Scripps: radio out, podcasting in; and triplej's Hottest 100 shows radio still big for the young
Last week, I posted about iHeart’s Santa 100, a radio station in Columbus OH which switched to “Christmas time, all the time”. No wonder I was confused - it was, of course, a stunt (another from the crazy mind of Paige Nienaber), to get people to talk about iHeart’s Hot 100, a new urban-format radio station. Its main competitor is WBFA 98.3 The Beat, an urban radio station which… iHeart owned until 24 November. I guess they missed the urban format too much.
United States
Scripps are selling their 34 US radio stations; retains podcasting company
What happens if you insult a Morning Joe ‘technician’ - an excellently amusing clip. Good work.
Apple is giving music artists analytics now. There are some radio equivalents - indeed, I bet that some of the current music monitoring companies could build something like this relatively easily, to allow anyone to realise how large radio is. For example - could this page showing Rita Ora plays in the UK be combined with their RAJAR quarter-hour figures to get actual “play” equivalents? Indeed - this page (compiled by Radiomonitor) shows that KISS in the UK has played “MK” the equivalent of 18 million times.
Surprises from Boise Idaho in the US - including an AM station being #1
Death of AM: LED headlights can interfere with radio signal (which we knew, but I’d forgotten that cars now have LED lights installed too)
Really enjoying listening to the Tonya Harding story on the NYT Daily. This is a really well-told, well-produced story. Very recommended.
Impressive development from the folks at Futuri Media: they’ve launched their own ad network (and dynamic ad serving)
Triton Digital release their latest webcast streaming figures.
United Kingdom
Watch “Every Football Phone-In Condensed Into 2 Minutes 30” - hits home. I’ve heard an awful lot of very poor mobile phone interviewees lately.
Behind the call - a great story of Steve Penk not wanting to tell his boss what he was about to broadcast: particularly when it was winding up the British PM…
BBC News no longer runs BBC Local Radio. Nor does BBC Radio, of course; but Ken McQuarrie is a good egg and this is a good move, all told.
Nick Ferrari of LBC skewers another politician not knowing the basics.
The BBC’s going for loudness normalisation for its podcasts, which is a good and sensible thing. Warning: jokes about similarity of LUFS to LOVE in this blog post.
The enduring power and magic of football on the radio
Who reads the news on BBC Radio 4? The hidden world of Chris Aldridge, Charlotte Green, Zeb Soanes and Corrie Corfield
“Why radio continues to leave television standing” - and the final column, if I’ve read this right, from the lovely Gillian Reynolds before she goes to the Sunday Times.
Australia
If you’re someone who believes radio is dying, and youth aren’t listening, here’s another inconvenient truth: triple j’s Hottest 100 attracts record number of voters. It broadcast over last weekend - is it the Biggest Streaming Radio Event in the World? - I think it is.
Impressive. My TV set-top box has added very comprehensive support for Google Home (and Google Assistant). Nicely done.
No-nonsense radio competition on the Central Coast…
Elsewhere
Pakistan would like to regulate short-wave radio transmitters across the world. Ambitious.
A podcast from South Africa covering radio there, and a #lazybugglesheadline
Sobering future for radio: Scripps sell their US stations (keeping their podcast companies); boss of BNR in Netherlands says FM radio, by itself, isn’t enough and focuses on podcasts. There is a trend here.
Data: Ghana radio listening. Congratulations Peace FM.
Is the Swiss licence-fee for TV and radio safe? One poll thinks so. They vote in March.
Online radio measurement statistics - a good overview of how things are in South Africa.
How to get your podcast onto Google Home - it’s got nothing to do with Google Play Music, and everything to do with raw HTML code. Here’s how to do it…
A 1930s Austrian radio which you tuned-in using a map.