BOTW: How long does AM radio have left?; Translating the ABC’s five-year plan; TMH woes will drag on
Welcome to Best of the Week, edited on a chilly Saturday morning in NW Tasmania.
Today: The ABC has a new five-year plan but can it admit (even to itself) that it has an audience problem?; Why the end of Market Herald saga keeps receding; And Instagram prepares an AI-bot.
Unmade’s paying members help us fund our independent analysis. In return they get full access to our archive, which goes behind the paywall after two months; a reduced price for our events, including humAIn and RE:Made; and our exclusive Tuesdata posts.
You can become an Unmade subscriber today and save 45%. The price will never be as low again.
Topics
The answer to the question in the headline is “maybe not long in the capital cities, but probably decades in the regional/rural areas. Where DAB is available, AM listeners will migrate there (for the “better quality” reason that they’re also migrating to online). But there’s no DAB outside the largest conurbations, and the cost of extending it nationwide to replicate existing AM coverage would be phenomenal. So in regional Australia at least, some AM radio is likely to survive for a good while yet.
When you live 75klm from a capital city (Perth in my case), all of our radio listening at home is streaming via our trusty Google speaker devices…..”Hey Google, play 6PR Radio” etc etc.
Normal reception from the city based transmitters is dodgy to say the least!
I am sure that is one of the major reasons for the large increase in radio streaming numbers!
Some things to consider regarding ABC radio:
* the ABC is required to provide radio broadcasts Nationally
* the ABC has 53 Local Radio stations – 8 in the Capitals, and 45 Regional/Rural Stations utilising a plethora of transmitters around the continent
* the ABC also has 4 National Networks, 7 Digital Stations and 1 International station
The ratings being discussed are the 5 major capital cities (SMBAP) which are reported 8 times per annum, plus less frequent surveys for Canberra, Gold Coast and Newcastle, and then also Hobart, three regions in Qld, and 2 regions in Vic.
The regular ratings (SMBAP) represent 14.07m people 10+ or around 53% of our population. The ABC transmits near to 100% of the population which is not being included in the data that has been used. Most of the ‘missed areas’ are regional and rural where the ABC has a greater listening share (less commercial broadcasters plus the national focus of the ABC). So as a guide, you could safely bet that the NATIONAL audience would be around double.
I use the excellent Pocket Casts app for my podcast catcher. I subscribe to 192 podcasts. I have 508 podcast episodes in my queue. Very aspirational to ever listen to them all. But my phone storage allows it so they shall stay put. I am absolutely hooked on podcasts if you can’t tell.
I think Southern Cross Austereo is doing a great job with LiSTNR. The app is well designed. And you can get LiSTNR podcasts in your own podcast catcher. I like The Briefing and Matt and Alex’s All Day Breakfast.
I listen to lots of podcast episodes of talkback radio programmes. Neil Mitchell’s Mornings and Tom Elliott’s Drive on 3AW do a great job of packaging up their programmes into digestable clips. They also offer the full programme. But that’s not for me. Patricia Karvelas’s Radio National program also does a great job of this. I listen to clips of her program this way when a topic catches my eye. I don’t understand why ABC Radio Melbourne doesn’t do this clipping strategy with Virginia Trioli last I checked a few months ago. Might have changed now.
I don’t know if you’ve listened to Bitter Blood: Murdoch vs. Murdoch on Audible yet Tim. But I’d highly recommend it. The Sun King about the history of Rupert Murdoch’s British news empire was also very good. Another Audible exclusive. And The Murdochs: Empire of Influence is on SBS On Demand. Was based on the New York Times Magazine’s massive Murdochs missives and was originally a CNN+ commission before that was shuttered. I mention these as I know how much you liked Succession.