Consultant John Silliman Dodge recently offered broadcasters his “iPod approach” to programming and marketing radio. In a recent article for FMQB he asks:
“Look at your 21st century customer: Blackberry in one hand, iPod in the other, and a cell phone on the belt. Ask yourself the defining question: how does my radio station fit into this person’s life?”
A recent entry in the Sundance Film Festival, Hustle & Flow — written and directed by Memphis native Craig Brewer, and produced by John Singleton– has been purchased by Paramount.
“Djay is a pimp suffering a midlife crisis and although nominally successful, he yearns to record his flow and become a respected rapper. Galvanized by a gospel song, he sets his dream in motion–recruiting his motley crew and building a studio in his home. And though he succeeds in putting his rap, “It’s Hard for a Pimp,” onto tape, the barriers to fame and fortune are many, and getting there becomes an elusive goal.”
Kennett Senior Correspondent Viretta, proudly reports that her baby boy, Luke, worked on the soundtrack. She adds that she’s not bothered that the film is about “pimps & ho’s.”
“In less than six months, more than 2,000 podcasters have sprung up. Eventually an iPod-like device will have a subscription capability built in so you won’t even need to be tethered to a computer. It’s not hard to imagine an iPod with WiFi capabilities that could become a radio with no geographic limits.”
— Dave Winer
That jumped out of a post by Jeff Jarvis on Buzz Machine and –at first glance– it seems too obvious to mention. But the company I work for was started by a man who built and owned (owns) a radio network. He didn’t own the radio stations but he owned the network that provided them content (news, sports, ag). Others might have been able to produce the content but (back then) had no affordable way to deliver that content to the radio stations. When our founder put in a satellite uplink, we had an even greater advantage. Faster, cheaper, better quality.
We still have the satellite uplink and the downlinks and we work with more radio stations than ever. But more and more of our content is now “delivered” to our affiliated stations via the internet. Very close to not needing the satellite system at all. If we were starting the company today, it would almost certainly be web-based. And the podcast explosion is sure to add another interesting dimension.
Other nuggets from Jeff Jarvis’ post:
* The audience often knows the news before we report it.
* A blog is a little First Amendment machine (Jay Rosen)
* Google is a brand killer. People find what they want from any source and don’t credit or remember the source.
My sister-in-law called from Indonesia this week with a report on my brother, Blane. He’s somewhere in the Aceh province of northern Indonesia, helping coordinate relief efforts.
Most of the cell towers were destroyed so calling home (1,000 miles to the south) is iffy, but Tonya got a call a few days ago. Blane says it’s far worse than anything shown on CNN. And the corruption is beyond description.
Because he speaks the language and knows the culture, his role seems to be more one of coordination than hands on. But it’s ugly, stressful work. They only allow team members to do body recovery for a couple of days at a time before rotating to other tasks. No shit.
He’s scheduled to return to Bandar Lampung late this week and we’re praying for safe return. On a brighter note… I learned that he, Tonya and the kids will return to the US (Tulsa) in June. Every four years, they return for six months furlough. I’m sure he will have some amazing stories to share.
Clever invite to Brett’s annual Ground Hog Day Party.
Howard Dean lost in Iowa…
Donald Trump had a hit TV show…
So did Paris Hiltenon…
The US baseball team didn’t make the Olympics…
Somebody actually claimed that goofy X-Prize…
Martha Stewart went to jail…
The Red Sox won the World Series…
Wake Up!
The National Football League has a deal to make recordings of this year’s remaining playoff games available for portable audio players (iPods, etc). The recordings will be available for purchase at iTunes and other sites that sell audio over the Internet.
Won’t someone please point me to a positive story about (what we’ve started calling) “terrestrial” radio? Mabye it’s just media dog-piling but everytime I click my mouse, someone is predicting (or declaring) the death of radio. Alyce Lomax (The Motley Fool) is pissed and sad at the passing of (Thursday) of Washington D.C. radio station WHFS.
“Radio, as we’ve known it, is dead. The news about HFS obviously struck a chord with me, but with satellite radio, Internet radio, and things like Apple’s iTunes (or even the iPod Shuffle!) revolutionizing music and giving listeners more options than ever before, chances are it won’t be missed.”
Okay, Alyce is entitled to her opinion. Now, where are those positive stories about radio?
Keith Good solves the “not enough hours in the day to blog” problem by getting up at 4:00 a.m. I talked to him this morning (10 min) about his blog, FarmPolicy.com, which deals with U. S. agriculture policy. A really good example of the kind of citizen journalism (or publishing, if you prefer) that’s transforming and challenging mainstream media.