"Good Morning! This is your favorite RJ Shakthi and you are listening to Blah-Blah 99.99656554 FM"
Yes, this post is about Radio Stations.
All India Radio (AIR) was ruling the air at one point of time. Now, almost all the numbers (including decimals) between 90 and 100 are taken and there are FM stations in the numbers. Competition has become so fierce in Chennai, because of this, every FM station has a tag line that indicates "We are the best". If everyone advertises that they are the best in FM market, then what is the meaning of the word "best"? Probably its time to rewrite Oxford English Dictionary.
"There are very few good RJs.
Majority of the RJs make us frown.
There are very few good programmes.
Majority of the programmes make us clown."
Let me explain a programme (lets call it Non-Sense, in short NS) in one of the radio station in Chennai. This NS runs for 3 hours. Starts in the morning itself. People can go and bang their head on a wall 100 times instead of listening to this NS. RJ will announce the topic that will be discussed in this 3 hours of NS. Then the callers will have to call the NS programme and speak NS to the NS RJ. How NS!! Few of the topics I have heard:
If you have 5 rupees, what will you do? [KP] Bloody, I will go and buy cotton for 5 rupees and keep it on my ears, instead of listening to your 3 hours NS.
Though I said I will list a few programme names, I really don't want to list more than one NS. Again, only few callers talk something meaningful and thoughtful. Majority of the callers talk NS.
I am sure you would have heard about lot of SMS contests in FM stations. One such SMS contest that I heard:
"In the recent budget, they had reduced the price of which product?What the hell. Most of the SMS contests are of this demeaning quality. Just to earn money, these stations should not conduct worthless contests and make the listener's brain go dull.
Option A: Toilet Brush
Option B: Tooth Brush
Option C: Mobile Phones
If you know the answer, take your mobile phone and type "SMS Contest BULL SHIT" to 12345. One lucky winner will win a lucky prize"
Though there are numerous FM stations in Chennai, FM still has its life. The one and only reason for the FMs existence are songs. So, FM Stations, please have a balance on 'advertisements-RJ Talks-SMS Contests-Songs'. Have a proper mix among all these.
Oh, its time for me to tune one of the FM station to listen to one of my favorite RJ ;-)
11 comments:
Hey I totally agree.. most FM stations have lost it when it comes to quality content. The radio's become quite boring now... and i've been listening to stuff on my MP3 player. Hope they focus on the essentials and just throw away the rubbish periphery items.
I agree to the point that FMs are still existing bcos of the music & songs.. Everytime an RJ starts talking I tune to the next station whichever is playing music, most of the times I dont even want to see which station is it.. I am so fed up of there non-stop non sense.. I hope RJs will read this blog and at least then realise wat listeners really want and cut all the crap...
comment
heyyyyy nice blog... bt u shud hav given sm program names though.
dat wud b more fun
sm irritating RJ names as well :)
Hahhaa...That was a good one! Remember, you d written one on Sun music VJs - click the similarities for a check and you ll find the only difference is that is video and this is audio!!!
@ Ajai,
MP3 players rule.
FM is like side-dish, MP3 player is like Main course :)
@ Souj,
That's what I EXACTLY do. Tune to another station that plays song.
@ Natasha,
WOW. Whatta comment.
@ Smiley,
Specific mentions are always risky :) Better to be generic as much as possible.
@ Dwija,
hehe. Bingo!!! Seriously, all the comedies that we see on a VJ show, we can hear it in a RJ show.
lolest!
Common.. what would radio channels do...? They need to keep up the advertisements and their brand. How many SMSs do you think would be sent if a question arises like - whats beethovan's first composition or whats are objects and classes in Object oriented programming..? The recent marketing trend is to make sure you force your viewer to send SMS and simple question (yes, NS) is one way to do it.. This happens everywhere around the globe - I heard a question in a Radio channel in America like - whats the capital of North America.. a. bentonville b. paris c. Washington DC. Send in your answers through your XYZ telephone service asap and win prizes.
On MP3 plyr vs Radio- it totally depends on the individual. At time when we drive long distances- listening to songs alone (from Mp3 plyr) tends to become a big time bore. Radios help a lot here and when someone is talking with a good timing.
In many cases radio channels broadcast some cool information like traffic update, flash news, and cannot forget-live cricket match scores.
Program timings in radio channels are decided with a careful survey on number of listeners/type of listeners in a given time of the day.
"lets turn to radio to listen songs" - this is not the lone reason for a radio channel's existence.
@ AV,
:) Same here.
@ Kaushik,
Capital of North America va... aagga... looks like Tamil Radio Stations are better :P But, all these are very cheap way of involving people and making money out of it. Don't know why people still respond to these type of NS contests.
MP3 player Vs Radio: Agree with your point. But, that happens rarely, I mean the long drives. Majority times, MP3 player helps :D Again, if the RJ's talk sense then obviously people would be interested to listen.
Live cricket score: This is the ONLY useful information I had got out of Radio Stations. Nothing else.
"lets turn to radio to listen songs" - Majority thinks this way. Take a mass and do a survey machi. Seriously. Who would think "ok, let me listen to this boring NS RJ for sometime and get myself depressed before sleeping".
Letters to the Editor:
proof read your content before posting.... word "content" has been used in place of "contest". :)
@ Sudarsan,
hehe. That's nice. Corrected it da. Aging problem you know ;-)
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