Think-through: the local radio station.

When I was in advertising, because I was a one-man company without brainstorming partners, I used my writing to develop strategy for clients. I called it a "line of thinking." I sat down with my yellow pad--later my computer--and just started from square one, laying out the premises, history, situation--and this activity stimulated ideas. I still use the method, now mainly for fiction. But, I can't stop thinking about the other forms of communication I've lived through and still feel connected with--commercial persuasion and media, especially radio. So, I'm starting a new series of posts today, about programming a local radio station in the post-digital era.

With all the popular flavors of music covered by on-air stations, satellite radio companies, and Web and cellphone services--not to mention the ability to assemble your personal music collection and program it with previously unimagined convenience--what's left for the on-air broadcaster with a government-licensed commercial radio station to do to gather an audience of sufficient size and buying power to produce a profit from advertising?

That's the question I'm addressing in these posts--at a time when everything in the established American radio business is under immediate structural pressure. My purpose: to think through whether a truly local news and talk radio station can be quickly developed, and whether it has a chance to produce a profit in today's radio. I'll start with the next post, since this is about as big a chunk as I think the traffic will bear. Stay tuned.