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A few months ago on this site, there was a report about Spotify wanting to produce "radio-like" streaming services for the car combining a mix of music and locally-sourced news breaks. Such as service may well pose a threat to music stations.
According to the 2nd last horizontal bar chart, in 2017, 75% of listening in cars was terrestrial (AM/FM/DAB) with 1% listening to internet (IP) audio streams. In 2020, the percentage of listeners to terrestrial radio is 66% with a a corresponding increase of 19% listening to IP streams. The big threat of IP streaming is to music-oriented terrestrial shows.
On podcasts, one would presume that they are spoken word programs. There is no information about the percentage share of audio books. Whether it an audio book or podcast it may well pose a threat to spoken word terrestrial (AM/FM/DAB) broadcasting.
While podcasts may be daily up-to-date such as Ross Greenwood's "Money Minutes" or Brooke Corte's "Money News" or Sean Aylmer's "Fear and Greed" or Dr Norman Swan's "Coronacast" , generally podcasts don't have the immediacy of the 'breaking story' or the reaction from listeners via talkback or other talent.
In sum, terrestrial music programs may well be threatened by Spotify but not for terrestrial talk programs.
Thank you,
Anthony of analytical Belfield
I may add that Spotify is incorporating spoken word podcasts as part of its service. It has recently signed a broadcaster for $100m plus, https://www.theguardian.com/media/2020/may/24/spotify-podcast-deal-the-joe-rogan-experience .
Perhaps spoken word terrestrial broadcasting may be under threat from spoken word podcasts. Then again, podcasts do not have the immediacy of live radio and do not allow for immediate two-way communication between the broadcaster and the listener and/or guest.
Nevertheless, podcasts are the beginning. What is to stop Spotify having customised streams of podcasts interspersed with news on-the-hour from local sources?
Thank you,
Anthony of applications-oriented Belfield