Forces of Change

In a world with an ever-developing line of products and services, it is sometimes difficult to keep up with the times. Before even the age of television, society had to find other forms of entertainment. The radio industry, at one time, was the absolute highest technology money could buy. In fact, radio is what led to the invention of other industries including the telephone and electrical equipment industries. The roots of the radio industry travel back through history, and while not as traditionally popular as it once was, radio still has grown in even bigger ways as it adapts with the ever changing times.

Radio, like every invention, was not perfected overnight by a single individual. It was developed throughout continuous contributions of a multitude of innovators. The timeframe of the initial development of radio spans from roughly 1873 to about the 20th century. James Clerk Maxwell can be considered the first theorist in the world of radio, as he theorized “that a form of radiant energy must exist. (History of Radio) This is also known as electromagnetic energy and it is the base of how radio is able to be broadcasted. Heinrich Hertz, an inventor, was able to prove the validity of MaxwelI’s theory. Ironically, Hertz was not looking at Maxwell’s developments as enabling the communication industry, he actually “had followed up on his experiments with a theory of why they could not be used for communicating.” (Ross, B., Esposito, R., & Walter, 2006). In 1899, William Gugliermo Marconi, an Italian inventor and also a close accompany of Maxwell, demonstrated the action of transmitting and receiving morse code while on a ship at sea. However, once word got out about his discovery, competitors quickly emerged and people began developing morse code, later utilized by the military. It was not until later that radio began becoming a commercialized industry as we see it today.

In 1925, the Radio Corporation of America released statistics indicating that of the 19.2 percent of homes had radio receivers, yet the number of broadcast listeners was estimated at 20,000,000. Very much similar to television in the later era, families and other people would religiously sit and listen to a variety of radio broadcasts. There were different genres and types of broadcasts ranging from “Gunsmoke” to “Boston Blackie”. It became very popular for the news to be broadcasted over the radio waves, as well as emergency alerts. In 1933, Edwin H. Armstrong patented FM radio which is “a radio wave to reduce static and interference from electrical equipment and the atmosphere”. All of these elements combined is what allowed the radio to be a driving force in the media industry as the ages developed. (History of Radio)

Today, radio reaches more and an outstanding 90 percent of US people on a weekly basis which is more than roughly 68% of consumers older than twelve years old. When broken down, there are about 13,500 radio stations spanning across the US, and people always have an opportunity to “tune in”. Radio, however, is becoming more of a digital phenomenon as opposed to consumers actually using a radio through radio waves. With options such as SIRIUS XM, Pandora and Spotify, consumers are beginning to shift toward different exports of media. (History of Radio)

“[Radio] is the original form of ‘social media’ in that it allows you to connect with other people and ideas in your community or beyond, for free; this is what makes radio unique and the reason behind its longevity. Terrestrial radio is growing as well as the Internet and online radio