About the Audience

About the Audience 

http://www.makingthemodernworld.org.uk/stories/the_rise_of_consumerism/02.ST.03/?scene=5

            A medium of media is nothing without an audience. The very definition of media is something that communicates with “with people widely”. (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/media). It stands to reason then that without the broad public support it received, without the wide audience that adopted it, radio would not exist as it does today, if it existed at all.

            Every medium is shaped by its audience. Radio is no different. The way the audience shapes the media is simple: They pay attention to it, but only if it meets their needs. People do not just mindlessly consume media for the sake of media; no people listened to radio because it carried the things they enjoyed. It provided a mix of escapism and news that people in the 1920’s, the early days of radio, had not previously had and it provided these things within the comforts of their own homes to boot. But of course radio broadcasters were not, nor could they afford to be, altruistic. They, along with the Ad agencies, recognized the popularity of radio as a means by which to turn a profit; a profit dependent on one thing: The audience’s attention.

            Advertising is the way radio survives in America, and became the main means for satisfying the aforementioned profit motive in 1922. This is when the AT&T station WEAF broadcasted the first commercial (Media Now). That practice, advertisers paying broadcasters to have their ads imbedded into programs, has since become the main money making technique employed by radio and later television. This is the interaction between broadcasters, advertisers, and the all important audience that has given radio the shape it has today, and the reason why the audience is the most important force in radio’s history.