This is why you shouldn’t worry about the FCC’s decision to allow the merger of XM and Sirius — or, for that matter, why you’ll only have to live with the horrendous state of chain-owned commercial radio for a few more years.
Once it’s possible to have low-cost, reliable WiFi in your car, someone will start offering Internet car radios. And that will mark the end of the radio business as we know it.
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Anonymous
I live with Pandora internet radio on at work. While it will sometimes get a little repetitive with the same artist two or three times in an hour, it is far superior to commercial radio, at least when it comes to music stations.while I think there will always be some kind of market for talk radio, i’m hoping internet radio is the death knell for most FM corporate stations.
John
Here’s a related question I’ve had on my mind for a while now, and maybe someone here can shed light.What if a website was organized as a non-profit, publicly funded venture and wanted to syndicate (pay for) NPR’s live program streams? You can download NPR programming once it’s aired, but I don’t know of any source of live NPR programs available to news orgs which aren’t member stations.I wonder if NPR would be open to such an agreement, especially for startups interested in adopting a public broadcasting business model but without a terrestrial broadcast signal.John
Kirk
no! i think it not will end of the radio business
Anonymous
The RIAA is on a mission to kill Internet radio and they won’t rest until they’ve done it. They’ve already made great headway.
Anonymous
**Once it’s possible to have low-cost, reliable WiFi in your car, someone will start offering Internet car radios.**That’s a tall order. “Reliable” isn’t going to arrive for awhile.”Low Cost”? Who’s gonna pay for the infrastructure?**And that will mark the end of the radio business as we know it.**Oh, I think they’ll always be room for “Free” radio. Advertisers like radio, and Jordan’s furniture isn’t going to be jumping to buy time on “internet radio” which doesn’t target a specific market.
Aaron Read
What if a website was organized as a non-profit, publicly funded venture and wanted to syndicate (pay for) NPR’s live program streams? You can download NPR programming once it’s aired, but I don’t know of any source of live NPR programs available to news orgs which aren’t member stations.I wonder if NPR would be open to such an agreement, especially for startups interested in adopting a public broadcasting business model but without a terrestrial broadcast signal.John, NPR depends heavily on affiliate station membership fees to survive. The model you describe is absolute heresy to said affiliate stations because you're encouraging listeners to get their NPR content through a means other than the listeners' local affiliate station…which means the listeners aren't going to donate to the local affiliate, nor are they hearing the local affiliate's local underwriting, which dilutes the value of said underwriting.Plus, what would the point be? Most NPR affiliates already simulcast their AM & FM signals on their websites…you can get live NPR programming that way, almost always for free. And most, if not all, NPR content is also available in real time at http://www.npr.org too.Obviously, this doesn't necessarily apply to non-NPR programming, like PRI's and APM's stuff. But in most cases, it's still true.Besides which, NPR is most definitely not interested in licensing their content to anyone "outside" of NPR and the member stations; they're more interested in just distributing it directly themselves. It's more advantageous financially both for NPR and for the member stations. I'm sure if NPR *could* run a satellite radio company themselves, they would do so…but they can't, hence why they do their deal with Sirius.However, the overall point of wifi in the car being a nuclear missile aimed at radio is a very valid one. For example, I routinely download the Marketplace podcast on my smartphone via a 3G internet connection and play it through my car stereo's line input. I do this because I often miss the first half of the show while driving home (I have a long commute, nearly an hour). While it's great for me, it's not great for my local NPR affiliates; I don't hear their fundraising or underwriting.As of yet, there isn't really a solution; the existing model of business that NPR and other content creators have with their affiliate stations is unsustainable but it's so ingrained that nobody's thought up an alternative yet. It's most definitely on the radio screen of both NPR and the member stations, though. Has been for two or three years.