The are delegates from the far, middle and south-east Asia, as well as from the Asia Pacific region. They hail from countries including India, Nepal, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore together with some from the UK, Sweden and a strong contingent from Australia.
The Radio Asia 2022 conference, convened by the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU) is themed: “Building a new future for radio.” It is being held at the Shangri-La Hotel in Kuala Lumpur.
Running over two days from yesterday to today, Radio Asia 2022 will be followed seamlessly by Radiodays Asia 2022 on Tuesday and Wednesday (tickets for online attendance still available).
The program yesterday comprised two Workshops. The first featured Akim Mogaji (below) from the BBC, UK, who spoke passionately about story-telling.
Born to a white English schoolteacher mother and a black Nigerian engineer father, he used his own experiences from childhood to the present to illustrate how stories are told. He explained the structure that underpins a good story, but it was the emotion in his story that shone through.
The second session, titled New Content, New Platforms was led by Steve Ahern (main pic) who is currently Head of the ABU Media Academy. His message was that radio must “fish where the fish are.” So, if the “fish’ are listening to Spotify, podcast apps or other platforms, then radio must be available on there too.
Joining Ahern (below right) was a panel of four experts, (from right to left):
Andrew Morris of the CBAA took a deep dive into the value of the data available from digital platforms and how to harvest it.
Richard Phelps from app creator All In Media (AIM) who spoke about clever ways to drive more listening through apps.
Then, Alex Bilbie Clarke, Snr Product Mgr at the ABC, talked about what’s trending in apps – live streamed radio wins.
And Natalie Pozdeev from AFTRS went into where the next generation of audio producers will come from and what type of content they will be making.
The session closed after questions from the floor and lively discussion.
To register for RadioDays Asia at a radioinfo reader discount rate, go to radiodaysasia.com/register, then go through the credit card payment process and apply the discount code at the payment page.
The discount code for radioinfo readers is RINFKL
Peter Saxon