Radio Survivor celebrates 10 years on the internet and four years podcasting with our 200th episode. Matthew Lasar joins Jennifer Waits, Eric Klein and Paul Riismandel for this review of the last decade in radio that matters. Matthew tells the Radio Survivor origin story that sprang forth from his I.F. Stone inspired research deep into […]
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Podcast #96 – Are Smart Speakers Smart for Community Radio?
Amazon Echo. Google Home. And soon, Apple’s HomePod. Smart speakers are quickly taking up residence in homes. Taking voice commands to deliver news, weather, music and more, they play a very radio-like role in people’s daily routine. Radio journalist Brian Edwards-Tiekert joins to explain what these speakers can do, what they can’t, and what the […]
Community broadcasting in 2035: the let’s-get-real version
Radioinfo of Sydney, Australia has some coverage of that country’s Community Broadcasting conference (#CBAAconf). Looks like an interesting event, and one of the panels considered what community broadcasting in 2035 will look and sound like. I can’t say I’m wowed by the excerpted comments, which pondered the state of DAB+ and “curation” two decades ahead. […]
Radio and bicycles: can they help each other?
We are always writing about North Carolina State University campus station WKNC-FM around here, and now they’ve gone and done something fun and creative again. This time it’s the WKNC “Radio Ride,” billed as an “alleycat” bicycle race and scavenger hunt fundraiser through Raleigh for the station. On August 29, contestants will meet at the […]
Can WFMU’s Audience Engine Shake Up Non-Profit Journalism?
Related: Matthew Lasar takes a look under the hood of Audience Engine. Does America’s maverick freeform music station have what it takes to shake up non-profit journalism? It’s no secret non-commercial news online is facing hardships. Funding and engagement remain persistent needs, with no guaranteed formulas for staying afloat in a competitive journalism field. The […]
How Pandora helps its South Dakota FM station build audience
As I promised in my last post about [soon to be] fully Pandora owned radio station KXMZ-FM in Rapid City, South Dakota, I’d try to get more details from KXMZ deejay Mike Swafford about how “Hits 102.7” is working with the streaming service to connect with the Rapid City audience. On Friday, Swafford sent me a summary […]
Thinking through Radio History: An Interview with John Durham Peters – Pt. 1
Once again, we are very excited to present an interview with a leading media historian for Radio Survivor’s Academic Series. John Durham Peters is a media and cultural historian and social theorist who is currently the A. Craig Baird Professor in Communication Studies at the University of Iowa. He is also a consultant and participant […]
Radio Survivor’s 2014 Year in Review
Happy 2015! As we start the year, it’s a good time to reflect on the biggest radio stories of 2014 and also to make our predictions for 2015. Over the past few weeks we’ve shared our thoughts on the state of college radio, low power FM (LPFM), radio in academia, and podcasting in 2014, as […]
How community radio can adapt to digital disruption
This is part one of a series identifying ways community radio stations can adapt and ultimately embrace digital disruption as a tool to empower communities through media. A lot of the pushback I get from community radio stations – and yes, well-resourced NPR affiliates – is that there aren’t enough people to work on digital. […]
If music curation isn’t the answer, what’s the question?
The RAIN newsletter has an interesting opinion post up by Mike Spinelli, formerly at SoundExchange, now in law school studying music licensing. Spinelli’s post is titled “The ‘me’ generation: why music curation isn’t the answer.” We are all individualists now, Spinelli says. Looking at various aspects of Beats Music, he contends that “human-curated playlist are not […]