Radio station 702’s recent relaunch is a desperate attempt to find a foothold in a crumbling legacy media landscape. It’s quixotic so long as the station holds dear outdated ideas about programming and the media consumer.
The legacy media landscape may be under stress, but talk radio has an advantage over music radio, which is battling advert-free streaming services for the attention of music lovers. Talk radio’s disadvantage is that its presenters cost more to feed than the digital programming software behind music radio. So, talk radio stations need the right people to attract listers.
702 believes these people need to be of a certain colour. In a recent interview in the Sunday Times, Primedia Broadcasting acting CEO Geraint Crwys-Williams admitted to failures at the station but waxed lyrical about the shifting racial profile of its presenters, as if racial diversity is
Abstract: There's a new threat we need to talk about: dead camels...
Dinner conversation is drying up. And the culprit? So few new topics. When we chat animatedly over our lamb cutlets we prefer a subject that can be expressed as a word or phrase so it can be neatly packaged and passed on to the person sitting next to us - "what do you think of this Zuma thing?" or "isn't crime getting out of control now?"
Abstract: Are TV news editors really qualified to determine what we watch?
On 20th October 2011 Muammar Gaddafi was captured by rebel soldiers, taunted, beaten and shot. His body was then publicly displayed and abused. You will remember it because it was shown on TV. It savaged some of the fundamental moral guidelines of broadcasting, but was considered justified for reasons that are dubious. It deserves re-examining now because South Africa is, unfortunately, being increasingly riddled with such 'Gaddafi' moments.
Shortly after the murder of Gaddafi I had the opportunity to challenge a professor of journalism and one of the UK's most respected authorities on issues around morality in the media why the local TV stations aired footage of his capture. I asked him who makes the decision whether or not I, as a viewer, should witness Gaddafi's obvious distress. He missed the broader philosophical