Mass media is widespread at present and radio is one of the well-known types of mass media. The content of the material that we hear on the radio nowadays differs from the quality of the material that was recent. The most valuable reason is that present time radio is owned by large corporations and syndicates and they make a potential influence on what we hear on the radio today. The most important problem of new owners is that they make a great impact on the content of the material that is spoken on the radio i.e. great number of business news, financial and economical life of this or that country. But they do not pay any attention to the needs and wants of the population in general and the constant listeners in particular. It is important to mention some historical facts about radio in the US. The first commercial radio station in the U.S., such as KDKA in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, appeared in present-day life in 1920. The first constant old-time radio shows had begun by 1922. In the late 1920s, musical programs had very popular shows including opera, big bands, jazz, classical, popular and modern music (Brady 1).
Because of the diversity and complexity of the region, the conversation must touch upon the problem of changes, functional uses, and the appearance of the new types of communication (Sussman 133). Let’s have a closer look at Canadia’s first local all-news radio station. The beginning of Canadian broadcasting developed certain American flavor. All the chiefs tried not to allow the U.S. influences on their programs, but despite this news radio and television programs, U.S.-based, fast-paced video, and increased ownership concentration are becoming more usual and everybody can admit this state. The United State’s all-news pioneers together with Westinghouse Broadcasting CHFI’s owners helped Canada’s first local all-news radio station, CHFI, to appear in June in Toronto to the wider population, and now it has the great plan to provide a local all-news channel in Toronto. They took the idea of this project after New York 1 News in Manhattan (Sussman 133).
The proclamation and the statement of the news vice president and the executive editor of CHFI touched upon the problem that their company’s emphasis had been that if it had a great experience in the U.S., they had a chance to look at it, and he also claimed that.
When they decided to go into all-news radio they discussed it with Westinghouse and they agreed to help them. Their top people helped train their news and sales staffs. They even borrowed a little from their all-news slogan, ‘Give Us 22 Minutes We’ll Give You the World.’ Their slogan is ’20 Minutes of News Every 20 Minutes (Sussman 133).
There are a lot of clients on this all-news radio station and all of them state that the radio helps to improve their newscast and reporting. The main impact on the quality of the radio material is that new radio owners i.e. corporations and syndicates, in the opinion of the majority of listeners, take great advantage of the business and economical side of the news. As there are many clients from all over the world being the representatives from different companies and wishing to promote themselves. If the company invests money in its own radio or announces its own radio syndicate, then, as many people think, this company will provide the listeners with the information about the business, economical or financial situation of the company; and this firm will not have any wish to supply the listeners with great amount of different music, music news and other entertainment material as the majority of the listeners want to hear. The influence of the corporation owner’s on the radio material can have also the positive sides and the negative ones.
The positive side is that the co-owners of the radio station have more opportunity to invest their money in the development of other different projects and as a result of this to increase the level and the popularity of the station itself. But the bad side will appear itself when these new invested projects have only business side without any enjoying project. The example of the next radio station owner will show the different information they provide to the listeners; and this information is one of the most useful thing of the radio station within the corporative chief in our modern society.
This corporation provides the radio listeners with information and helps them to be entertained without any commercial news and advertisements. There is one station, i.e. National Public Radio (NPR), that proclaims itself as an independent, private, not-for-profit organization proposing and syndicating news, music, and cultural radio programs to more than 850 independently operated noncommercial member stations. The shows that it broadcasts include news programs “Morning Edition” and other things such as cultural programs like Fresh Air and World Cafe. It was founded in 1970; NPR receives private grants from government agencies and donations, dues and independent rights (Adelson 9).
The plus of this company is that its radio supplies the listener with various kinds of information: from the business news to the relaxing music and entertaining programs with different shows. So, in such a case it could be stated that the majority of the listeners would be satisfied with such a radio program, because most of them wish to know all the possible information all over the world; not only the business news, the advertisements or the situation with the financial crisis of the world, but also such kind of information with the help of which the listener could enjoy yourself and get a relax.
Debut Broadcasting Corporation, for example, is the media and Entertainment Company has the syndication of Motown 50: The Radio special and the affiliation of Emmis Communications.
Motown 50: The Radio Special has the celebration of the golden anniversary of the Detroit record label that transformed the face of popular music against the backdrop of revolutionary era in American history. This Radio Special also targets the other radio stations and all together they have the purpose to make the great project to honor American’s 50th anniversary with remembrance of the artists’ songs and personalities that build the legend and take the pleasure for many listeners (Adelson 9).
It is very important to mention that none of the co-operative radio station rejected the project, they only were very glad to participate because of the importance of this period for American culture.
From the above mentioned it is necessary to make the conclusion that the impacts of the corporative radio owners have both positive and negative factors. There are some stations, for example National Public Radio, that do not pay so much attention to the promotion and increasing the status of their own company by the means of different advertising, news about this or that companies and so on, but they try to make as many projects on different topics as they can to reach more and more listeners in a week. In spite of this, there are also Radio stations which under the influence of their owners have the aim not to satisfy the priorities of the listeners but to satisfy the clients of their owners who invested money for the advertisements and different programs that touch to the sphere they work in.
Works Cited
Adelson, Andrea. “The Business of Public Radio.” New York Nimes 1999: 9.
Sussman, Gerald. “Who Speaks for Asia: Media and Information Control in the Global Economy.” Journal of Media Economics 1999: 133.
Brady J, Richard. “The History of Old Time Radio” 2009. Enzinearticles.com. Web.