Because 1) I really don't consider this subject to be within the scope of this mailing list; and 2) my answer, based on my observations of the radio and Internet radio industries (I wanted to be a disc jockey when I was growing up) is longer and more complicated than most, I have been reluctant to answer this question. Still, for what it's worth, my answers are below.

1) AM radio is dead. If you don't believe me, take a look at the Mexican and Canadian radio stations lists at  http://www.radiostationworld.com  among others. Both governments have been encouraging their AM station licenseholders to reapply for FM frequencies. Because it has been doing this longer, Canada now has few AM radio signals outside of its major cities, and Mexico isn't that far behind. In the U.S., we have been trying to prop up our AM licensees by allowing them to operate FM translators, sometimes even at night if the AM station is a daytime only operation. Nevertheless, the decline in AM radio is slowly occurring here too (see the Wikipedia page for defunct U.S. radio stations to see what I mean), and that slow drip drip of exiting AM radio stations is expected to continue.

2) FM Radio is holding steady (for now) but its long term prognosis isn't good either. That is because many younger listeners are abandoning radio altogether and turning instead to Internet radio and/or podcasts for their entertainment.

3) Radio is no longer viewed as a necessary medium. On a recent edition of the Rollye James show (she is a long-time writer on the broadcast industry and owns two radio stations in Globe, Arizona), she talked about hitting a near tornado while traveling in North Dakota. When she turned on her car radio to find out about the weather, she could find nobody carrying local weather-related information for the area--all of the stations were either satellite-fed or completely automated. When she got to her hotel and complained to the desk staff about her experience, they just shrugged their shoulders. Because of several factors, including the 1996 Telecommunications Act and the growth of the Internet and mobile telephone use, radio is no longer seen as being an essential source for information in emergencies and has instead become just another business commodity.

4) All of that said, I find it hard to believe that Internet radio, particularly music-based Internet radio, will replace radio when the latter is gone. The biggest issue is the payment of royalty fees to the artists and their record labels. While traditional U.S. radio had to pay fees to songwriters, thanks to the efforts of the broadcasting lobby, recording artists and their labels never received any money when their records were played over the air, and that is still true today. This, however, is not true outside of the U.S., however, and it is certainly not true when broadcasting online, because of the 1998 Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA). To stream online, broadcasters and webcasters have to pay a per song per listener fee to the artists and their labels for every song they stream. To complicate matters even further, streaming rates vary between countries outside of the U.S., making most large U.S. radio broadcasters cutting off access to their streams to people living abroad. Some small U.S. broadcasters are even limiting Internet access to their webcasts to those living in the coverage area of their over-the-air broadcasts in an effort to avoid paying the artists and record companies entirely. A very good solution would be to have one set of webcasting and broadcasting musician and record company payment rates worldwide, but I don't see that happening any time soon.

So, That is my (very) long-winded answer to your question. AM radio is on its way out, FM radio is holding steady but its long term prognosis doesn't look that good either, but Internet radio, because of what needs to be paid to musicians and their record companies, doesn't look to be a long term promising replacement.

--
Ted Chittenden

Every story has at least two sides, if not more.

-----Original Message-----
From: Visually Impaired Computer Users' Group List <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of brian
Sent: Thursday, January 30, 2020 12:30 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [VICUG-L] Do you think that radio will ever go totally on line?

As blind people we all enjoy free over the air radio for things like sports news and talk.  I ask this because there is a man on mytelaspace who has the all thing radio board.  He thinks that in about 20 or 30 years from now over the air radio as we know it will be gone.  Do you agree or not?  Do you want to have to always be online to listen to the radio or do you want the portability of radio?  I would like to hear your thoughts on this.  This is the 1 hundred anaversery of radio so what do you see for the future of radio?  Radio has stood the test of time unlike many technologiesdispite people predicting it's demise.  If you listen to sports then you still need to have a radio because many games are not being broadcasted on line.

73

n8mnx

Brian Sackrider


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