Looks Good On Paper

Thursday morning, sometime before dawn, someone drove down my street, paused at the foot of my driveway, and flung a copy of the Los Angeles Times in the general direction of my front door. Shortly thereafter, I emerged from that door, retrieved the paper from its resting place by the front wheels of my car, brought it inside, and dropped it on a desk in my office. As of Friday morning, it is still there, further untouched, the string holding the double-folded sections together still intact. It will remain in that state until Sunday morning, when I will remove the string, take a very cursory glance at the headlines, and combine it with the Sunday edition in a stack I will deposit in the recycling bin. This is a sequence that has been recurring for several years.

Why do I still get a hard copy newspaper in 2021? (And why are we talking about newspapers in a column about radio and podcasting? Hang on, I'll get to those soon enough.) Good question. One answer is that it has been cheaper to subscribe this way and get access to the paper's website and apps than if I had a purely digital subscription. I subscribe to support local journalism, too. Another reason is inertia. I understand why the Times still prints a paper edition -- there remains a customer base, small and shrinking but still a customer base, for the print version, and I understand why they're willing to discount the subscription if you take the Thursday and Sunday editions, because juicing those two days' circulation helps sell advertising at higher rates. But if it were up to me, I'd subscribe to the paper the way I subscribe to several other papers and news and sports organizations, all online.

There's also the tactile and sensory pleasure of reading a real newspaper, but I'm over that. It applies to reading books -- I do read ebooks, but a real printed copy is still a better experience -- but books aren't time-sensitive. By the time a printed edition of the Times hits my driveway, I've already had a chance to read everything in it on the website. When I check those printed headlines, I recognize practically every story as something I'd seen two, three days ago, maybe even a week earlier. A scan of the coupons and obituaries (I'm old) and I'm done.

None of this is exactly breaking news. You already know that the newspaper, the printed version, is a relic. Now, let's talk about another medium, namely your medium, whether it's radio or podcasting. (I told you I'd get to that.) The questions the newspaper industry has been grappling with for the last few decades are whether the printed product has any relevance moving forward (no) and how to better monetize what DOES have relevance (paywalls, maybe), and those questions have their equivalents for radio and podcasting as well. Does broadcast radio have relevance moving forward, and if podcasting is where it's going, how can that be monetized to replace the revenue slipping away from the broadcast product?

Let me answer the first question by saying that broadcast radio is not exactly analogous to printed newspapers. It may have lost its fastball along the way, but broadcast radio, at least as a technology, has its advantages, from a massive installed base (even as actual radios disappear from homes everywhere) to its being free to use, ubiquitous, and, despite the anecdotal evidence of people saying "radio sucks" or "I don't listen to the radio," still holding a substantial lead in reaching an audience. Newspapers have the simple problem of being unable to deliver breaking news before it's already been broken online. They're out of date before the presses start rolling. At least radio doesn't have that problem.

There is one thing broadcast radio and printed newspapers have in common, though: The people in charge need to constantly ask themselves what their medium is best suited to deliver. A printed newspaper with yesterday's news is useless. A printed newspaper with commentary, insight, and in-depth reporting that's not time sensitive and not immediately available online might have a chance, because the medium is better suited to that than news that's available everywhere else a day earlier. Radio? Let's see, now... okay, unlike podcasts, it's live. The rush to embrace social audio like Clubhouse ("talk radio, only on your phone and mostly panels about crypto and NFTs and how to become a billionaire") shows that live audio has value. That's a start. Social audio has the advantage of seeming like it's a new thing and shares podcasting's "anyone can do a show" concept, but talk radio on broadcast signals or streaming can be the same but curated, and isn't "curated" a buzz word? Yes, it is. All broadcast radio needs is better curation of a wider, more appealing range of subjects. (Not crypto, please.) And a more diverse bunch of hosts with something interesting to say. Most people don't want to host their own shows, but they DO want to listen to something interesting. That might be a podcast, but give them a reason to listen to you live and they'll listen to you on the radio, too.

Podcasting's best use is not breaking news, of course. Rounding up big stories in a daily update works if and when you add context -- why you need to know about this story -- but the platform is better for less time-sensitive material. A lot of traditional talk radio shows actually fit the podcast model better, and some of those shows just happen to be top podcasts as well for that reason. I suppose that what I'm suggesting is that as we move forward and consider what broadcast radio is good for, we might want to also consider that what broadcast radio has been good for up to now might work better as podcasts (or, in the case of music, as customizable streaming and playlists), and what we can do with the medium should be analyzed by thinking more in terms of what the platform can and can't do better than others. If the strategic advantage of broadcast radio is being live, then it should be live. If it's to take callers instead of static interviews, let's do that.

Otherwise, you're gathering dust along with Thursday's Times. I don't need a pile of wasted paper to keep up with the current news. I don't need broadcast radio for something that isn't immediate and live. Do what you do best and it's not inevitable that you'll end up being sorted into the blue recycling bin.

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Something that's never going to be obsolete is All Access' show prep column Talk Topics, because you'll always need something to talk about, wherever you do your talking. Click here and/or follow the Talk Topics Twitter feed at @talktopics with every story individually linked to the appropriate item.

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Have you registered for the 2021 virtual All Access Audio Summit yet? Do it. I can disclose that my panel on making the move from radio to podcasting, with Atlanta's Jeff and Callie Dauler and Amplifi Media's Steve Goldstein, is everything you'd want it to be: Informative, useful, and inspiring while also being realistic and grounded. I'm proud of them and the panel, and you'll be able to ask questions live, too, so mark April 21st down and make sure you register now for the event. You'll also get The Breakfast Club, Jason Aldean, and lots more useful panels an information, right in the comfort of wherever you happen to be. Join us, won't you?

Perry Michael Simon
Vice President/Editor, News-Talk-Sports and Podcast
AllAccess.com
psimon@allaccess.com
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