Radio Listening 2.0

It occurred to me the other morning driving to work while listening to my customized playlist of audio news & podcasts stream from my iPhone, that my move from terrestrial radio to the Internet has just about come full circle.

When I bought my first iPod in December 2004- 30gb iPod Photo, I almost immediately began listening to podcasts that I would download through a 3rd party "podcatcher" and import into iPod (later automatically synced through iTunes and then to my iPod each morning).  The iPod would go with me in the car to work and I would listen through an audio jack to my Auxiliary input in my Infinity M35. The audio input was really for DVD players but served the purpose for me just to get the audio.   Apple even included the cable with the 3rd Generation iPods.   

I had started listening to one of the early pioneers of podcasts, Adam Curry, and his Daily Source Code.   This was initially fascinating to me as he was living outside of London, would record basically a monologue into his computer from his house, take the file and apply the appropriate geeky RSS tags to it and upload it for "podcatching" software to find.  Adam's show was very self serving, but that didn't bother me as I enjoyed the podcast industry-centric nature of the content and he turned me on to other podcasts that eventually became part of his Podshow podcast network.  Here's some Wikipedia history, if you care.

I was hungry for more programming and became an early subscriber to a handful of other early adopter podcasts.

One of the first I found was WTOP Radio in Washington DC, a 24/7 news station in the Nation's Capital that would take their on-air short segment features and interviews and package them up into a podcast generally lasting less than 5 minutes.   Their access to Washington-insiders was fascinating and something I couldn't get on local radio in bite-sized segments.  Since then, most other talk terrestrial radio stations and personality-formatted music stations have done the same.  Digitally record normal programming, edit (sometimes), package, tag, and upload. 

The challenge I had with iTunes podcast functionality was and still is that unless you wanted all the shows to automatically be deleted upon listening, you had to go in manually and delete the file once you had listened to it to free up space on your iPod.   This became a weekly chore for me as some of the files I would want to save and perhaps listen to again later.

So for several years I maintained this library of content and listen to it in the car to and from work, around the yard, walking the dog, and whenever I wanted to multi task on the move.  It became habitual for me, but I never could see the general public making this same effort despite the fact that the iTunes Podcast inventory increased to thousands of different titles and it could be automatically downloaded.

Then came along Stitcher Radio at www.stitcher.com.   Note:  I have nothing to do with this company.  Stitcher basically has become my default 'radio station."  They aggregate content from thousands of content providers and organize the content into "stations" that listeners can browse and listen to. Audio content is delivered from thousands of large and small podcasters as well as national media providers such as CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, BBC, NPR, and the Associated Press.  The content is kept continually up to date so there is always fresh content available.  

While I still allow the podcasts to automatically download to my (now) iPhone, I find myself just launching the Stitcher iPhone app and plugging it into the iPhone jack in my car and listening to my personalized content via Stitcher and the iPhone's AT&T 3G or Edge connectivity.  The content updates automatically so I don't have to manage it and I have put the podcasts in the order I want to listen to them.   So on my 35-minute commute to work in the morning I listen to:

1.  New York Times Front Page  (5 Min)

2.  Wall Street Journal Morning Tech News (5 Min)

3.  TechCrunch Headlines (5 Min)

4.  Tech 5 (5 Min)

5.  Tech News Today (30 Min).

I don't even have to take my eyes off the road as the content plays automatically and in order.  If I did want to bypass a particular show, a simple tap on the right arrow and I'm on to the next program.  If I've already listened to the show, Stitcher moves on to the next new program effortlessly. 

The full circle is I feel like I am just listening to the radio everyday without the hassle of managing the content.  Like traditional radio, that's been taken care of for me AND  it's customized to my interests!

I usually don't finish the 30 minute Tech News Today from Leo Laporte's TWIT Network, but I just launch Stitcher on my desktop, fast forward to where I left off, and hear the remainder as I'm working.  I always have the latest release of the podcasts I like to listen to and they are always available on any device with connectivity.  I find myself rarely syncing to iTunes anymore except when I plug in the iPhone to juice up or if I'm going to fly.  Stitcher has thousands of different podcasts as well as live streaming terrestrial and internet talk and music stations available.

It's the best of all worlds -- streaming "radio" in the car, customized for my tastes, and automatically fed. This..... I can see the general public, non-techies, non-early adopters gravitating to.  As a former radio guy, this is almost as magical as radio was when I first got into it in high school and continues to support my belief that audio and the spoken word will reign supreme within the disruption of digital technology.


Addendum:  General Motors & Ford have announced a partnership with Stitcher that will bring it into vehicles directly.

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Goodbye (Traditional) Radio!

I left the radio industry professionally over 10 years ago, but never left the audio medium from a professional observer and consumption standpoint.   I still maintain that audio is the most powerful communication medium of them all and regardless of the morphing of consumer habits to consume, it will continue to be, if not the winner, one of the most effective channels of communication - attention marketers!

Why?

Simply it's the only non-linear medium that you can fully concentrate on while you're doing something else!

You can certainly add in the other benefits such as theater of the mind, the number of people who are primarily auditory in nature, the personal nature of listening alone through earbuds or headphones and the like.  But, without distraction, can you read or watch TV as well as you can listen to audio while driving your car, jogging, answering email, reading a book, magazine, newspaper, blog post, etc?

I argue NO!

Now, the purpose of this post.....on June 21st, the new Apple iOS4 will be released allowing latest generation iPhone and iPod Touch users to update their software.   There are a myriad of enhancements to the hardware in the new iPhone 4.0, but the real game changer is the software that will allow you to multitask on your device.  The talk is the ability to switch between (selected) apps instantly with all apps remembering where you were the last time you used them.

But the real game changer for me is the ability to use your device while the (selected) Internet radio application of your choice continues to play.  The example shown in April was Pandora's ability to stream while you are using other apps.  Previously, you could only listen to music you had stored on the device while using any of your other apps.  If not later this month, soon the other "radio" apps will have this capability, whether it be Stitcher, iHeart Radio, AOL Radio, NPR or the hundreds of general and specific options you'll find in the App Store.

This changes everything for me, a veracious consumer of audio content on both my iPhone and iPod.


Yes, the Android platform has featured multitasking and this capability all along, but come on, admit that the masses use iPhones and heretofore Android deployment has been mostly the early adopter and geek community.  Count the white earbuds next time you're on any form of mass transit.

But that's not all, the next blow is later this year when the Ford SYNC system brings Internet radio to the car, the last safe haven for terrestrial and satellite radio.  Read this!

While I don't drive a Ford, already my subscription to XM ends at the anniversary date because I am already using the 3G on my iPhone to listen to many of the apps above in my car today.  A bit geeky I'll admit and requiring an audio input (which my car has), but when Internet radio shows up on the dashboard for the masses, it's all over.

Ah but Todd, what about the local traffic, news and weather (together) that local terrestrial radio provides?   Good point!

Anyone who has worked in radio knows that the traffic is spotty and rarely relevant to enough of the audience.  I get my traffic on my Google Maps app on the iPhone which measures the speed of the other iPhone users on the road and is amazingly accurate.  Throw in alerts I get from Traffic.com for my commute and I don't need the faux-helicopter traffic reports.   Local news comes in the form of tweets and RSS feeds from the local newspapers and TV stations that I subscribe to.  A quick glance at Tweetie and/or Google Reader and I'm all set in the morning.  That's my new "morning newspaper".   Weather is similar.   My iPhone shows me the forecast and current radar (wherever I am).

And I'm a baby boomer.  Imagine how the millennials are NOT using traditional radio.  iPod, torrents, streaming  (I'm listening to a live streaming concert from Bonnaroo 2010 as I create this post), etc.

I love radio.  I love audio.  I listen to more "radio" today than ever, it's just none of it comes from that tall tower on the horizon.  Sorry.  Figure it out boys.  The audio medium is stronger than ever.  As I heard Om Malik say the other day on an audio podcast, as I was doing yard work outside, anyone dealing with this real digital disruption, should be looking forward, not backward or you're going to run into something and have a serious accident.

Or maybe you already have.

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