March 15, 2006
Terrestrial Traitor

Traitor.  Call me Brutus, Benedict or Alger (hissssss).  After almost forty years in the world of microphones, this radio guy crossed over and hooked up with the enemy.  I’m now a satellite radio subscriber.  Why the defection?  Commercial radio has only itself to blame. 

Example A.  A couple of weeks back, headed for Denver, Jan and I were stuck in a traffic standstill just short of Vail Pass.  While coming to a complete halt wasn’t a shocker in the middle of an early morning mountain snowstorm, we did wonder exactly what was happening, or not happening, in front of us, and hopeful of a guesstimation as to when traffic would be underway. 

Up and down the radio I searched.  All along the dial were continual reminders of my listening to, “Your ten in a row station”, “Vail’s real local radio”, “the much more music station” and “Vail valley’s own” but nary a mention of the major traffic jam currently clogging I-70. Could satellite give me the information I wanted?  No way.  Here was a golden opportunity for local radio to demonstrate their superiority in providing information not available anywhere else.  But the Vail stations were much too busy with “no talk triple plays” and “a greater variety” to bother with the autobahn that had turned into a parking lot outside their station’s front door. 

The lower levels of listening in terrestrial radio are not caused by the “corporate play lists” or “media concentration” espoused by ignoramuses continually on the outlook for an electronic boogeyman in our midst.  The real reason is broadcasters unwilling to work at their craft. 

In today’s commercial radio, the place where for so many years I earned my daily bread, satellite is the bad guy, the electronic equivalent of Simon Crowell, the Oakland Raiders and Al Qaeda rolled into one.  And yet the folks in terrestrial radio seem to be going out of their way to insure the success of the “evil empire”, satellite. 

Satellite radio does have capabilities the terrestrial folks can’t match.  Over 150 channels of different programming are available from one source.  Be your preference classical, comedy, country or rock, one finds many variations of each genre to grace the ears.  The one advantage any earth bound station has over big brother in the sky is local information and entertainment and that is the missing ingredient in today’s radio.  

What satellite can’t deliver is the kind of music I prefer plus local news, a few giggles and service to the community. Today’s voice on the radio has devolved into nothing more than a pre-recorded monotone momentarily halting the tunes to intone, “you’re in the middle of 10 in a row.”  Big deal, I can do 200 or more in a row on my I-Pod.  How about what radio used to do best, entertain and inform along with the music? 

At a recent radio gathering, surveys detailed the number one competitor in morning drive for radio appealing to women between the ages of 25 and 54 is the Today show.  Think about it.  Matt and Katie, two multi-millionaires a couple of thousand miles away in New York City, not live but on a two hour delay for the Mountain Time Zone, are more relevant to listeners than the folks on the local radio station.