Digital Radio

Digital television has been available to the public since 2001, and it's time to broaden the horizons and include radio: humble, yet prolific.

I'm currently researching for a story on what digital radio will mean to the Australian news and entertainment media landscape, and more importantly, what it will mean to you and I: what will it offer us?

Minister for Communications, Senator Helen Coonan reckons we'll have digital radio by 2009, but is this soon enough?

Now I love radio, some day I want to work in radio, I think radio is an amazing medium that has survived the test of time and succeeded in the face of intense competition. But let's face it, radio needs a boost. The internet will eventually equal radio's share in the advertising market and people will be downloading the latest music faster than radio stations can change CDs.

Radio needs to go digital as soon as the technology is available so it can say to the liseners `Hey, look what we can give you that no other medium can. Sure, you can download music but we've got this` "This" is digital technology. "This" is live, high quality programmes you can listen to anywhere. "This" is a new angle of opportunity that will stop radio's body bag being zipped up.

There's plenty more to say, and I'll do a bit of a wrap-up of my story after I write it. I'm heading in to the Triple M and 4BC studios next week for work experience, so hopefully I'll get some juicy information there.

In the mean time, feel free to comment. Do you think radio will die without digital? Are you ready to adapt to digital radio technology... has anyone already adapted? Can you wait till 2009 before it's widely available? Has your dog been itching itself more than usual...?

Time to go.