From Hit by iPod and Satellite, Radio Tries New Tune: Play More Songs:
Previously, like most stations, 105.1 let computer scheduling programs pick the songs from a library of 300-400 titles, with the same 30-40 songs playing most of the time. Now the station is going against the grain of the past two decades in radio, more than tripling the number of song titles played on any given day. With more than 1,200 songs on the playlist, most songs get played only once every few days, rather than several times a day. Program director Mike O’Reilly and his assistants handpick the music and the order in which they are played.‘It’s all about train wrecks,’ Mr. O’Reilly says, using radio terminology for two unlikely songs played back-to-back. ‘If you hear MC Hammer go into the Steve Miller Band, I’ve done my job.’ Indeed, the station boasts that it might play a grunge rock anthem by Nirvana alongside a disco hit by K.C. and the Sunshine Band — the kind of serendipitous combination offered by an iPod.
So, they’re moving away from computerized scheduling to hand-picked playlists in order to emulate the randomness of an iPod. Fortunately, my ironometer goes to 11.
A little history:
Doomsayers predicted radio’s demise back in the 1950s, when television became widely available and long-playing records made listening to music on record players easy. But the industry adapted to competition from television dramas by cutting many of its own dramas and playing more music. And it turned out people who bought LPs didn’t stop listening to radio broadcasts. Once the 1960s hit and the invention of the transistor made receivers small and portable, radio boomed again.When FM and stereo sound started to take off in the 1970s, conventional wisdom held that AM radio was finished. Instead, it became the home for talk radio, while music stations migrated to the FM dial. Radio overcame another perceived threat in the 1980s, when Sony Inc.’s popular Walkman became the first device to make custom-selected music truly portable.