radio was great when there was one owner per station

Miguelito said:

The truly great days of radio were the "Live & Local" days.

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That's a bit of mythology. Historians call the 1920s and 30s, when national network radio was king: The Golden Age of Radio. In Philadelphia, almost all of the stations are live & local right now. Does it make a difference? Even iHeart has local hosts on its Philly stations. I think your criticism is fake news. Does having live & local DJs in Philly make people tune in to stations that play music they don't like? You tell me.

Regarding your second point, people have had access to music they want for 50 years. That doesn't mean they want to program it themselves. Radio gives them access to the music they want in a convenient way, plus it surrounds the music with live & local DJs. And as I said, the stations in Philly have NOT cheapened the product. The amount of money they spend has nothing to do with whether or not anyone listens.

TheBigA said:

That's a bit of mythology. Historians call the 1920s and 30s, when national network radio was king: The Golden Age of Radio. In Philadelphia, almost all of the stations are live & local right now. Does it make a difference? Even iHeart has local hosts on its Philly stations. I think your criticism is fake news. Does having live & local DJs in Philly make people tune in to stations that play music they don't like? You tell me.

Regarding your second point, people have had access to music they want for 50 years. That doesn't mean they want to program it themselves. Radio gives them access to the music they want in a convenient way, plus it surrounds the music with live & local DJs. And as I said, the stations in Philly have NOT cheapened the product. The amount of money they spend has nothing to do with whether or not anyone listens.

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Oops. I was talking about the truly great days "in my opinion." And you are absolutely allowed to think that my criticism is incorrect. But can we not throw around "fake news?" LOL. I'm not reporting news. But we're skirting around issues here. No, having live & local DJ's does not make people tune to stations that play music they don't like. That's ridiculous and not at all what I was implying. But having a lack of local content can certainly change listener perception and make fewer people want to tune to the station REGARDLESS of the music that's being played.

Regarding your second paragraph regarding my second point: Seriously? LOL. Yes, there were 8-track players and record players. What I'm saying is there's a TON more options now and it makes it easier than ever (8-tracks? Records?) to get just what we want--and nothing we don't--exactly when we want to hear it. And if you think Philly radio stations haven't cheapened the product, you must never have listened to Mix or Max on 95.7 when the automation would start the next song and not end the one that was already playing. And you must never have listened to Philly's 106.1 at all. That thing sounded like garbage. And I find it hard to believe that stations are doing as much local research as was done back in the day. They naturally want to try to use more "national" research and hope it sticks in as many markets as possible. Because it's cheaper.

"The amount of money they spend has nothing to do with whether or not anyone listens" is a mind-blowing statement. So if a company (that produces any product) starts cheapening the product, it doesn't have any impact on sales/use of the product? C'mon, man.

This has turned into an interesting lively thread. I didn't see that coming. hahaha. I wish I didn't have to leave work right now. But I am leaving work right now. Bye!

Miguelito said:

But having a lack of local content can certainly change listener perception and make fewer people want to tune to the station REGARDLESS of the music that's being played.

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But we're talking about Philadelphia here, aren't we? The perception you present is wrong. It also assumes that people WANT local content. Unlike the 60s, very little of the popular music being made is from Philadelphia. So obviously local content isn't that important.

Miguelito said:

"The amount of money they spend has nothing to do with whether or not anyone listens" is a mind-blowing statement. So if a company (that produces any product) starts cheapening the product, it doesn't have any impact on sales/use of the product? C'mon, man.

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Compare cars made 25 years ago with cars made today. More plastic, made in foreign countries, a lot cheaper. Does that stop people from buying new cars? Of course not. The products we buy today are made cheaper than they were years ago. Why? Because they're made by companies that want to make money. They can either cheapen the product or raise the price. Which would you prefer?

Do you care if Rush Limbaugh gets paid $50 million a year? Would that make you listen to him? He works for a company some call "cheap channel." The fact that they pay him so much money doesn't sound cheap to me. Nobody makes their listening decisions based on the amount of money a station spends. They care about if the station plays the music they like.

There is nothing on radio today that interests me. If I want music I can program my own and the car/home player will play it in any sequence or rotation I specify. I can even add bumpers between songs if I so desire (just to remind me of the good old days). The only thing I cannot do is replicate the days of the DJ who really made listening interesting. Those days are gone. OTOH I don't have to listen to 5 and 6 minutes of commercials either so perhaps that is one really good trade off. I miss the old days and the DJ's that made Top 40 radio but there is nothing I can do to bring them back. Fortunately, I still have the music. I don't need radio any longer.

Hasta la vista, baby!

landtuna said:

The only thing I cannot do is replicate the days of the DJ who really made listening interesting. Those days are gone.

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Actually you could if you went to the various aircheck sites where files from those particular DJs still live, even though they themselves are long gone.

And the reality is there are lots of DJs on the air today who tell stories about the songs, but not necessarily the songs you like, because they were popular before those DJs were alive.

landtuna said:

There is nothing on radio today that interests me. If I want music I can program my own and the car/home player will play it in any sequence or rotation I specify. I can even add bumpers between songs if I so desire (just to remind me of the good old days). The only thing I cannot do is replicate the days of the DJ who really made listening interesting. Those days are gone. OTOH I don't have to listen to 5 and 6 minutes of commercials either so perhaps that is one really good trade off. I miss the old days and the DJ's that made Top 40 radio but there is nothing I can do to bring them back. Fortunately, I still have the music. I don't need radio any longer.

Hasta la vista, baby!

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Exactly Landtuna, couldn't have said this better. I feel the exact same way. Today, everything is corporate monotony with zero leeway, set in stone, not an angstrom in flexibility in any which way, almost military....solid as a rock! Prime example, look what has happened to WOGL this past year (very much a Philadelphia topic I might add). Now, instead of a fun station with everything a station should offer, now sounding like the rest of them, stale and boring. No thanks.

Same here, my playlist at home trumps anything radio will ever try to offer in this day and age. Radio will never compare. Sadly, radio will be a thing of the past someday and doing what they do today, won't help any.

I long for the days of personal DJ's, great music and weekends on the radio. So when I say, it can be done, just rewind the clock about 25-35 years and implement it, just with today's tech. Everyone is afraid to try. I would in a heartbeat and it will win.

oldies76 said:

Radio will never compare. Sadly, radio will be a thing of the past someday and doing what they do today, won't help any.

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Only for you. A time will come when all of the classic hits stations, and even the hobby oldies stations, will go away. The stations that will remain will be playing the music of Y2K, music from the new millennium, music for the new millennials. They will control the future, and we're creating multi-platform radio that will appeal to them, incorporating on-air, online, on demand, and social platforms, broadcast and streaming, following them wherever they go. No need for rewinding the clock to the past when the future is so exciting.

DavidEduardo said:

The problem is that "secondary" songs are ones which a few people like and many people dislike.

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I disagree. We're not talking Debby Boone or Bobby Goldsboro or even Maureen McGovern here. Take those sappy songs out (not that they would be totally ignored, but.......) and many hundreds upon hundreds still remain. THOSE are the ones I'm referring to, but are widely ignored today. My station does not need to play "Footloose" 25 times a week. People know the song, don't need to drown them in overkill. But we can play "I Love You" by the Climax Blues Band or "Trouble" by Lindsey Buckingham.

TheBigA said:

No need for rewinding the clock to the past when the future is so exciting.

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The future is real exciting, but you can also use 1980 radio ideas to play future songs. The Constitution was created in 1787, we still use it today.

oldies76 said:

The future is real exciting, but you can also use 1980 radio ideas to play future songs. The Constitution was created in 1787, we still use it today.

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There you go again, lecturing us how to do our jobs.

oldies76 said:

Exactly Landtuna, couldn't have said this better. I feel the exact same way. Today, everything is corporate monotony with zero leeway, set in stone, not an angstrom in flexibility in any which way, almost military....solid as a rock! Prime example, look what has happened to WOGL this past year (very much a Philadelphia topic I might add). Now, instead of a fun station with everything a station should offer, now sounding like the rest of them, stale and boring. No thanks.

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What....because they moved further away from the long-outdated dinosaur songs? Boy oh boy, has that turned out badly for them.

What mythical flexibility do you think the audience is missing out on? They're tuning in, in rather sizable numbers. They hear upbeat local personalities. They still have the longstanding Saturday night specialty show. What should the station be free to do? Sabotage their success by playing crud the audience tells them they don't want to hear?

oldies76 said:

Same here, my playlist at home trumps anything radio will ever try to offer in this day and age. Radio will never compare. Sadly, radio will be a thing of the past someday and doing what they do today, won't help any.

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Great--you have an alternative that works for you. Enjoy it. Meantime, WOGL and whoever else you have some irrational grudge against will keep on doing what they do: selling spots at a nice price because they have listeners to sell.

oldies76 said:

I long for the days of personal DJ's, great music and weekends on the radio. So when I say, it can be done, just rewind the clock about 25-35 years and implement it, just with today's tech. Everyone is afraid to try. I would in a heartbeat and it will win.

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What is this rewind the clock nonsense? In what other entertainment medium are things being done the same way they were 35 years ago with widespread success? Even franchises that were around 35 years ago and is still pumping out new content--James Bond, Star Wars, Star Trek--aren't doing things the same way. On TV, shows certainly don't look like they did decades ago. And you think magically recreating Hot Hits 98 (to keep this a Philadelphia-based topic) will somehow magically make them...what...super-duper number one? No one is afraid to try downright ridiculous ideas that data shows definitively won't work, any more than the reason we don't have clothing stores specializing in avocado-green and hot-pink men's suits is because someone is just afraid to try it. Or that we don't have a successful horse-and-buggy dealership because someone isn't willing to take a risk.

Your idea will win nothing where it matters--keeping people employed with a roof over their heads.

Something else I've learned too. When someone tells me not to play a certain CD, on air, one must obey. If I don't, I'll no longer be allowed to play anything from that musician. Just because I own over 100 CD's, doesn't mean I'll get to play them all. Just some food for thought.

Dan <><

AbrahamJSimpson said:

What is this rewind the clock nonsense? In what other entertainment medium are things being done the same way they were 35 years ago with widespread success?

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Rewinding the clock means......DJ's that were more personal and cared about their listeners more, memorable music presentations, actual requests and satisfying the listeners with the perception that you actually cared, instead of saying today, "Oh, we'll try to get that on for you, if we even have it", when in fact they never would because the song wasn't on the rotation for the day. Not to mention, great jingles and bumpers and the music.......oh, the music! Methods that can be utilized today with the "newer" classic hits being played today. You keep your listeners by listening to them.

Once again, I will reference the motto given by KFXM 98.3, near Lancaster, California on their webpage.

"We do not have consultants to tell us what to play.
We answer to a higher authority;
The Listener"

DavidEduardo said:

Given that freedom, and a variety of choices, most listeners will reject the kind of entertainment you suggest. And stations are free to avoid doing that.

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Kind of difficult to reject, since most of those newer listeners were children or not even born when those methods of entertainment (as described above) were all over the airwaves. To them it would be new and rather interesting.

And vinyl records are making a large comeback. Things do indeed cycle, and its a good thing.