Live radio is... lazy radio?
![](https://i.podnews.network/a/2048/npr-laptop.jpeg)
Above - a clever idea for a radio station branded thing - something actually quite useful that will be in someone’s eyeline for hours every day.
My column
- Live radio is lazy radio - I can’t help but feel that my column this week might annoy some people. (Let’s hope they read it first!). It’s kicked up some interesting comment on the various sites that I write for; some people arguing against everything being voice-tracked (not what I’m asking for), and others understanding what I’m saying a little more. It’s even got me into a Spanish podcast. This video shows nice segues using RCS Zetta, and rather underlines the point - to just mash songs and sweepers together while live simply can’t produce the same effect. And, of course, some bits of radio should be live - don’t, for example, pre-record travel news days in advance…!
United States
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Radio still does pretty well for music discovery (if you look at all age groups, at least)
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WLIR probably deserves credit for breaking, among others, Prince - says Newsweek
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Interesting interview about how radio stations need to (commercially) adapt. Some bright ideas.
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US television news anchors all reading the same script. This looks vaguely horrifying, until you remember that its the same as national TV, just much less efficient
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Amazon Music Says Number of Subscriptions Doubled In the Past Six Months - notable how quickly this is growing. Driven by Echo?
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Corporate FM - on Amazon Prime, a movie about US radio’s consolidation. Personally, I think it’s wonderful that people care this much.
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TagStation Unveils Interactive, Visual AM/FM Radio - uses hybrid techniques to add visuals to the in-car experience
- TuneIn launches a new subscription service, just for Amazon Alexa devices
United Kingdom
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An actually amusing April Fool’s stunt from Heart Sussex, worth a watch…
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Great research from DAX about digital audio advertising. Really good to see Global doing this kind of thing.
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Interesting new regulation from the EU - a German subscription to Netflix, for example, has to work everywhere in Europe. This might have ramifications for the geoblocking that happens in many parts of Europe, including - for example - radio match commentaries for football.
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The BBC started live broadcasting of Parliament in 1978. Here are some clippings from the time from Andy Walmsley.
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Interesting to see a podcast using binaural sound. Seems obvious, really, but somehow this seems a new thing.
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The Guardian snootily disregards the Radio X top 100 - interestingly, I’m told Radio X has 40% female listeners, so not quite as laddish as you might think, and the chart is compiled by, genuinely, what listeners asked for. How very dare they.
Australia
- They don’t make radio station websites like these any more… (except this one, that is) - wow
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Live radio is lazy radio. And here is one brilliant video from @TimLeeOZ showing exactly what you can do by NOT being live. Awesome.
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Live radio isn’t lazy if you’re doing traffic news. Pre-recording traffic bulletins is an astonishing breach of trust…
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2DayFM dumps ads between 9am and 3pm daily - this is quite a thing if you’re a commercial station. Depends if it leads to more cluttered breakfast/pm drive though…
Elsewhere
- France: La Maison de la Radio - a day in the life of Radio France, from 2013. Worth a watch, says a correspondent. (Also on iTunes apparently)
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Belgium: the benefit of digital means more new formats - like this rock station
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Norway: Smart speakers are supposed to be the future of radio; but this looks MUCH more interesting.
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Spain: I think I’m in this podcast, and I hope that Tommy has been nice about me.
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Denmark: is the country going to switch off FM soon? Looks possible.. Yet a comment on Twitter told me that Denmark will vote against FM switchoff. So apparently it isn’t as possible as you might think.