ftm Radio Page - week ending June 10, 2022

Mood music is the next watershed for radio
"medium of last resort"

Australia’s radio broadcasters have long been delightfully conventional. Listeners - like most everywhere - know what they like and like what they know. Commercial stations play the hits of one sort or another with limited interruptions from nondescript voices and, of course, ads. Morning shows tend toward the playful. Public radio isn’t much different; serious sometimes substituted for the manufactured fun and games. For the broadcasters, low risk means high reward.

Recent audience estimates for Melbourne, the country’s biggest radio market, showed a distinct change in mood, literally. Public channel Triple J, for years top rated for young listeners, has been upended by Smooth FM, essentially a background music channel. Audience share for Triple J dropped to 14.4% from 21.0% while the Smooth FM share rose to 9.0% from 7.3%. Among 18 to 24 year olds, the share for Smooth FM nearly doubled, something owner Nova Entertainment is taking to the media buyers. (See more about media in Australia here)

On this detail, Australia’s media watchers went overboard dismissing radio broadcasting, generally, as a dinosaur in the digital age. “There is plenty of anecdotal evidence to suggest that for many younger listeners radio is becoming a medium of last resort,” said Sydney Morning Herald (June 3). “While they consume vast quantities of music, much of it is via streaming platforms like Spotify, YouTube and TikTok. The radio isn’t the principal conduit to a world and identity – it’s just one channel among many. And when they do listen to radio, young people are increasingly shunning the stations targeting them in favor of golden oldies.”

Smooth FM self-identifies as “the first Australian radio station to be programmed based on a mood (feel good music format) rather than an era or genre with announcers handpicked to complement the music format.” Triple J, part of public broadcaster ABC, is hardly identifiable as an old-school radio channel, much like BBC Radio 1 in the UK. It’s more like a catalogue of social media streams. “Our podcasts are some of the most listened to at the ABC,” said ABC Music Director Meagan Loader.

Listeners treated to Pink Floyd song, and more
"We were really hacked"

A Moscow radio channel, ostensibly providing business and financial news to Russian listeners, suffered a “breaking news” burst at midday Wednesday (June 8). Broadcast and streams from Kommersant FM, related to the publication of the same name, were interrupted by the Ukrainian National Anthem and a few anti-war songs, including Pink Floyd’s “Hey Hey Rise Up”. This was highly unusual in the Russian Federation but not impossible.

By all reports, led by BBC reporter Francis Scarr via BBC Monitoring, the internet and mobile stream of the Kommersant FM noon-hour news report suddenly offered the special musical interlude. The FM broadcast may or may not have been affected, local sources varying. “We were really hacked,” said editor-in-chief Alexey Vorobyov to independent Russian news portal The Insider (June 8). An investigation to determine the source had commenced, he told state news agency TASS. Kommersant acknowledged the hack saying normal broadcasting resumed “quickly.” (See more about media in the Russian Federation here)

Kommersant FM and the Kommersant publication are principally owned Alisher Usmanov, the oft-sanctioned Russian billionaire “close” to president Vladimir V. Putin. Mr. Usmanov is also an investor in the UK football club Everton FC and owns, naturally, a huge yacht. The radio channel and publication have been editorially separate for several years. Kommersant FM is heard in Moscow on 93.6 FM.

Shortly after Russian Federation forces invaded Ukraine in February notorious hacker collective Anonymous hacked Kommersant (the news portal), TASS and other Russian state-owned media outlets. Days later news/talk channel Ekho Moskvy, principally owned by Gazprom Media, was shuttered by Russian state media regulator/censor Roskomnadzor. Three St. Petersburg radio stations - Retro FM, AvtoRadio and Nashe Radio - were hacked in May for two hours, also with the Ukrainian National Anthem and anti-war songs.

Radio Page week ending June 3, 2022
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Radio Page week ending May 27, 2022
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Radio Page week ending May 20, 2022
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Radio Page week ending May 13, 2022
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Radio Page week ending May 6, 2022
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Radio Page week ending April 29, 2022
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Radio Page week ending April 22, 2022
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Radio Page week ending April 15, 2022
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Radio Page week ending April 8, 2022
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Radio Page week ending March 25, 2022
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Radio Page week ending March 18, 2022
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Radio Page week ending March 11, 2022
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Radio Page week ending March 4, 2022
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Radio Page week ending February 25, 2022
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Radio Page week ending February 18, 2022
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Radio Page week ending February 11, 2022
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Radio Page week ending February 4, 2022
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Radio Page week ending January 28, 2022
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Radio Page week ending January 21, 2022
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Radio Page week ending December 17, 2021
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Radio Page week ending December 10, 2021
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Radio Page week ending December 3, 2021
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Radio Page week ending November 26, 2021
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Radio Page week ending November 19, 2021
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Radio Page week ending November 12, 2021
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Radio Page week ending November 5, 2021
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Radio Page week ending October 29, 2021
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Radio Page week ending October 22, 2021
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Radio Page week ending October 15, 2021
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Radio Page week ending October 8, 2021
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Radio Page week ending October 1, 2021
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Radio Page week ending September 24, 2021
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Radio Page week ending September 17, 2021
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Radio Page week ending September 10, 2021
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Radio Page week ending August 6, 2021
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Radio Page week ending July 30, 2021
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Radio Page week ending July 2, 2021
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Recently added radio audience figures and resources

• France - Greater Paris Radio Audience (April 2022)
  national and local channels, market share, trend
• France - National Radio Audience (January-March 2022, published April 2022)
  national channels, sectors, market share, reach/TSL
• France - National Radio Audience (November-December 2021, published January 2022)
  national channels, sectors, market share, reach/TSL
• France - National Radio Summer Audience (September 2021)
  national channels, summer period 2016-2021 trend
• Spain - National Radio Audience (July 2021)
  national and regional channels, reach share, trend
• Romania - Radio Audience (May 2021)
  national and Bucharest surveys, market share, trend
• Belgium - Flemish region, Radio Audience (April 2021)
  market share, Jan-Apr 2019 to Sep 2020-Feb 2021 trend
• Belgium - French region, Radio Audience (April 2021)
  market share, Jan-Apr 2019 to Sep 2020-Feb 2021 trend
• France - Greater Paris Radio Audience (April 2021)
  national and local channels, market share, trend
• Austria - Major Media - Radio Broadcasting (February 2021)
  public and private broadcasters, owners, management, audience trend

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