Analysis: transformations in the technologies we use to listen to radio are breathing new life into a medium which has existed for well over a century
Last year the Report of the Future of Media Commission in Ireland found that FM radio remains the most popular way for people to listen to audio in Ireland. While radio's popularity persists, the report noted too that there has been a surge in people listening to audio online. Podcasts, as well as on-demand music streaming services such as Spotify, are increasingly competing with traditional radio for our listening time. However, these trends in listening habits are not yet the harbinger for radio’s demise. Instead transformations in the technologies we use to listen to radio are breathing new life into a medium which has existed for well over a century.
Radio’s history as a broadcasting medium is entangled with its regulation by government. In Ireland, the legislation that introduced 2RN in 1926 ensured that legally only the government could operate radio stations. Preceding this, there was much debate in government about the technology, and particularly the type of programming to be broadcast.
As Richard Pine notes in his history of Irish radio, these debates were underlined by a deep suspicion of foreign programming, leading one TD at the time to glibly remark "I am afraid that if we are to have wireless established on an exclusively Irish-Ireland basis, the result will be 'Danny Boy' four times a week, with variations by way of camouflage."
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From RTÉ Archives, Douglas Hyde, founder of the Gaelic League and later first President of Ireland, officially opens 2RN on 1 January 1926 with an address in Irish
As people tinkered with transmitters, new independent radio stations emerged with gusto in the 1970s, illegally occupying different bands of the airwaves. The debates of the 1920s on what the role of radio should be was answered differently depending on these new pirate broadcasters. Not only did they reject the state broadcaster’s conservative music programming, but as radio scholars John Walsh and Brian Greene note, "they created their own communities of listeners ranging from teenage fans of pop music bored with RTÉ, to punks and Goths with their own niche stations, to rural devotees of the growing country music scene."
Other broadcasters like North Dublin Community Radio explored the potential of radio to draw attention to social issues in their area. They also used radio as a tool for community development by giving space to amateur broadcasters to create programming. In Galway, Radio Pirate Women explored the power of the technology to give local women a space to freely on issues that they were facing within their daily life.
Such broadcasting activity highlighted the flexibility of radio: It could be grounded in people’s community and exist at a local level, in a manner that RTÉ could not. The regulation of independent broadcasters in 1989 under new government legislation began the slow crackdown of these independent radio stations, with the regulation only initially recognising the more commercial pirate radio broadcasters, ignoring the breath of radio activity at the time.
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From RTÉ Archives, the growth in pirate radio is forcing a rethink on who should be allowed to operate a radio station in Ireland (episode of 'Frontline' broadcast on 2 October 1978)
If radio as a medium came to be moulded by the constant game of cat and mouse between regulation and piracy, the internet in the 1990s heralded an era of communicative freedom. In Ireland, some broadcasters, such as Dublin’s Power FM, a pivotal station in Dublin’s electronic dance music scene, became one of the first pirate radio stations in Ireland to trial broadcasting online in 1998, intermittently broadcasting on the net amidst the uncertainty of FM broadcasting.
Initially broadcasting over the internet was not without its challenges; poor internet connections, lagging streams, limited audiences. In the early 1990s the internet was a text based medium, and transmitting audio required overcoming these limitations in order to bring sound to the net. However, the experiments of early net radio enthusiasts have become synonymous with how we understand radio today. Whether thats in the popularity of podcasts, the ease of listening back, or how you can 'tune in’ to your favourite radio station anywhere in the world.
While radio broadcasting originally involved a radio signal being transmitted over the air from a single source in one continuous transmission, streaming, instead, involves your device searching through the network and requesting a singular stream. Streaming is considered a one-to-one experience, as you retain control over the stream, something you cannot do with a live broadcast. In this way, the technological affordances of the internet make it a more individualised medium in comparison to the experience of sharing time in traditional analogue media.
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From RTÉ Radio 1's Morning Ireland, Dr Mark O'Brien from DCU's School of Communications discusses the donation of the Irish Pirate Radio Archive to the university
In the past decade there has been a proliferation of independent internet native radio broadcasters. As the requirements for setting up an internet radio station are basic; a computer, streaming software, inputs for the audio source and a website, new small scale stations can be set up cheaply, and operate without the need of a broadcasting license.
Inspired by independent radio broadcasting of the past, stations such as Dublin Digital Radio in Ireland (of which I’m a founding member) use internet radio as a means to rejuvenate underground music scenes by providing a space for people to encounter new music that might not be traditionally considered "radio friendly". These stations have been noted to be increasingly important to grassroots cultural exchange and maintaining the vibrancy of cultural scenes during the pandemic. They also draw from community radio’s participatory ethos to create spaces of sociability, turning the individualism of streaming on its head.
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From RTÉ Archives, North Connemara Community Radio calls for greater priority to setting up small neighbourhood radio stations (broadcast 19 December, 1989)
While it is important to emphasise that these broadcasting efforts are small in scale, they highlight a continuation of a tradition within independent radio broadcasting that seeks to use radio as a means to facilitate community, conversations and social values that are sidelined in larger media organisations. As our experience of the internet becomes dominated by major global platforms such as Google, Facebook and Spotify, small DIY internet radio stations can also offer an alternative experience of the internet.
As radio scholar Rosemary Day argues, community radio’s alternative broadcasting traditions point us toward different understandings of how our media can function. Community broadcasters are governed by their social commitments, their facilitation of social diversity and cultural vibrancy, and their understanding of their audience, not as consumers, or sources of data but as potential broadcasters. The Report of the Future of Media Commission recommends the establishment of community hubs around Ireland. Perhaps internet radio stations, as a media form well suited to micro broadcasting endeavours, would be well placed to form part of this initiative.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ
