Web 2.0 - More for Us to Learn?

The Internet is changing again.

You may have heard the term "Web 2.0". You also are likely to have heard these thrown around:

Myspace
Podcasting
Blogging
Mash-ups
Web services
Wikis

There are a lot more of these terms, and a number of related companies and services that increases hourly.

If you Google "Web 2.0" you'll get about 829 million returns. I suggest you take a look at the first few.

What is going on is in a sense a huge increase in interactivity. The Web is becoming more than a catalog or presentation medium. It is taking advantage of several new technologies and the effects of networking to link people and things in whole new ways.

Your listeners are creating new interactions and communications through Myspace (and many other social interaction sites).

Your listeners are sharing through blogging and wikis.

Some of the new technology can be immediately important. That might include podcasting, blogging and Myspace.

Others may be things to learn about today, but important tomorrow.

I admit. It is a little overwhelming. But I'm thinking about it and I encourage you to do the same.

Why?

We are not radio programmers only. In fact, we are entertainment programmers. The listeners decide what they value in terms of how the obtain and interact with their entertainment choices. If we need to be able to offer instant title identification and lookup of previous titles (Web services), if we need to be able to provide up to date information about our contests, new songs, concerts and other areas where our knowledge and the listeners' concerns overlap through an RSS subscription (Blogging), if our key personalities need to come alive through Myspace (social interaction site) or carry on an ongoing dialog with listeners through Wikis (group Web sites), our very careers require us to learn about these new tools.

One new technology, "mash-ups" combines Web services like searching and mapping. Personally, I don't see, today, where that will help us programming radio stations. But with more and more services to combine, somebody will come up with an answer.

You don't need to be an expert. But, unless your audience is all 50+, I feel that it is to your advantage to:

1. Sample the new Web 2.0 developments. Learn a little. Build a Myspace page. Publish a blog. Have your most creative jock create a series of podcasts. Build something the audience can interact with. Post pictures from the concert and audio from the artist interview. Use the new shared sites, not just your own.

2. Learn exactly how these technologies are filtering down to our audience. It may be hard work to stay one step ahead. On the other hand, the resources are nearly unlimited. As as a radio station, people expect you to play and talk and ask and try things. There is no downside.

If nothing else, it will keep you young.

Site Suggestion: Yes.com

What would you expect a site called YES.COM to be about? Some kind of search site perhaps, where you ask a question and it finds an answer? Is it a place to propose marriage?

Actually, it is a site that I really like. It is a place where you can check on the songs being played on thousands of radio stations. Not Internet stations. These are real commercial stations. Most are in the US, but here are also others all over the world. Want to check out the stations in Johannesburg? No problem.

Or, as I just did, punch up a station, view the songs played during a couple of hours, and get a good feel for what they are doing. I just punched up WWDC, Washington, DC, and was able to contrast the music in midday against what they do at 8PM.

With a little effort, you can learn how many songs per hour they play, where the spot breaks are, and even how many minutes an hour of music they play. The site doesn’t give you run time for each song, but if the station is in your format, you’ll probably have that information close at hand.

In addition, you can quickly get a top 10 or a top 100 list of most played songs on any of the stations.

There is no link back to the station, but if you find something interesting, you can always Google it.

You can also buy any song played on iTunes, but I’m guessing that won’t be the interesting part for anybody reading this blog.

If you have a number of stations that you admire, this is a great way to check up on them. You can do it quickly and regularly.

Universal Printing and Radio Programmers

Universal Printing and MusicVISTA

It is hard for a busy programmer to keep up with all the computer jargon. But one thing you’ve probably heard about is the term: PDF.

It is worth understanding the value of this, as it is one of the innovations that help make the Internet such a successful communications medium.

Exchanging information is one of the most important and common things we do everyday. And on the Internet, the standard for printed information is called ‘PDF’ or Portable Document Format. It is owned by Adobe, but the reader is free to the world. And just to make sure we have lots of names to remember, they call the software Acrobat.

When I wrote a book about conducting music research, it was published as a PDF document, ensuring that anybody on the planet could read it, no matter what software they owned or what type of computer they used. (Let me know if you’d like a copy).

When I go to many business Web sites, I find that they have taken their product spec sheets and advertising materials like booklets and converted them to PDF files. Again, that allows anybody to read them.

Depending on your browser, it is possible that you might not have the free PDF reader installed. It is possible, but unlikely these days. Still, many Web sites include a link back to the Adobe Website where you can download the Acrobat PDF reader.

I think this is important enough in my own work that I own software to actually build PDF documents, as well as read them. Yes, that does cost. But below the full-featured Acrobat Professional, there are several less expensive alternatives that will work for any printing project you’re likely to encounter.

What does this have to do with MusicVISTA?

MusicVISTA is designed to help you analyze, understand and implement a library music test. Maybe you want to share some of that information with someone. Maybe you want a second opinion about something. If you do, then the new PDF feature will be helpful. When you create a report, you can print it, of course. But if you prefer, you can convert it to a genuine PDF document (click, then name your PDF file). That can be emailed to anybody, who will then be able to read it, even without MusicVISTA installed on their computer. Or they can print it and head for the coffee shop.

Finally, I should mention that PDF is not your only option. You can save any report as an RTF (rich text file) file, which means that formatting is intact, and it can be read by programs like Microsoft Word. You can also save the report as an EMF (enhanced metafile) file. Which is a funny way of saying it is a picture of a page.
The results don’t have to be ‘printed’ at all. You can export them as an Excel XLS file, a tab-delimited text file or a comma-delimited text file. These are standard data formats that can be read by all major spreadsheet and database programs.

Finally, there is a 20+ page AMT Executive Summary that I prepare for every music research project. This used to be a Word document. But today, it is converted to PDF format. It is viewable in any Internet browser, including the one that is embedded within the MusicVISTA software.