Wotz a Radio?

[Ron Ron Ron]

Did anyone else see the feature about BBC Radio's 50th anniversary, on the BBC1 10 O'clock news last night (Friday)?

 

At the end of the feature, the reporter took a transistor radio (didn't look particularly old, could have been new) into a High Street and asked a few young people if they knew what it was.

Many didn't.

They had no idea how to use it, what to do with it or how to turn it on and "tune in" to listen.

 

Asked if they ever listened to radio (broadcasts), most said no.

 

 

 

.

Edited October 1, 2017 by Ron Ron Ron

[TonyA]

I'm still having problems tuning in to the Home Service. 

 

Tony

[Oldddudders]

Radio is something that took a severe bashing when tv became affordable. The arrival of ITV in the mid-50s helped that process. But until the last 25 years, tv was a distinctly evening experience. Car radios are still so-named because they include that feature, but since cassettes were added, then CDs, now USB/MP3, only those who wish to listen need do so - in-car entertainment is now multi-choice. Traffic news and frequent time-checks help car-commuters, no doubt.

 

I see radio these days also as the popular-music palliative for factory and workshop staff, while it continues to offer more varied and intellectual fare for those who seek it - in an era when tv seems increasingly unwilling to offer as much of the latter as it once did.

[stewartingram]

Radio?????????

Surely you mean WIRELESS.

 

Stewart

[Horsetan]

...Surely you mean WIRELESS....

No no no, that's WiFi.

[stewartingram]

No no no, that's WiFi.

 

Sigh......

[steve1]

"What is radio?"

 

The best medium of all for enjoying* audio content.

 

steve

 

*And I don't mean consuming!

[brianusa]

We saw it and came to the same conclusion as Ian.  Radio has a place today in spite of TV and its many forms and provides a background of news and music for those who eschew daytime TV which should I would think, encompass most herein.  I confess to being a media snob as I prefer classical music and news from the BBC.  Wasn't always so as ITV provided 'cool' shows for the time and Radio Luxembourg was the music source before the advent of rock and roll or worse.  Also if you have endured the average US TV show or news programme with its adverts every few minutes, the BBC represents an attempt at respecting their listeners intelligence.  Fortunately w get some on PBS over here.

 

Brian.

[Tony Davis]

I much prefer radio over the television. I have radio in the modelling room tuned into a Blues station, or Radio 2  when it's popmaster time. I can listen when I am working and not have to keep watching the screen and I find I can phase out of listening when I need to concentrate. I listen on headphones to Paul Jones on a Monday evening whilst SWMBO is watching TV and the dogs are sleeping on our laps. I like radio.

[BoD]

I too much prefer radio over television.

The pictures are better.

[jjb1970]

BBC radio is excellent, I listen to Radio 4 and Radio 4 Xtra all the time, they have some wonderful comedy, documentary and drama shows which are streets ahead of the content I see on BBC TV these days. BBC radio seems to be what BBC TV likes to pretend it is but isn't - a provider of intelligent, high quality and interesting material which merits its status as a national institution.

[tractionman]

Earlier this year I treated myself to a decent short wave radio, the kind I would have loved to have had when I used to listen alot to international broadcasting stations back in the eighties. Alas, as I tuned across the shortwave bands I was a tad disappointed to find so few stations now transmitting on short wave compared to thirty years ago.

 

I guess I should have realised that short wave like everything else has changed over the intervening decades, it'd be the equivalent of a returnee loco spotter going back to Crewe thirty years on and expecting to still see 40s and 25s!

 

Oh well, it's useful to listen to Radio 4 on and I guess shortwave might make a comeback when the www has a meltdown in the not too distant future...

 

All the best,

 

Keith

[Ron Ron Ron]

The point is not about the quality, or experience of radio, nor about its relative value against other forms of media.

Rather that a new generation do not listen to it, or even have the experience of listening to it.

 

Just another facet of "main stream media" that has been abandoned by a new generation. A generation whose only window on the world comes through their smartphone or tablet pc.

 

 

.

[jjb1970]

I must admit that quite a bit of my "radio" listening is via BBC I-player, although I do have an excellent Geneve world radio (despite the name, it does not receive short wave) at home.

[James Makin]

I think that there's still a fair amount of young people still listening but I'd think that in the case of the OP and the survey - probably more indicative of how people listen to the radio today. I'd imagine that many of the younger generation (discounting those old enough to drive and have car radios) would listen from either childhood hi-fi (whooo!) setups or increasingly, online via laptop/iPad/phone. Even the radio is trying to turn itself into TV - you can't go 5 mins on Radio 1 without being told to tune in online to see live videos and exclusive content that you can't get via simply listening to the radio itself.

 

FWIW, I'm 31 and never owned a small transistor radio - in fact, I would even doubt that several of my less-aware mates would know what one was - through our wonderful hobby here, you tend to become more aware about past social history and interacting with the older generation more than other people my age. I love the radio myself (in particular Radio 1's Scott Mills & Greg James!) and listen all the time via my car DAB and BBC R1 podcasts streamed or downloaded to iPod, I've no need for a machine that sits at home and is merely a radio only, without any other function. I'm also not at all surprised that the Generation Z below me have no idea what the word 'transistor' even means and that you'd have to turn a rotary dial to tune in, rather than the click of a touchscreen button!

 

Cheers,

James

[Horsetan]

BBC radio is excellent, I listen to Radio 4 and Radio 4 Xtra all the time, they have some wonderful comedy, documentary and drama shows which are streets ahead of the content I see on BBC TV...

 

Apart from having the car radio permanently tuned to Radio 4, I also have a mobile app which picks up most of the Irish radio stations. If the car radio could pick those up, I'd be happy.

[NorthBrit]

When Iwas a little lad (many, many years ago). I was poorly with measles. Obviously confined to bed and missing my 'wireless fix', my father made me a crystal radio. (Google it if you do not know what it was/ is.). Fantastic. I was sorry to get better.

[brianusa]

Apart from having the car radio permanently tuned to Radio 4, I also have a mobile app which picks up most of the Irish radio stations. If the car radio could pick those up, I'd be happy.

Once upon a time I commuted between Plymouth and Exeter (pre motorway) and sometimes I'd return over the Moor via Tavistock.  It was on of the few places where one could hear  Radio Eireaan complete with commercials.

 

Brian

[Phil Parker]

I suspect the original report suffered from a couple of issues that made it less than accurate:

 

Most vox-pops are carried out when you aren't likely to find the brains of Britain wandering around because they are at work. The woman who made up most of the feature seemed to fit, partly because she's just been pounced on by a camera crew. Her boyfriend didn't seem to have a problem, but he didn't fit the narrative so we didn't get much of him.

 

Second, "no-one listens to radio" is the cry of people who don't drive. That includes media luvies based in London with excellent wifi and public transport. Streaming services makes less sense anywhere you do well to find an FM signal. There isn't even DAB all the way between Birmingham and London, hardly the back of beyond.

 

The report conveniently ignored the 15m Radio 2 listeners. Add in the others and to quote Queen, "Radio, some one still loves you..."

[davknigh]

Perhaps if someone explained that the content of radio broadcasts was free it might draw more interest?

 

Cheers,

 

David

[wombatofludham]

Apart from having the car radio permanently tuned to Radio 4, I also have a mobile app which picks up most of the Irish radio stations. If the car radio could pick those up, I'd be happy.

 

I sometimes wish my car radio couldn't pick up Irish radio.  Much as I enjoy RTE when I listen to it, here on the west coast of Wales I prefer to listen to Radio Cymru, except in the evening various Dublin Bay independent radio stations swamp the airwaves and drown out the local Welsh language broadcasts.  BBC Radio Cymru's C2 evening broadcasts, especially Georgia Ruth, have an eclectic mix of Welsh language rock, pop, folk-crossover, and foreign music that is as good as the late lamented John Peel which I enjoy listening to when driving back from other parts of the country, but the minute I get to the Bwlch just outside Dolgellau, it all gets swamped by Dublin pop and prattle.

 

​Mind you I did find one Dublin Bay rock station, with an awful drum and base noise track, very useful when I wanted to annoy some illegal campers one night up Penrhyn Point.  Irish drum and base at full whack soon woke them up.

[Zomboid]

I gave up on the radio until I got a car with DAB. The music stations on FM etc are not to my taste, and the news is far too depressing to listen to.

Now I have it in the car, and I stream it to my phone a lot at work. But whilst I remember the old transistor type, I don't have one since I can't pick up anything I want to listen to with it.

[TheSignalEngineer]

I sometimes wish my car radio couldn't pick up Irish radio.  Much as I enjoy RTE when I listen to it, here on the west coast of Wales I prefer to listen to Radio Cymru, except in the evening various Dublin Bay independent radio stations swamp the airwaves and drown out the local Welsh language broadcasts.  BBC Radio Cymru's C2 evening broadcasts, especially Georgia Ruth, have an eclectic mix of Welsh language rock, pop, folk-crossover, and foreign music that is as good as the late lamented John Peel which I enjoy listening to when driving back from other parts of the country, but the minute I get to the Bwlch just outside Dolgellau, it all gets swamped by Dublin pop and prattle.

 

​Mind you I did find one Dublin Bay rock station, with an awful drum and base noise track, very useful when I wanted to annoy some illegal campers one night up Penrhyn Point.  Irish drum and base at full whack soon woke them up.

BR caused the opposite effect during the commissioning of the Cambrian RETB signalling. When the transmitter was initially turned on it completely trashed TV reception along the Irish coast

[DLT]

My radio takes too long to warm up.....

[jjb1970]

I still have my old Sony SW7600 short wave radio that I used to take to sea although I very rarely use it. The SW7600 in its various iterations seemed to be almost the de-facto standard for people that wanted a genuine world band radio, they were brilliant pieces of kit and very well made. Mine is 25 years old and is still going strong.