Wrapping up the decade in radio and looking forward to the decade ahead
As I said in my introduction to our subjective and opinionated review of radio in the 2000s, I still think it was darn near impossible to predict how the medium of radio would end up at the beginning of 2010. Sure, the seeds for satellite radio, HD radio, low-power FM, internet radio and MP3s were […]
Sunday Night May Be Where it's at on Commercial Radio
Today I spotted an article from this weekend’s Seattle Post-Intelligencer that extols the virtues of a Sunday night hip hop show called Sunday Night Sound Session on commercial station KUBE in Seattle. The show runs from 10:45pm to 12:15am and plays music that isn’t normally heard on the station. The piece points out that the […]
Which is better for Internet radio, a dedicated receiver or a Netbook?
Amazon.com Widgets Reading Jennifer Waits’ excellent history of Internet radio, I’m pondering the same question everyone else is these days: How am I going to listen to it? Just go to Amazon.com and you can choose from an amazing assortment of streaming audio receivers. But before we look at some of them, I’ve got an […]
Is Verizon's Mobile Web Browser worth a $350 ETF?
Are the music features in Verizon’s Mobile Web browser worth the data costs and high early termination fee? We talked with current and prospective Verizon consumers about the issue.
The decade’s most important radio trends #1: The birth and troubled childhood of satellite Radio
At end of the first decade of the 21st century there are more audio entertainment options available than any time before. Even if traditional broadcast radio has a case of the doldrums, the viability of radio-like media has never been stronger. Satellite radio is one medium that entered the scene, although its long-term prognosis is […]
The decade's most important radio trends: #2 The growth of Internet radio
Although today’s New York Times claims that “Internet Radio Stations are the New Wave,” a look back at the past decade makes it very clear that Internet Radio’s growing influence is hardly revolutionary news. In fact, it’s hard to overstate the importance of the Internet and Internet Radio during the last 10 years. The radio […]
Twitterers call and pray for Rush Limbaugh to die, live, not die, or all of the above
As everybody in the radio world knows, conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh is in a Honolulu hospital, recovering from chest pains. Meanwhile, something of a referendum on his fate is being conducted on Twitter. “Please, Rush Limbaugh, DIE NOW!” tweeted Chuck69dotcom not too long ago. “oh pleez oh pleez oh pleez let Rush Limbaugh […]
The decade's most important radio trends #3: iPod and iTunes lure listeners away from terrestrial radio
Music listening has changed dramatically in the past decade in large part because of the rise of digital music. Following the explosion and shut down of illegal file sharing service Napster (1999-2001), a variety of digital music companies attempted to profit from the burgeoning interest in music delivery via the Internet. Some focused on music […]
The decade’s most important radio trends: #4 Podcasting
August 13 of this year marked the fifth anniversary of podcasting. On that date in 2004 former MTV VJ Adam Curry began his Daily Source Code podcast, ushering the term into the popular consciousness. Like so many innovative ideas, podcasting is quite simple. It’s not like there weren’t online radio programs prior to 2004. The […]
NPR calls for Congress to create "common public media waiver"
As we’ve reported, National Public Radio has been filing comments with the Federal Communications Commission a lot these days, talking up its localism initiative, Android app, and new mobile site. NPR’s latest commentary to the FCC on its National Broadband Plan reiterates all these points. But here’s the paragraph in the filing that got our […]