SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) -- Radio industry magazine Radio & Records shuttered its doors Friday, another victim of the nation’s ailing economy during a time when the printed word is waning and other newspaper and print publications continue to fold shop.
Ben Fong-Torres, a long-time rock journalist and former editor at Rolling Stone who also writes a radio column for the San Francisco Chronicle, says he wasn’t surprised by Nielsen Co.’s decision to close the 36-year-old magazine. He says the focus of the publication--the radio industry--has changed as well.
“Fifteen, 20 years, when R&R was at it’s peak, there were more and more programmers and DJs and music people interested in the continuing evolution of radio programming.”
KCBS’ Patti Reising reports
As big companies continued to swallow up smaller stations, Fong-Torres says fewer people actually programmed the radio stations and cut R &R's subscription base. But the bigger issue, he says, is the health of the radio biz itself.
“It may be too late for over-the-air [and] on-the-air terrestrial commercial radio.”
Nowadays, he says there's too much competition from satellite and Internet radio, as well as MP3's and ipods, and even social networking sites seem-- all of which seem to occupy people's time.
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