Teach42

Fascinating story I heard on the radio today. As soon as I got to work, I did a Google search about it and found an article about it in the Washington Post:

WHFS-FM, the Washington area radio station that was a pioneering purveyor of alternative rock to generations of young music fans, did a programming U-turn yesterday by ditching the genre for a Spanish-language, pop-music format that transforms it into the largest Spanish-language station on the local dial.

… At noon yesterday, the station behind the HFStival, a popular annual concert, broadcast the late Jeff Buckley’s 1995 hit, “Last Goodbye.” And then came something that WHFS listeners hadn’t heard before in the station’s 36-year history as the arbiter of cutting-edge rock:

“WHFS transmitiendo desde la ciudad capital de America:

“Esta! Es! Tu! Nueva! Radio!”

I have no idea how many people listened to WHFS, but I would guess that it had to have several hundred thousand, perhaps millions. Unfortunately, whatever the number was it wasn’t high enough to keep the station in the current format. Instead, because of ratings pressure and financial pressure, the station literally switched formats in the middle of the day.

This is where Podcasting is going to find a huge market. The overhead for Podcasting is minimal, practically non-existant compared to traditional radio. I would guess that by the end of the year, podcacthing software will have evolved to be much more stable and full featured. And someone is going to come up with a decent business model. The cream will rise to the top. Quality shows, with great music and fantastic personalities that appeal to mass markets will be bought out by a corporation and people will have to pay to recieve the show. Either that or they will continue to be free, but will be peppered with advertisements and sponsorships to help pay the bills. Either way, shows like DND and DSC are going to become mainstream. I told my wife, we’re just a year or two away from a Dawn and Drew TV show or movie.

Anyway, I’m rambling a bit, but the point is people are going to realize that the product supplied by traditional radio is not worth the cost. Why put millions of dollars on the line when in a few years you’ll be able to reach a larger (worldwide) audience with minimal investment?

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