This is a year where it’s especially important to act as an industry: I have a lot of contact with my friends and colleagues in commercial radio, and it’s clear that the economic crisis affecting advertising revenue is severe. A meet with some friends at one commercial station last week was made a bit depressing by the knowledge that it was three peoples’ last day, as they’d been made redundant. At an industry meeting yesterday, I was rather taken aback at how a senior colleague from one embattled radio group had visibly aged, and lost weight, in less than six months. And at least two untimely deaths in radio over the past two weeks – taking young people at the prime of their lives – have only exacerbated the growing sense of doom.

It’s easy to retreat. It’s easy to hide. But it’s better to talk. And, at this unparallelled time for radio people, it’s important to meet up and discuss issues with others. We’re probably best doing that over a pint of frothy beer; but “everybody needs a place to think” as a rather clever ad campaign once said – and it’s worthwhile thinking about The Radio Festival.

This year it’s less far to go for most of the radio industry – to centrally-placed Nottingham – and the two-day event offers a programme that is interesting and reflects what the industry is currently doing.

I’m speaking at the preceding TechCon conference – doing a less than serious roundup of the day (the unwritten theory being that if you turn up at 4.30pm-ish, you can learn from me what you missed by not attending the whole day but shhh, don’t tell anyone) – and I’m producing a session at the main Radio Festival event. My session, predictably entitled “Radio at the Edge”, will spill some of the beans about how people use the BBC iPlayer for Radio; how Absolute’s iAmp app for the iPhone has done (and whether anyone’s using it really); and will show some shiny things from BBC Radio 1 as well. And you don’t need to listen to me doing it, either: I’ve got better people to speak.

It’s really easy for me to give good reasons why you should go: and really easy for others to point at the cost of travel, a hotel for the night, and the conference fee (lower than any other major industry’s main yearly conference, I should point out) as reasons why you shouldn’t go. It’s still a lot of money.

But while it’s very hard right now, this recession won’t last forever. And if you make friends now, you’ll keep them when the outlook is better. There’s no better place to bump into the Important People, and expand your horizons and career in terms of bright ideas from your peers, than at the Radio Festival.

So, if you think you can’t afford to be there, it’s worthwhile asking yourself whether you can afford not to be there. And if you need any more reasons – Early Bird registration, saving £80, runs out at the end of Friday 29th May. (Depending whether you read this, that’s probably today.)

Disclosure: I’m a trustee for the Radio Academy. My employer is a patron. My full disclosure is here.

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