Written by Vincent Sneed
The radio environment is neither audiovisual, nor music-only: it is an environment where sound-only usage / non-retail prevails. Most of the listening is still done by reception of broadcast content. As this mode of transmission enables one-to-many access and can influence listeners, national governments grant licences to radios allowing them to broadcast. However, radios have to be present on a multitude of platforms to maintain their audience.
The internet as we know it now was born in 1995… when radio was already everywhere, mobile, simple-to-use, interactive, cost-efficient and complimentary. 80% of the EU population on average listens to radio for at least 2 or 3 hours per day, as shown by national audience measurement (as regularly shown by data collected with AER national Members). For commercial radio, these features are all based on a very efficient model: terrestrial broadcasting of free-to-air programmes, funded (almost) 100% by advertising.
