Reaction to Mark Day’s column urging commercial reads to be banned, ranged from anger to derisive laughter today as radioinfo contacted radio industry practitioners to gauge whether the idea had any merit.

The column in today’s The Australian Media supplement, was headed ‘Ban live commercial reads to cure cash for comment.’

Analysing the recent radio industry controversy Mark Day said:

“The real issue is – how do we ensure there is a distinction between advertising and editorial comment on the public airwaves?”

His solution is “ban live reads, a situation which incidentally exists in Britain.”

He argued that presenters could voice ads for companies such as Telstra, but those recorded ads should not be played in that presenter’s program. He mentioned 3AW’s Neil Mitchell as someone who refuses to do live read ads because they could compromise the perception of his impartiality.

Radio industry practitioners we spoke to reacted with things like: “He would say that, he works for a newspaper,” and explained that if newspapers could break radio’s hold on live read ads they would have another source of advertorial revenue. Some agreed with the ideal that commentators should not be compromised by having their voice associated with advertising clients, but did not think listeners really objected to the practice.

“He works for Rupert Murdoch, the king of hidden newspaper advertorial,” said one contributor who did not wish to be named. “Just look at how News Limited manipulates its share price by the way its papers cover News Limited in their business pages… If you live in glass houses you better not throw stones.”

Another radio industry staffer pointed out that in the UK radio has 6.9% of total advertising spend (although they measure it a little differently from Australia), which is lower than the Australian Radio Industry’s share of advertising spend which usually sits between 8% and 9%.

In America, where they do have live read ads, there are 1,274 News/Talk stations. News/Talk is the second most popular format in America (country music is the most popular) and has expanded from just 360 stations in 1990 to the present number today.

Radio live read commercials usually command a premium of around double the cost of a pre-recorded spot, because they work so effectively.

Former advertising executive, now Chairman of Austereo, Peter Harvie told radioinfo:

“This would be a draconian step. I don’t see any reason why we should look to the UK for advice on this, their broadcasting landscape is very different from ours…

“[Being able to] offer live reads is part of the range of methods we have of delivering benefits to our advertisers. In the Austereo network we have a somewhat different environment from News/Talk radio, but we still do some live reads, it is all about the ability of advertisers to have the freedom to choose how they deliver their message.

“You must have safeguards of course, but it would reduce the choice for advertisers if we did not have live reads at all.”

Harvie understood Mark Day’s point was about preventing the blurring of lines between advertising and commentary, but disagreed with him about the way of achieving that: “In our network the distinction is pretty clear because of the nature of our formats, but it is also possible to differentiate ads from comment in a News/Talk environment.”

2UE Sales Director Ian Sheppard told radioinfo:

“Live reads on radio and tv have been part of our media culture since radio and tv began, it would be a major cultural change for our industry.”

“Some people think you should prohibit advertising of alcohol, some people think we should ban advertising altogether… It’s a pretty arrogant attitude to say that listeners can’t make up their own minds about ads… I think it would be a strange thing to start thinking about banning advertising in a democracy.”

Southern Cross Radio General Manager Graham Mott simply said Mark Day is “wrong!”

“It’s about commercial agreements not live read commercials – he’s missed the point.”

ABC staff we spoke to said “thank god for the ABC,” which they felt is able to bring a non-commercial balance to issues for listeners who seek it.

Feel free to contribute your thoughts about this issue on radioinfo’s forum pages.