IT'S ONLY A RANT 2005:
HOWARD STERN ENTERTAINMENT REVOLUTION!
A friend of mine got into pay radio about a half year ago and riding in his
car listening to the variety of stations was great, but with over 1200 albums,
several thousand CD's and a box full of 45's my mixes on cdr are pretty much
unbeatable. My record collection goes back to pre- World War 1! I can actually
follow Herman's Hermits doing HENRY THE 8TH with a 1912 version!
Howard Stern coming on however, an uncensored station, changes all that.
Back in the early 1980's Michael Weldon of the Psychotronic books began
recording on cassette Stern shows for me and I've been a fan ever since.
Around 20 years of listening and I still enjoy the show. So I decided to
listen in to the Howard Stern 100 shows now, before he goes on satellite.
It really does make you do a double take when you first hear the 7 dirty words
you can't say on old time radio dropped casually in conversations. Highlights
so far have included Howard's parents developing a show (no dirty words but
great stories), the Superfan Round Table with Mutt, the gay screamer from New
York, Bobo who has been a fan of Howard as long as me, and of course the
pickiest hetero that ever lived, Ralph. There is the Howard Stern news, and
Double A did a great interview with Beth on his show.
So, what do I think?
I think old time radio is in trouble. Our society puts President Bush on time
delay when he speaks (surf through the channels when he is on and you'll be
shocked at how many don't sync up) so censors want the right to censor the
President! I don't think it will be an overnight sweep of pay radio as free
radio fears, but just as cable TV chipped into network TV it will do the same
to free radio.
Free radio has reacted the exact same way free TV tried to stop cable with. It
didn't work for free TV, it won't work for free radio either.
So what does this mean for Stern? He instantly has a world wide audience. He
can create a Stern world of radio shows to launch an entertainment empire the
likes of which has never been seen in entertainment before. Oprah may have her
magazine, but an entire radio network devoted to her world? Watch for Stern to
use this to launch incursions into all forms of media.
What does it mean for old time radio? They are reacting with fear right now.
Perhaps the censors have so much control they can't understand that Stern is
changing all the rules of marketing. This is as big a revolution in
entertainment as when radio went from AM to FM, movies went from silent to
sound. They can create their own pay stations, but right now, they are too
afraid to.
But doesn't the entertainment biz, which seems to thrive on fear, always react
with anger and fear when something new happens?
The platform is the message, to paraphrase Marshall McLuhan. The medium was
his term, and he was right. No matter what your message was, the medium it was
placed on allowing your message to be heard was what remains important. How
can Hollywood stop bootlegging? They can release films on the net the same day
it is released to theaters. That is the only way. That will also give them
time to create shows exclusively for the nets well- and this day is coming.
Stern has realized that mastering all available platforms is the way to
promote now. From TV, to film, to radio and who knows what else, the mentality
of defending your one platform is just silly. Just as the big guys fought
blank tapes, fought blank video, they will eventually have to look into
bittorrents to get their movies out. With Google creating TV's that will allow
you to put the net on them it seemingly wouldn't take a genius to realize this
will pit movies into homes. But folks, that will also change the audience.
Right now teens and people in their 20's control the movie world. Once the
film studios realize they should put their films on the net they will have mom
and dad to cater films too as well. Kids will always go to theaters to get out
of the home, but parents usually stay home.
This will mean a return to films for adults, mature adult themes with older
actors and actresses ala Hollywood in the '40's and '50's.
It is thisclose to being realized by the studios. It is coming.
Rather than curse Stern, the entertainment industry needs to realize what he
is doing- is showing the approach to sell their product across the board. It
may not have been in their marketing books in college, but it's here.
Just listen!
.
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