“With the coming change to digital broadcasting
technologies, then, it is incumbent upon media scholars to revisit the public
interest standard and to see whether technical advances in radio will be capable
of providing listeners with something like an electronic public sphere –
a salon or coffeehouse of the airwaves.”1
Looking at the future of the radio, it might be easy for one to think that the programs I’ve recreated are so unlike radio that they can’t even be considered as such. For many years, radio has been thought of as the transmission of audio through radio waves from a transmitter to receivers. By that definition, services like XM and Sirius Satellite radio, podcasts and Internet radio programs probably would not qualify as radio. In fact, if we were to stick to that definition, it’s very possible that there will be no radio at all in the near future.
What has attracted people to radio is something more than just the transmission
of sound from one antenna to a radio. It is the sense of community it instills
among those that listen. In the very beginning it was the amateurs’ communication
with one another over great distances that got the press and the public talking
about the potential of this new medium. When corporations took control of the
airwaves out of the hands of the public, the counterculture took FM radio by
storm and made the airwaves unpredictable and a service for the people. When
Americans in the 80’s thought they had lost civic discourse and activism
in their community, they turned to public radio and the call-in talk shows to
reaffirm their belief that they could make a difference. Now with the rise of
the Internet, it’s as if the amateurs have control again, while the corporations
scramble to make sense of this new form of communication, that rivals the radio
in its increasingly egalitarian capabilities.
If history has it’s way the individual will once again lose its voice
to the power and money the big corporations wield, while the government may
or may not act with the public’s best interest at heart. The good news,
however, is that if history does have its way, there will always be yet another
venture that the community will expand on and make their own. Listeners are
most attracted to radio when it’s “a place for surprise versus predictability,
tension. Once one format is co-opted, a new one will rise and take its place
in radio controversy.”2 So long as that is true, radio will always return
to the ideas that excite people the most, the ones that come from the people.
Radio stations will have to be asking themselves many questions in the near future, ones that will undoubtedly change the way they function and serve the people, and they may even change radio as a whole. There is a serious possibility that terrestrial broadcasting could become extinct in just a few short years, so it’s more important than ever for these stations to ask themselves the kind of questions that these demonstrations try to ask: what is radio, why do we listen to, and what purpose does it serve? People’s lives have changed dramatically since the 1920’s, but radio’s changes have not always reflected those changes in the most appropriate manner. If people are now experiencing programs when and where they want to, it’s necessary for radio stations to figure out how to best incorporate these new tools into their mandate of public service. If people are listening to the radio on their computer, why shouldn’t they be able to talk back to the radio on their computer? If stations have the technology to produce and distribute visual components to their shows, why shouldn’t they? If the government won’t define what constitutes public service, why can’t the public? While these four program demonstrations attempt to answer some questions, they are more of an attempt to provoke more of questions, in hopes of redefining radio and to see how it can utilize new technologies to maintain relevance in the community and continue to serve the public.
Instead of staying stagnant and working with archaic of ideas of what the medium is supposed to be, radio will continue to thrive and be an important presence in the community when stations like KRLX and others embrace newer technologies. Whether these technologies are visual or for communication purposes, the medium needs to embrace whatever will be of the most benefit to the community.
1 Michael P. McCauley, “Radio’s Digital Future,” Radio Reader: Essays In The Cultural History of Radio, eds. Michelle Hilmes and Jason Loviglio (New York: Routledge, 2002) 507.
2Susan J. Douglas, Listening In: Radio And The American Imagination, From Amos ‘n’ Andy And Edward R. Murrow to Wolfman Jack And Howard Stern (New York: Times Books, 1999) 283.