Learning to Listen: Developing the Canadian Radio Audience in the 1930s

This article explores the development of the early Canadian radio audience. Without a pattern to follow, the listeners found ways to listen that reflected the restrictions and possibilities of the new technology. Early listeners picked favorite programs, became club members, and were sports fans for the first time. The early listening experiences created the foundation for radio audiences and their listening patterns.     

The Hidden Radio Audience in Spain: Study on Children's Relationship with the Radio

The arbitration imposed in the audience measurement systems used in Spain excludes a major swath of the population as soon as it segments the potential radio audience starting at the age of 14. Thus, the child-listener is ignored by both programming and advertising strategies. However, is this marginalisation fair? The purpose of this article is to answer this and other questions and to demonstrate to what extent the existence of the child-listener is a sufficient condition to seek mechanisms that include children in radio audience measurement systems.     

Different Periods of Post-Revolutionary Radio in Iran: Audience Evolution

Iranian society after the Islamic revolution in 1979 entered a new era. Almost all public domains and social institutions underwent drastic changes, and this caused many subsequent changes in the media in terms of both form and content. The number of radio stations increased and they are paying more attention to content quality in order to absorb new groups of people and to establish a more permanent position in Iranian society. The present study analyzes the changes to Iranian radio by dividing the post-revolution time into three periods, with a fourth period that has just started. It also deals with the challenges radio faces in the future in Iran.     

Consider Clicking In: Using Audience Response Systems to Spark Discussion

Courses: Any large-lecture format, communication course.

Objectives: Students will apply and evaluate course concepts through daily discussion activities and class dialogues supported by audience response systems (i.e., clickers).     

Promoting Sustainability: Audience and Curatorial Perspectives on The Human Factor

Abstract Humanity faces a growing list of socio‐economic and environmental problems, which impel us all to foster more sustainable forms of development. This paper examines how museums might encourage the kind of awareness that can lead to sustainability, by assessing responses to The Human Factor, a permanent exhibition at the Royal Saskatchewan Museum, which raises questions about values, beliefs, and actions associated with the industrialized worldview. Responses to the exhibition were assessed through quantitative exit surveys and a novel technique involving heart rate monitors. Additional qualitative insights were gained from responses of participants in a high school Youth Forum on Sustainability that used the exhibition to catalyze discussion. Together, these studies suggest that provocative exhibitions can foster understanding and awareness among teenagers and adults through a combination of cognitive and emotional responses, and that a focus on sustainability can be challenging both for visitors and for museums as cultural institutions.     

追求卓越:北京交通广播的现在与未来

北京人民广播电台交通广播是由北京人民广播电台和北京市公安交通管理局合办的。自1993年12月18日开播以来．多次获得国家广电系统．北京市的各项荣誉。北京交通广播连续三年广告创收位居全国广播单频道之首，2003年广告收入达到1．5亿，取得了社会效益和经济效益的双丰收。2001年底，北京交通广播在全国广播电视系统首家申请并通过ISO9001质量管理体系认证。     

EDA Positive Change: A Simple Algorithm for Electrodermal Activity to Measure General Audience Arousal During Media Exposure

Skin conductance provides an inexpensive and nonreactive measure of electrodermal activity (EDA) that is widely used as an arousal indicator. When communication research employs real-world audiovisual stimuli, the measurement sensitivity of EDA-based data can become challenging. Measures that are commonly employed to correlate EDA with continuous stimuli (the tonic skin conductance level and the frequency of skin conductance responses) are replicable for stimuli of one minute or longer. This article discusses positive changes in EDA (EPC) as a measure that integrates the frequency of skin conductance responses with their amplitude while reducing processing complexity and error. The use of EDA data from 115 subjects demonstrates that EPC is a more accurate measure of stimulus-induced arousal than the response frequency, the conductance baseline, and average skin conductance. Assets and drawbacks are discussed in the context of theoretical and practical issues.     

In Search of the Older Audience: Adult Age Differences in Television Viewing

General Social Survey data were used to test the claims that (a) older adults watch more television than younger adults and (b) they do so because of poor health, retirement, and widowhood. Older adults did watch more television on average than other age groups. This effect was not explained by birth cohort or altered by time of measurement. However, the age effect was small (despite striking mean differences), because variability within the youngest and oldest groups was large. Overall, traditional explanations of older adults' viewing were largely unsupported. Demographic and social variables explained younger adults' viewing better than older adults'.     

Verbal Bourbon: Speaking Secrets to Intoxicate Your Audience

Public speaking strikes fear in the heart of many people. This tactics session sought to sharpen the audience's public speaking and presentation skills by providing them with six ingredients to a successful presentation: comfort level, gaining attention, organization, presentation style, discussion, and the wrap-up. Incorporating these principles in one's presentation would help the speaker gain the attention of the audience, communicate effectively, and enact change.     

Radio Frequency Identification: Transforming the Dynamics of Supply and Demand in Publishing

Radio frequency identification (RFID) is a mature technology used across many industries. However, beyond satisfying industry mandates, many in the publishing industry have stepped back from pursuing the potential of RFID. Why? Publishing was first introduced to RFID in 2003 through retailer mandates which created a negative cloud around RFID. Many focused exclusively on the technology and the cost of compliance, rather than the business benefits. Since then, the primary focus has continued to be on the technology. For a publishing industry facing new sources of competition and serious supply-chain issues, the time has come to stop focusing on the technology and start thinking about the benefits. RFID is really all about lowering costs and achieving greater efficiencies. The potential for RFID to reduce warehouse and distribution costs, in-store theft and out-of-stock conditions is exciting, as are the larger opportunities to improve forecasting, customer experience and planning. RFID is new to the book industry and there is still a lot to learn. Understanding the technology is important. But, RFID is not just a technology. It is an enabler for reducing costs, improving profitability and enhancing competitiveness. It is essential that the industry go beyond the technology and start realizing these opportunities.     

When Everything Else Fails: Radio Journalism During Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico

ABSTRACT

In an era of over-reliance on online media technologies in disasters, this research examines the journalistic functions played by Puerto Rican AM radio workers during Hurricane Maria. Throughout the emergency there was total loss of electricity and communications, nonetheless local radio continued operations. This study is one of a few that explore journalistic practices during a disaster in the context of a Spanish-language media system. Through a qualitative analysis of in-depth interviews with radio workers, we found that in spite of having preparedness plans, the magnitude of the disaster led to improvization and the embracing of alternative journalistic roles. One of the main barriers was the inadequate technology for this particular context. Radio workers were also victims of the disaster and faced challenges in both their journalistic and first responder roles.     

Radio's Role During Hurricane Katrina: A Case Study of WWL Radio and the United Radio Broadcasters of New Orleans

This narrative case study examines the news and information role played by WWL Radio and the United Radio Broadcasters of New Orleans during the real life drama of Hurricane Katrina. The performance of United demonstrates that media consolidation, deregulation and the threat of emerging technologies do not justify abandoning the idea that broadcasters still have a moral and ethical responsibility to serve the public interests of audiences; that traditional radio should stop looking over its shoulder at threats posed by other media, and instead should make use of the medium's greatest strength—taking care of the communities it serves on the local level. This study provides further proof that traditional radio is still vital, especially in times of disaster and catastrophe; that radio's attention to the local community, and its ability to collaborate among other broadcast outlets in that community, may be two of many distinct factors that keep the public tuned in to the medium.     

Stewart,Essential Radio Skills: How to Present a Radio Show

This article reports on ongoing studies of political satire in the seriocomedy genre produced by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) and its French language counterpart, la Société Radio‐Canada (SRC). We compare and contrast examples of each network's way of imagining its respective society as well as each other's society. We situate the definition of seriocomedy in a discussion of the contrasting role of private and public broadcasting in the North American context. Then we present examples from programs produced in two historical periods. The definition of seriocomedy and the analysis of texts follows the dialogical theory of discourse developed by the Russian thinker, Mikhail Bakhtin. In the conclusion, we discuss how these examples of dialogical criticism help demonstrate the complex process in which the seriocomedy genre expands and reinstitutes the normative boundaries of what can be said or represented in public culture.     

Learning From Kids: Connecting the Exhibition Process to the Audience

Abstract When the Chicago History Museum re‐opened its doors on September 30, 2006 after a 21‐month‐long renovation, the debut included a new interactive history gallery for families. The exhibition, Sensing Chicago, was designed primarily to appeal to and communicate effectively with eight‐ and nine‐year‐old children. Since this was a new target audience for the museum's exhibition program, the team followed a course for this project that departed from the museum's typical exhibition development. The process was informed by audience research that has broadened our understanding of how a collections‐based history museum that traditionally caters to adult audiences can create meaningful and memorable experiences for children. This article focuses on one aspect of the research, a three‐month concept‐testing phase conducted by in‐house staff, which provided the team with useful information that, in turn, impacted the development and design of the gallery.     

In Our Own Voices: Reproductive Health Radio Programming in the Peruvian Amazon

This article examines the political and social implications of broadening public discourse and facilitating a collective mediated space in which gendered inequities, interests, and identities are debated via the feminist reproductive health radio program Bienvenida Salud! The article describes the mediascape in rural and indigenous Peruvian Amazonian communities and the ways in which feminist reproductive rights discourse has been introduced and interpreted in communities that have limited exposure to global feminism. By analyzing the reception and listening practices among the Bienvenida Salud! audience, the authors explore arguments about the limits and possibilities of participatory media to effect social change. Finally, the article examines the capacity of Amazonian women to use alternative media to voice their traditionally ignored reproductive health priorities, goals, and practices, and in so doing, critically assesses the potential of participatory media interventions to influence the discourses of global feminism and population planning.     

Audience Research in the Post-Audience Age: An Introduction to Barker and Morley

This article considers the contributions that Martin Barker and David Morley have made to the ongoing debate about the future of audience research in communications. Considering their positions on theory and method in the field, the article concludes that audience research in the future must incorporate a variety of different methodological perspectives. The article also notes the increasingly political nature of questions posed in the field of audience research and our necessity as researchers to acknowledge the political dimension of our field.     

In Search of the Sarnoff "Radio Music Box" Memo: Nally's Reply

In 1993, I published an article in the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media entitled "In Search of the Sarnoff ‘Radio Music Box' Memo: Separating Myth from Reality." That article focused on my quest to find the original memo David Sarnoff, the legendary broadcast leader, claimed to have written in 1915 in which he predicted the advent of broadcasting. This article presents evidence I sought then that proves the existence of a "Radio Music Box Memo" written in 1916 and includes confirmation of a reply E.J. Nally wrote to that Memo in 1916. It also describes the context in which both of the documents-Sarnoff's 1916 memo to Nally and Nally's 1916 reply- were written. These materials indicate Sarnoff and Nally were actively involved in developing some type of music service for wireless consumption. They also show that Sarnoff had conceived the idea of a "music box" that would use wireless apparatus as early as November 1916. He should be recognized for that early concept.