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"Radio" in the Year 2068

kfbkfb

kfbkfb

Leading Participant
I got my first (AM only) radio in 1968.

I didn't listen much to AM radio until
1970 (WHB AM 710).

How did radio predictions made in 1968
(for the next 50 years) work out?

What are some predictions about "radio"
50 years from now (streaming via wireless
broadband networks, no AM/FM/HD etc.)?

Kirk Bayne
 
I remember listening to WHB AM 710 from 1965 forward to 1969 when my family moved to Dallas. Lots of hours listening to Phil Jay and folks like Richard Ward Fatherly on WHB. It was about that time 1380 KUDL switched from talk to Top 40 with the Boss 30 playlist 20/20 News, etc. Around the same time (I want to say maybe 1967) KBIL 1140 in Liberty came on the air at first with a "Town & Country" format, evolving to what was to become known as Adult Contemporary. KXTR FM was going to a 24/7 format about that time from a red colored house in Independence (I remember that because we'd hit KXTR to grab AP teletype news out of the trash can for the part 15 a friend and I ran in the evenings with occasional 'all night broadcasts' featuring those AP news stories). KXTR was Beautiful Music until noon, classical until midnight and jazz overnights. On one visit they were thrilled because they had hit a benchmark of 20 commercials a day. I think the jocks were happy about that because morning guy Tom Green had remarked about the low pay once when I visited. As I recall KCJC FM dropped their upbeat version of beautiful music for Album Rock around November 1968.

Around 1985 I was working a CHR in Bryan/College Station, Texas. The on air talent was to present a recording of what we felt radio would sound like in the year 2000. As more of a party joke we claimed radio by the year 2000 would be uncensored. Our station was KRAP, "The crap you listen to". It was full of stuff that would be fairly mild today ("Bob, your girlfriend must be back home." "She is." "I thought so. You can't quit licking your your upper lip."). In a few years what we did on that recording was usually done by at least one station in a big city. We'd never heard of Howard Stern at that time.

Radio in 2050 will likely be how my Dad describes popular music generation after generation. He said you cannot imagine what it will become because it will be so different from what you know it to be, you'll hardly recognize it for what it is. In much the same way The Platters are different from Jimi Hendrix, Kanye West is just as different. I will say, if the current trends continue, the device termed a radio might be rare by then, almost a novelty. Perhaps by then a frequency will offer options for listening and possibly time shifted for flow, customized for the listener's preference versus just one signal everyone hears the same way. I'd say radio listening might be menu oriented.
 
Radio will evolve to streaming. It's the only direction it's going.
 
kfbkfb said:
I got my first (AM only) radio in 1968.

I didn't listen much to AM radio until
1970 (WHB AM 710).

How did radio predictions made in 1968
(for the next 50 years) work out?

What are some predictions about "radio"
50 years from now (streaming via wireless
broadband networks, no AM/FM/HD etc.)?

Kirk Bayne
Click to expand...

Even in 1968 those making predictions were saying that
"Radio is Dead".

That was largely based on the fact that the Golden Age of Radio
had come to an end, with scripted comedies and dramas all moving to television.

Radio found a way to survive by evolving and finding new content that people
found to be engaging that could not be found on television. If it is to continue
to survive it will have to do so again.
 
It may or may not evolve to streaming. If it does, the companies you love to hate will dominate it. Witness what's happening with podcasting. The big players are buying in.

It does amaze me when folks say they can't wait for all the towers to come down, as a final "f-u" to corporations, and then wish for the day corporations called Comcast, AT&T or T- Mobile distribute all audio content. Wait until big box corporate America becomes the defacto FCC and thought police.
 
gr8oldies said:
Wait until big box corporate America becomes the defacto FCC and thought police.
Click to expand...

You've summarized my deepest concern about big tech companies appointing themselves gatekeepers (censors) of online content. It's happening.
 
Last edited:
Bongwater said:
Radio will evolve to streaming. It's the only direction it's going.
Click to expand...

I respectfully disagree.

Radio is a great unicast medium which can reach an infinite number of listeners easily and with a much lower cost per listener than internet streaming. My prediction is that in the not too distant future receivers will become a hybrid of RF FM and GHZ internet. Receivers will suck in, and store audio and data files while the listener is sleeping or otherwise away from the receiver and audio content will be location and demographic specific using GPS or cellular triangulation. You will want to hear the commercials because they're geared to things you want or need. Traffic reports could be for your exact location, built by artificial articulation devices. You're not in the mood for Captain and Tennille this morning? Your receiver will autofill with some Doobie Brothers...

If we actually manage to not nuke the planet by then, technology may be so advanced that we no longer need radios or an internet to communicate. Some of the possibilities simply boggle the imagination!
 
kfbkfb said:
I got my first (AM only) radio in 1968.

I didn't listen much to AM radio until
1970 (WHB AM 710).

How did radio predictions made in 1968
(for the next 50 years) work out?

What are some predictions about "radio"
50 years from now (streaming via wireless
broadband networks, no AM/FM/HD etc.)?

Kirk Bayne
Click to expand...

Well........the best time for radio was in the 1975-1989 time period. Creativity, music, programming, jocks....etc...nothing will ever duplicate the magic this period had to offer on the FM (and AM) dial. Now, with major corporations in charge, controlling everything imaginable, radio today is run-of-the-mill, bland, ho-hum, everything sounds and is presented the same. I just do not ever see a return to those glory days, when radio was personal and made people happy. And certainly that will not be the norm going forward, these next 50 years. Your best music and playlists are on your own personal laptops, nowhere else. For the ones who lived it and experienced it, radio is on fumes......or just a ghostly shell of what it once was. We had it made and it's gone.
 
oldies76 said:
Well........the best time for radio was in the 1975-1989 time period. Creativity, music, programming, jocks....etc...nothing will ever duplicate the magic this period had to offer on the FM (and AM) dial. Now, with major corporations in charge, controlling everything imaginable, radio today is run-of-the-mill, bland, ho-hum, everything sounds and is presented the same.
Click to expand...

And yet popular music -- TODAY'S popular music -- and the artists who make it still have a huge following, just not in your (and my) demographic. How can you say that younger-than-us listeners today aren't getting the same pleasure out of hearing the new Drake or Dierks Bentley song on the radio that we got hearing the latest from the Beach Boys or Johnny Cash?

Oh, and outside of morning drive, listeners to current music formats haven't wanted to be entertained by disc jockeys for a generation.
 
Last edited:
oldies76 said:
I just do not ever see a return to those glory days, when radio was personal and made people happy.
Click to expand...

Yet radio was not personal back then. It just seemed "personal" as there was nothing better.

In the mid-80's we got Compuserve and Prodigy, then AOL. In the late 80's we got cellular phones. The Internet followed, with all manner of ways to link up with friends and folks who liked the same things as you. 2008 brought smartphones, and we had Twitter and Facebook.

All those were far more personal than a DJ talking at you on the radio. We knew it and so did listeners, who abandoned high-energy DJs and vacuous talk in droves. Radio adapted.

The issues today involve changing consumer preferences for platforms and radio's huge disadvantage of having commercials... and way too many of them.
 
FreddyE1977 said:
Even in 1968 those making predictions were saying that
"Radio is Dead".
Click to expand...

You are off by nearly 2 decades in attributing "radio is dead" to 1968.

The "Radio is Dead" fear came when the first round of TV stations went on and network programming spun up in the late 40's. It reached a crescendo when it was apparent around '51 or '52 that the TV freeze was going to be lifted and that the levels of TV ownership and viewership would consequently explode.

And then came Todd Storz. And Gordon McLendon. And by the end of the 50's, radio was vibrant, growing and station values were exploding!

That was largely based on the fact that the Golden Age of Radio
had come to an end, with scripted comedies and dramas all moving to television.
Click to expand...

The Golden Age ended in the early 50's, not the late 60's.

Radio found a way to survive by evolving and finding new content that people
found to be engaging that could not be found on television. If it is to continue
to survive it will have to do so again.
Click to expand...

The main thing that enabled change was the loss of control of the AFM by James Petrillo which allowed stations to program entirely off recordings with no threat of strikes, picket lines and other interference with their business. That was the platform that the early innovators of music-based radio found and exploited.
 
DavidEduardo said:
Yet radio was not personal back then. It just seemed "personal" as there was nothing better.
Click to expand...

Personal meaning, DJ's taking actual requests, playing them in minutes (not waiting for the song to actually show up on a rotational playlist, or not playing them at all), dedications and more stats about the music being played....ie...year released, chart positions, artist backgrounds...etc...

I cannot stand it when a DJ today says....."I'll see if we have it.....". Just a runaround excuse.

Do agree though there are WAY too many spot breaks and long ones at that. That'll drive away your listeners.
 
DavidEduardo said:
All those were far more personal than a DJ talking at you on the radio. We knew it and so did listeners, who abandoned high-energy DJs and vacuous talk in droves. Radio adapted.
Click to expand...

That may be true in all, but I believe you know what exactly I'm referring to here about the perception of "personal" type radio jocks. Brian Beirne is a prime example, Mr. Rock & Roll. That ended in 2004 unfortunately. And he was very lucky, that type of broadcasting was already gone years before. He was a lone survivor in the L.A. market and a great one at that.

That's what I'm referring to. You do not see that anymore, except maybe on some small AM holdout broadcasting oldies.

Anyone including a toddler can do twitter, FB and instagram. And we're talking terrestrial radio jocks that know their music and audiences, not social media.
 
In the 1970s we took requests but not for songs we didn't have in the format and not on demand but rather when it came up in the playlist. This was in a small market where we were told if we broke the format somebody in the airchecks box might get lucky. I never had the liberty to play whatever or break format/hot clock.

I would say the commercial loads were greater in the past...usually 4 or more breaks of 3 or 4 spots. In some small markets I worked it was more like 24 units an hour. I'm hearing two breaks an hour and about 6 to 8 units totaling about 5 or 6 minutes. I used to think 4 units per break was too much back in the 1980s when stations did 3 or 4 breaks an hour.

I've used the "I'll see if I have it". Literal meaning: I can't play it or I can't play it now. I used to tell people when it would play when I had time but sometimes we fielded hundreds of calls in a boardshift, mostly kids. I preferred that to saying I would not be playing it.

We got to do dedications in the evening. I could air a caller sharing information that might be of interest to listeners.
 
Get real. CKLW would plug the hitline, and most of the kids were calling for the most popular currents. They came up in normal rotation, and the jock would say, "on the hitline for Farmington Hills, Sarnia, and Dearborn".

The one thing that could do a number on radio or audio-only programming? Self-driving cars. If you can watch TV while your car drives itself it'll be a new ball game.

 
oldies76 said:
Anyone including a toddler can do twitter, FB and instagram. And we're talking terrestrial radio jocks that know their music and audiences, not social media.
Click to expand...

No, we are talking about things today's listener does not want from radio.
 
gr8oldies said:
Get real. CKLW would plug the hitline, and most of the kids were calling for the most popular currents. They came up in normal rotation, and the jock would say, "on the hitline for Farmington Hills, Sarnia, and Dearborn".
Click to expand...


Here is something to think about:

In 1980 I switched format on a Beautiful Music station to a very contemporary format with a very tight playlist. As tight as anything today.

We had frequent request line mentions in sweepers. But we got no calls for songs.

T-shirt giveaways got instant calls, but zero rated stations can do that. We were concerned.

First book came out a month later, covering our third and fourth week on the air. #1, 22.5 share, triple the #2 music station and double the news/talk station.

Finally we did some mall intercepts at what, at the time, was the highest traffic, highest sales mall in the US... and people said, essentially, "why call if you are playing all the songs I love."

That's when I realized that requests were a distraction if we did our job right.
 
gr8oldies said:
Get real. CKLW would plug the hitline, and most of the kids were calling for the most popular currents. They came up in normal rotation, and the jock would say, "on the hitline for Farmington Hills, Sarnia, and Dearborn".

The one thing that could do a number on radio or audio-only programming? Self-driving cars. If you can watch TV while your car drives itself it'll be a new ball game.

Click to expand...

Good luck with that. Technology not even close. Especially after those preventable fatalities. There's some tech that's not needed and self-driving cars are one of them. I hope it backfires.
 
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