There was a time not too long ago when many thought that audio as a medium was almost dead. We live in a video world, we need to see things, no one has time to sit by a radio… Then along came podcasting, and iTunes and digital audio and Sirius/XM and I Heart Radio and blog talk radio and suddenly the spoken voice was transformed once again. This past week was National Radio Day, and by many accounts more people listen to storytelling via audio devices today than ever before…you can be very choosy about your interests, and if you have the means, can create your own broadcasts online for you, or whomever you want, to hear.
One thing is sure, and the Pandemic seems to have literally amplified it…audio is back.
And while more people are listening, the Pandemic has brought along some painful, hopefully short-term casualties. First, cutbacks in advertising and events have led to a downturn in staff. Whereas we might have heard a wide range of voices mixed in with score or weather updates on audio, now we hear many fewer. The lack of live sports during the hiatus also drastically reduced staffing, and many outlets still scrambling to recoup dollars have kept headcount lower. Hopefully that changes going forward, and we get to hear many familiar voices again soon.
Another area of growth that has been stymied is school. College and high school stations, on air, on line from no less than 25 nations and all 50 states have taken part each fall in college radio day a program, which was designed to draw attention to the value of college radio as a training ground not just for DJ’s, but for engineers, writers, bloggers, vloggers and broadcasters. Enterprising students, especially in politics, news and sports, found a niche that was impossible to break into in years past. Want to host a sports radio show and get guests? Be professional in your approach and just ask whoever runs the station where you are in school. Some call letters and some informed opinions and you can build your own portfolio, and some great references. The cost of production dropped astronomically, so the ability to record and broadcast, even live sporting events from high school games in a town to collegiate events, is more of an opportunity now than ever before. More importantly for the enterprising young man or woman, the ability to market oneself and be heard by the mainstream is easier than ever before. Educational outlets which once reached a few blocks can now be heard online around the world, and the ability to customize files and pass them along to those who may have missed a key broadcast can give anyone the ability to have an amazing career through the spoken voice. A recent New York Times story showed that there are almost 1,000 MORE college media outlets in the US than there are daily commercial newspapers, and in markets like Ann Arbor, Michigan, the college paper is now the primary news source for residents.
However, with the move to virtual classrooms last spring and this fall, we have heard that many college radio stations have either shuttered or vastly decreased any “hands on” applications. Then you have the thousands of budding young people interested in calling sports…and without sports on campus, that hands on experience slides away. Of course, streaming provides live talk and reporting and other forms of self-expressive audio, but having experience in a studio with a group, or at a game or another live event, can’t be really replicated. This summer we saw broadcast camps go virtual with some great results, as we wrote about here…can those experiences be amplified and repeated this fall? Hopefully the creative and entrepreneurial find a way yet again…or even find ways to ramp up the calling of what looks like will be some of the only school vs school activities this coming fall…esports and gaming.
Still, lets look at this as a bump in a long road, and the positive of the growth of spoken word as a tool for expression is showing few signs of slowing down again.
