Baltimore Media Examiner

Walking with Dinosaurs

Thinking about the show I realize radio, as we know it, could also be going the way of the Dinosaurs.  Years from now, our descendants may wonder what AM & FM were all about, what terrestrial  radio was like in the olden days, and what a transistor radio was used for.

Radio ruled not so long ago.  AM radio in the car, FM radio in stereo in the home.  But things changed after deregulation of radio in the 1990's, the arrival of satellite radio in the early part of this century, and the endless choices consumers now have, to get what only radio once provided.   MP3's and iPods plus cell phones bring what people want to hear, into their ear.

Music on AM radio?  Are you kidding?  In the 1960's and 1970's that's where you would find Casey Kasem, with American Top 40 played on WCAO Sunday afternoons.  The former music stations are now mostly news, talk, & sports.

Advertising on AM radio?  Sixty years ago radio was in it's prime with 94% of all households owning an AM radio.    

Although most homes have probably 5 or more radios around (go ahead count them) how big a part do radio ads play in consumer choices?  People are bombarded by not just radio ads, but television ads, digital ads online, and newspaper & magazines.  Back in the day, people bought what they heard about on the radio.

News on AM radio?  Still fills the niche, but with computers putting the Internet at your fingertips who needs to turn on another machine when LIVE AUDIO feeds are available from your PC? I like simplifying things and if I hear my AM news, get my nightly TV news fix, and read "the paper" all from my computer  that's where I'll do it.  Hopefully AM news will always have the front seat in the car. (I call shotgun)

Look ahead 20, 30, 50 years.  Digital technology has already hit radio, like the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs.  Smashing the old fashioned wires and tapes, the antiquated machinery,  the outdated mindset, which will all be buried beneath layers of fall out from the digital explosion, unearthed a million years from now like fossils.  Radio needs to be relevant, it needs to move into the next era by partnering with, instead of trying to compete with, the Internet.  No more debate over which is best, digital or analog.  The debate needs to be how fast and how far can radio gousing digital technology to keep up the pace?  Or will radio as we know it even survive til end of this century? 

Ironic, isn't it, that the "Walking with Dinosaurs" show relies on remote controlled radios to operate the beasts? Radio in some form will always be needed. Maybe not in the way we are used "needing" it for Music, Information, and Advertising. 

Adapt, or die, Radiosaurus. The large lumbering prehistoric reptiles whose skeltons show they had strong legs to support their massive size but relatively small brains.... provide an obvious analogy.

Radio  can survive ...but as Darwin points out:“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”

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