Month: May 2005

Future of Radio?

Macworld: Editors’ Notes: iPods killed the radio star
Some comments on the influence the iPod (and other music devices) have on radio programming.
The overall history of music broadcasting is pretty interesting and recent music devices certainly have their role to play in the current changes. Who knows, maybe the old “payola” system will soon be a thing of the past?
There’s a few deeper issues, I think. One is that the notion of shuffled playlists isn’t itself very new, as it was done on CD players and was especially powerful with CD changers. But the large number of tracks which can fit in the playlist of one of the recent devices makes the shuffle mode much more impressive on those devices than on CD changers. Not to mention that one usually selects specific tracks for a playlist as opposed to CDs which might include different tracks that we don’t really want to hear. So, in a way, the main change isn’t so much with the shuffle mode but with large selective playlists/libraries.
There’s something more, though. A radio station’s strength, according to some, is that professional DJs choose the tracks to broadcast. At least, that’s the impression they’re trying to give. In fact, Microsoft recently had a campaign touting music devices on which you can listen to FM radio because you can “Let a professional make your next playlist.” Now, whether or not people want FM radio on their music device is another issue, but touting it as “a key feature” on devices which are meant to hold the listener’s favourite tracks seems a bit clueless. Ah, well…
Still. The status of a good radio DJ is clearly changing. Some people may still love them, trust them, cherish them, worship them but other people have traded those professional human DJs with their own playlists.
There are other issues with today’s radio, as mentioned in this tongue-in-cheek piece about the Microsoft campain. Much of it is filled with ads, has way too commercial music, and may be outright annoying.
Personally, I almost never listen to any radio station unless there’s something specifically interesting. I did participate in a couple of radio shows but I tend to prefer being “proactive” with the music I listen to (or with the news I read). Call it foolish pride, but I don’t necessarily like to be told what I should listen to. “Push” technologies are an interesting concept when you can actually select what you want to be pushed to you. And it shouldn’t be pushed down your throat…
In the end, I wonder what role radio broadcasting will play in the future.
One thing that can be neat is a customized broadcast à la “podcast.” Eventually, it could be done in real time, wirelessly, from one music device to the next. Like jack sharing. If the recording industry were to see the light (yeah, right), this could be transformed into a viable mean of distribution with compensation to artists. As it stands, the radio doesn’t really help artists yet it’s backed and pushed by the recording industry. Since radio is sooo, like, you know, 20th Century, maybe musicians should invest more in other methods of broadcast and distribution…

Independent Publishing, Internet Economy

Still thinking about this review of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. Such an in-depth review would be a rare sight in a typical magazine, for many reasons. To make things even more impressive, Mac OS X 10.4 was released only a few days ago. It could take months for the typical magazine to release such a report. And the magazine itself would cost at least $5 and include many irrelevant articles.
As we all know, part of the power of the ‘Net (and the Web specifically, in this case) is to enable different types of publishing. It’s neither new nor surprising. But it’s still impressive.
In this case, Ars Technica uses Google ads as well as paid subscriptions, which carry some advantages (such as a PDF version of an article in 21 parts!). Again, neither new nor surprising. But if it works (and it seems like AT is doing well enough), it’s a better model than the model used by some publications which annoy their readers with constant reminders that they should subscribe or watch ads, or can only access content for a limited amount of time…
On the ‘Net, simple economic models may work. Not that they necessarily will. But what’s needed wasn’t the tulipbulb.com “e-commerce” model. Just a principle of targeted added-value. Dead simple. Everybody knows it. But some people are still fighting an old war with older weapons.
A similar situation with music. Apparently (should verify this at one point), the whole worldwide recording industry is worth a mere 30 billion USD. Nothing to sneeze at, of course, but incredibly small as compared to so many other industries, including advertising. There was something about ringtones becoming a 3 billion USD industry. It probably didn’t happen but that would have meant 10% of the recording industry. There’s something incredibly absurd about this, especially given the fact that ringtones are probably bought online and can probably use MP3s. In many ways, a ringtone is much less than the equivalent file on a CD yet it may be bought even if the CD is available. Doesn’t this seem strange to anyone else?

Yes, I know exactly how naive this all sounds…

LinkedIn

LinkedIn

Recently, a friend from Switzerland invited me to join his LinkedIn network. I joined in but didn’t add any contact. Another friend, graduating MBA from the University of Notre-Dame, was talking about LinkedIn with fellow MBA graduates and I decided to flesh out my network a bit. Not that I might benefit directly from this type of contact but I like to put people in touch and the very concept of a social network is quite important for me.

Un ami m’a invité dernièrement et je me suis inscrit. Plus tard, un autre ami en parlait lors d’une discussion avec des collègues d’université. J’ai donc pensé agrandir mon cercle de connaissance. Pas que j’aie vraiment besoin de ce type de contact mais j’aime bien mettre les gens en contact et le principe de réseau social est assez important pour moi.