRJ not the French NRJ (even if it’s the same brand, which would in ordinary circumstances lend me nicely to another Virgin riff, but I won’t). “Disunity” sounds like a negative, and it is in many ways (it’s harder to buy radio advertising here, and harder to reach consensus on technology-related issues) but it’s also a benefit, with a much more vibrant, creative industry than the Global/Bauer/GMG/BBC-controlled industry we have at home.

Radioday is their “Radio Festival”, a place where people come to meet and talk. The party in the evening, where I’ve just come from, is famous for its food - everything from currywurst to chinese food - its entertainment - this year, the entertaining spectacle of Croatia beating Germany, followed by Austria drawing with Poland, followed by Mousse T (”Horny horny horny”) and, among others, Roachford (sing “Cuddly Toy” and all, er, his, cough, other hits) - and its beer - tiddly little 20ml glases of Kolsch, the local beer type.

The difference between Radioday here and the Radio Festival in the UK is that, because of the sheer number of people who work in the radio industry here, there are loads of potential visitors. The uncharitable might claim it’s 1983 here - mostly, not networked; mostly, multiple owners; and almost totally still in the analogue era. And it won’t come as a surprise that I was there talking about DAB Digital Radio, which is the only real way of getting digital radio into a device costing as little as 15 euro. It’s a far cry from the UK industry, that’s for sure.

Today has been interesting to see how different the German radio market is, and what a surprise it is to them when public and private broadcasters work together. I was speaking with Nick Piggott from GCap Media, and I hope that we’ve shown that if you agree on technology and compete on content - then good things happen. And that means agreeing on Europe-wide technology, not just within Germany.

Photo: Merlijn Hoek - used under licence, and yes, I’ve a few pictures to upload shortly. Disclosures: for this conference, flights, accommodation and food was paid-for by AS&S Radio and Radioday. I got a nice gift of an analogue radio from AS&S Radio for speaking at an event the previous night, and a small speaking fee which I donated to charity.

Updated on legal advice. Woo!