Connect Me to the World

7-9 May, 2012, Jakarta

Radio is everywhere. In cars, stores, the workplace, online- no matter where you turn you hear content that is being broadcast on FM waves. Why does this technology exist anymore? With mp3 players and the Internet, people can hear whatever they want, can’t they? Actually they can’t. Radio offers so much more than just music. Radio connects people.

Radio is special because it fills a basic human need. Knowing that there is a DJ on the other end of the spectrum, sending you signals- there’s something very comforting about it and radio offers you variety. Even someone stranded on a desert island would feel more connected if they could hear a broadcast.

Radio and online are both perceived as providing connection with people’s social communities but on different levels. Online operates more within people’s immediate social network, allowing them to stay in touch with friends and highly defined communities of interest (My World). Radio connects people with their wider network e.g. their local community or broader community of interest (My Wider World).

Young people have a lot to think about, but not enough outlets to speak about their challenges, to voice their concerns, or to share their triumphs and strategies for success. They need the opportunity to tell their own stories and to learn from the stories of others.

Radio production and broadcasts provide such a space. Radio connects young people to each other. It has the power to inform, educate, entertain, and to inspire a generation of future leaders.

It is easy to forget that often low-tech methods of communication can have a much greater reach and impact than the high-tech communications methods of the digital era. Less affluent or remotely located men and women or those in island countries simply do not have access to all the technologies that allow them access to global information, something that city dwellers take for granted.

Community radio is an excellent case in point. It can be accessible to far more people, the technology needed is far more cost-effective and widely available to the community than a 3G phone or a laptop connected to broadband. Radio can be a direct link for men and women to share information with others in their own communities. It can also help them build bridges to connect with those in other communities.

At the same time, there is a change happening to our radio. Digital radio provides many possibilities for new content applications together with a host of data based services and even graphics and still pictures – visual radio. And content is still the key driver for the success of digital broadcasting. This is applicable particularly to digital radio.  Content for digital radio can be quite different from the type of content that is broadcast on analogue radio.

Radio is getting more connected to the rest of the world. That FM radio in the mobile phone could connect to the internet to discover more about what it’s listening to. In short, there are a lot of radio sets hidden within connected devices.

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