Good Morning Britain!

So... the UK’s most popular breakfast show is to get a new host. The widely predicted replacement of Terry Wogan from BBC Radio 2, with a certain Mr C Evans (of the same parish) isn’t exactly shocking in itself, however there are a couple of thoughts worth pondering today;

Moving younger... again!
There’s no doubt that Chris’ show will appeal to a younger demo than Terry’s. Just as there is more pressure on the “chilling” BBC to justify chasing younger audiences and generally being successful to excess (and to the detriment of commercial rivals) , they seem to stick two fingers up at the critics and announce a move that undeniably illustrates the point. Let’s not forget that in the last decade, Radio 2’s reach among 15-34 year olds has risen by 62%!

Certainly the show will turn off a section of the audience (mainly older Daily Mail readers!) who will still have the perception of Chris as a drunken buffoon who hangs out with Gazza all day and night. The truth lies a long way away from this, but Chris’s ‘youthful exuberance’ is an image he will retain for many years to come.

I believe the show will attract listeners from commercial radio... and probably more than it drives away from its existing base. Potential losers could be Absolute Radio, who despite having a very solid and listenable show with Christian O' Connell, may find that the offer of a big personality with a strong breakfast show track record, combined with a broader mix of music genres is a very tempting proposition for listeners. The somewhat ‘disenfranchised’ older listeners to the heritage ILR stations, (like Key 103 and Radio City) and newer regional offerings (like Real Radio) may also find that Radio 2 starts to pull at those all important 40+ demos.

Transition
After what will inevitably be a backlash from ‘middle-England’ / “disgusted from Tunbridge Wells” and a general outrage at the appointment of Chris to the role, this will die down (as it did shortly after Chris took over Drivetime) and people will get on with judging the show by what comes out of the speaker in the new year.

The differences in style between the current Breakfast Show and the Drivetime show on Radio 2 are vast. So the big question is... Will Chris adapt his style to the new time-slot to smooth the transition, or will he re-define the style of the ‘sound of breakfast’ on Radio 2? My view is he will do the latter, and shake up the show. Out go the ‘TOG’s’, and in will come a more bouncy, jaunty style of presentation complete with trademark ‘feelgood’ music beds and ensemble of characters. It’s a great formula that Chris has used repeatedly well throughout his radio career, and I don’t expect him to change now. Although Chris won’t go out of his way to alienate the loyal listeners to Wogan, I’m certain he won’t shy away from making the show his own within a pretty short space of time.

Salary
It won’t take long before questions are no doubt asked in the House of Commons as to “how much of licence fee payers money is being used to pay for the services of Mr Evans?” Will he be paid more than commercial radio could currently muster for a big breakfast show? Do BBC salaries distort the market? Well – I’m certain that if Mr Park and Co at Global really wanted a networked breakfast show and they felt Chris was the man for it, they would be able to find the money somewhere! (Mind you – can’t imagine Chris appearing on Heart somehow!) The cost of talent is a whole subject in itself, so I’ll save that one for another posting... OK?

Timing
I smiled a wry smile at the timing of the announcement this morning. It is no accident that Wogan chose to announce this on the very day that Chris Moyles becomes the longest serving Radio 1 Breakfast DJ in its history. Behind the smiles, the rivalry runs deep and there is a certain calculated timing in all this I feel! I’d love to have heard the phone calls between the Radio 1 and Radio 2 press offices today!

Chris
I’ve always been an admirer of Chris and his sheer devotion to radio as a medium. He consistently delivered some great radio shows on whatever station he’s been on.... OK... there were a few dodgy months at Virgin where the show (and Chris) “lost it” for a bit, but hey... haven’t we all had the occasional wobble?! He’s both a dream and a nightmare to work with, and certainly proves the point that ‘the best talent is the hardest to work with’. But he reminds me why I love working in radio.

In a period where traditional radio is coming under pressure from all sorts of digital offerings, (and providing you can set aside the politics of it all), it’s great news to have a real star like Chris heading up a flagship programme like the Radio 2 Breakfast Show.

I for one, will be tuned in.

"Parting is such sweet sorrow..."

Virgin Radio is no more. It ended on Friday 26th September with a fantastic on-air retrospective of the last 15 years, which brought back many memories to me as a listener, and even more as someone who worked there for 3 years.

Plenty of people are writing about the passing of this station (and let’s not forget the start of the new one) and it would be amiss of me not to add my own personal thoughts.

I joined in 1999 as Head of Music. Chris Evans was on the Breakfast Show, the ratings were good, and the money was pouring in. Remember the dot com bubble…? All those new start ups with sack loads of cash to blow on marketing? Well Virgin took more than its fare share of their money in exchange for providing plenty of fun sponsorships and promotions.

As a result of the combination of great audiences (over 4 million) and fantastic revenue, the ‘vibe’ the station had, was a brilliant one. Everyone worked hard to make the best sounding station possible, and then enjoyed their successes when the figures were good and the income was strong.

Therefore, I seem to remember a good amount of time was spent in the pub next door, which was called ‘The Midas Touch’. It kind of became a second home. You’d tip up in the morning, have some meetings… do some work… and then wait for the then Finance Director (he was the drinking ringleader!) to signal that it was time for a pint or 3 in the ‘The Midas Touch’.

Before you knew it, 2pm rolled round but often the view was taken that if people had done their work and everything was covered… why go back? If you were needed, everyone knew where you were!! So, many long afternoons were spent in the pub, discussing the radio station next door! In fact, serious consideration was given to running an extension phone line through the window, so we people could just put calls through to our fixed line in the pub. I don't think it ever got that far, but I did once hold a playlist meeting in The Midas Touch! Those were the days!!

The laissez-faire culture that existed was made easier by the fact that Chris, who now owned the station outright, was known to enjoy a drink or 2. So when you hear many people talk about the culture of the station being so great, they’re right. I witnessed it first hand, and it was probably the most fun I’ve ever had in radio. The culture was there from the start… driven by a ‘Branson’ view of “corporate culture” and it continued with Evans. To this day though, although pretty much all the faces are different than in my day, people still talk of the culture of the place being very special. I know that will live on and flourish under Absolute Radio.

A couple of stand out moments then for me; I remember when Chris was going through a particularly chatty (!) phase at breakfast, and not playing much music. I used to schedule 4… yes only 4 songs an hour... and had just brokered a deal with the lovely Dan McGrath, Chris’s producer, that he would try and play those 4 records an hour. Not a great 'ask' you’d think. I tuned in expectantly the next day and felt somewhat deflated as between 7am and 8am, we managed to play…. Not 4, not 3, not even 2… but one solitary record! And to an insult to injury, it wasn’t even one I’d scheduled!! Haha!

Another moment involving Chris at breakfast was when I’d become Deputy Programme Director. During the show, Dan McGrath had likened a certain females genitalia to a, and I quote, “badly packed kebab”. It seemed I had assumed the mantle of ‘Head of Complaints’ too, due to the calm way I could talk down mad listeners from suing us, and sure enough the complaints came thick and fast for this one. Looking back now, it was a surreal moment discussing with Dan why this perhaps wasn’t the most appropriate topic for breakfast radio and how he ‘really should know better!’. Fortunately we laugh about it now, and a friendship forged by arguing over ways of describing a "lady-garden" on the radio has manifested itself in us now playing together in a fantastic covers band... currently available for weddings, bah mitzvahs, Christmas parties etc!!

There are too many fun moments to mention. Giving away ‘1 Million Pounds’; creating the station’s first proper festival coverage at V2000; spending a couple of hours chatting to Paul McCartney and making a documentary with him; helping break this unknown band with a curly haired lead-singer. They were called ‘Coldplay’ I seem to remember; Doing The Breakfast Show live from the Guinness Brewery in Dublin… on St Patricks Day!etc etc… (Oh – and I met my fantastic wife there too!)

Programming-wise, Virgin had its fair share of highlights through the years, and some real broadcasting greats passed through the doors of One Golden Square. Listen back to the retrospective on Friday, I was reminded of the huge variety of ‘real’ music that has been played over the years… everything from Tommy Vance’s particular bag of solid rock tunes, Pete and Geoff's new music on their great evening show, sessions in The Zoo by some real legends, through to Gary Davis’ Late Night penchant for some really obscure 80’s treats!

So as the sun sets on an certain era in UK radio history, we say 'Goodbye Virgin Radio'. Saying farewell to Virgin is a little bit like waving off a good friend that's been a part of your life for a while. Without sounding too slushy about a radio station, it will always remind me of happy times and has secured a certain place in my heart. But at the same time, I'm excited about being introduced to a new friend… ‘Absolute Radio’. Let’s hope it brings as many happy moments as my old friend did.

"Absolute on Power Drive"

When you read the dictionary definition of the word 'absolute' you realise it's a pretty good word, as words go. It feels like a word you can rely on... a word you can trust... this word could be your friend. I find myself using the word quite a lot in my everyday speech. "Did you hear that breakfast show on your rival station this morning? It was an absolute disaster!!” Or... "Do you like my idea for a new morning show benchmark? I think it's absolute genius!" Things like that.

It also happens to be the new name for Virgin Radio as revealed to me this evening on an exciting, pan-European, satellite link-up live from London, from Clive Dickens, the head programming and operations honcho. (OK - he called my mobile).

I've had a little while to think about it while chomping away at my dinner, and here's the thing. They'll be a lot written about this over the next few weeks by an array of media commentators, brand experts, radio consultants and other interested parties. Some will like it. Some won't.

Some will say it's unoriginal or egotistical to name the consumer facing brand after the name of the company that will run the station. (For those who don't know, Absolute Radio is the name of the management company / owners / consultants that also run Jack FM in the UK / own FM 107.9 in Oxford etc) but I genuinely believe that if they knew they were going to call the thing 'Absolute' from day 1, they wouldn't have hired super-duper creative London agency Albion to help them develop the brand. And guess what... the listeners have never heard of a company called Absolute Radio, so there!! As far as listeners go, this will be a brand new brand.

So, tomorrow morning at 7:45am, the 'conversation' will begin where the current listeners to Virgin Radio will be introduced to their "new best-friend-word"... Absolute.

Like any new brand, I'm sure it will take a small while to get used to it. I remember when this mobile phone company in the 90's decided to name their company after a citrus fruit. And then this other mobile phone company in 2001 decided to name their brand after the vital ingredient in 'air'. Ahh... whatever happened to 'Lemon' and 'N2'.

The point is, after we got used to them, they just became another brand and we were de-sensitised to their 'newness' and they entered into our everyday vernacular. I'm sure the same will happen to 'Absolute'. (I'm just learning to say Bauer instead of EMAP mind you.)

Apparently, in their 'game for a name' that they just played, they wanted a real word (unlike Ocado or Skype), a word that could cross global boundaries (like Big or Fun), a single word (but not 'BigFun' as that would remind me of the band!), and something more importantly that could trademarked. Developing value in the name of your brand is essential in today's brand-ridden world. If you haven't got a strong, cross platform brand, you have nothing.

So, in 12 months time, we'll have forgotten all the fuss and will no doubt be enjoying shows called things like Absolute 80's and Absolute Classic Rock... and listening to the Absolute Weather. "It's absolutely pissing down with rain...” OK - we get the idea Nik.

Comedian Jasper Carrott once said "I'm amazed at radio DJ's these days. I'm firmly convinced that AM on my radio stand for Absolute Moron. I will not begin to tell you what FM stand for!" I'm certain that 'Absolute Radio' will deliver a fresh approach to radio not seen for quite some time in the UK, and the definitions of the word that mean "free from restriction or limitations" and "not comparative" are good omens that will have Jasper re-writing that particular routine. And without further ado, this re-branding gives me a great excuse to play this!!

Breaking News - Absolutely Fabulous!

Reporting live from a hotel room in Copenhagen I have some 'Breaking News'!

I've just been told the new name for Virgin Radio in the UK!

Are you ready... sitting down?

Here we go...

It's gonna be called...

"ABSOLUTE"

Let me compose some thoughts and get back to you!!

"What's Your Name Again?"

So Virgin Radio has been snapped up by Absolute Radio and their backers, The Times of India Group for £53.2 Million. First, congratulations to all the team at Absolute Radio International. Those who know them, or have worked with them, know what a first rate team they are both as owners and consultants. This particular UK national licence is safe in the hands of people who are passionate about radio. Good stuff.

The interesting thing about this deal is the decision to discontinue with the ‘Virgin Radio’ brand and launch a brand new radio brand. The BBC’s James Cridland has written a thoughtful article on his personal blog about the pros and cons of this decision, and comes to the conclusion that ditching the name is a good idea. Certainly, when I was Head of Music at Virgin in the late 90’s, the audience was over 4 Million and the Virgin brand had a lot more ‘media and consumer equity’ than it has now. So, with a war chest of £15 Million to re-launch this station… what’s this thing going to be called? How do you go about dreaming up a new name?

There are different tacks you can take. You can adopt the “Does What it Says on the Tin” approach, which delivers names like… Rock Radio, Classic FM, Planet Rock and The Jazz. You kind of know what you’re going to get even if you’d never listened to these before.

Then there’s the “Evokes a Mood” approach which gives us gems like… Smooth Radio, Easy, Chill, Beat and Vibe. This is more subtle, and yet nudges at expectation without being as direct. But you do have a hint at what you were going to get.

Then there’s the “Just Call It Something Cool” type of brand. For example… Kiss, Galaxy and Xfm. If you’d just touched down in the UK and had no prior knowledge of Galaxy, you’d have no reason to suspect it’s a Dance and RnB format aimed at under 30’s. But the name’s quite a good one nonetheless.

Of course the days of naming your station after a river are hopefully gone! Yes that’s right international readers… there are plenty of stations in the UK named after a local river!! As are the days of giving your station the Latin word for ‘undefeated’ which bore significance for William the Conqueror but isn’t that great as a radio brand. Come on down ‘Invicta FM’. We know who you are!

The only time I’ve been involved in naming a station was when I worked at Virgin Radio and we had been given a place on one of the London DAB multiplexes to fill with a ‘Soul and Disco’ station. The process involved the then Operations Director Andy Mollett saying “I’m going to toilet. When I come back I want you to have a name for this station”. And “The Groove” was born!! It has since died a death... but not, I believe, as a result of its name!

But the main point is this. In the long term, listeners won’t really care about what it’s called, as long as it delivers the content and music they want. Sure… some names are better than others, but we tend to only think a brand name is bad if the brand is bad. Bad brands make bad brand names. You can call a great brand whatever you want… people will still consume it.

Launching a new radio brand in the UK gives those who had lost faith with the old Virgin Radio a chance to reappraise the station under its new guise, and for those who love it as it is… it will be reinvented as perhaps something even better. I’ll bet you this though… It won’t be in Latin, named after a river, or decided upon during a toilet break!

RAJAR Qtr 1 2008 - "Story of The Blues"

Every set of listening figures tells a story beyond that of the immediate numbers, and the latest set of figures in the UK issued by RAJAR last week are no exception.

Actually, it’s a story with several tales to tell.

First, the main theme. The BBC is starting to pull seriously ahead of commercial radio, with almost 57% of listening verses Commercial radio’s 41%. Depending on which side of the fence you sit on, you can either see this as just rewards for investment in content and talent… or a blatant abuse of a privileged position designed to drive any commercial rivals into the ground… and stand on them hard! The BBC is long used to allegations of this sort, and to be fair, has to walk a delicate line of being successful… but not too successful, because “that’s just not fair”!

Perhaps it’s also tied into that peculiar British disease. We like success, but then when we see something becoming too successful, we cry foul, and denounce it as terribly unjust and really not very… well… ‘British’. Odd. To give a parallel example in the world of retail, I need only mention the word ‘Tesco’! ‘Nuff Said!

With Radio 1 back above 11 Million listeners and Radio 2 at 13.6 Million, there is no doubt that the BBC has made further inroads into the beleaguered commercial sector.

Virgin Radio’s resident number cruncher (and generally all round good-egg) Adam Bowie has written a very thoughtful piece on his personal blog about this topic and illustrated the theme with a rather good graph, which I've "borrowed". (I'll give it back whenever you want Adam!)

I think I need say no more on this topic, as the lines speak for themselves!

Another theme in this great RAJAR story is the tale of woe that continues for GCap. Capital has now slipped to 4th place in terms of reach with Kiss 100 now cume-ing an audience of 1.583 Million a week compared to Capital’s 1.563 Million.

Despite Kiss being a strong listen, I expect this to reverse itself over the remainder of the year as the ‘Denise’ effect kicks in. Word on the street is that the internal research is very strong for her and it’s only a matter of time before this translates to RAJAR. The fact of the matter is she’s a far bigger star than Johnny now. But how long can Capital hold on to her for? Hmmmm…

Elsewhere in GCap, Xfm’s worst nightmare has come true. Its market share is under 1% (at 0.9%) and its audience dropped a whopping 26% to just 379,000! (That “let’s get rid of all the DJ’s across the day” was a cracking idea wasn’t it!!) Is it time for that brand to be “humanely euthanized”? The boys at Global Radio certainly have a full ‘in-tray’ when they take over from the GCap!

And finally to a more subtle, yet highly significant tale: The number of people listening to some sort of digital radio continues to grow. Almost a third of the population (31.4%) listens to digital radio at least once a week, with DAB being the dominant technology. Sure… most of this is to analogue stations on digital, but it was great to see Planet Rock cume well the half million mark! Even The Jazz signed off with over 400,000 listeners. A bit too hasty to switch that one off? Over 27% of the UK’s population has a DAB radio, so it seems although the commercial sector is in turbulent times over the economics of DAB, the public still quite like it.

So, what’s the morale of our story? Simple really - invest in content! Easier when you have guaranteed funding I accept, but nonetheless, it seems to be a bit of a no-brainer really. And what is commercial radio’s answer to the current situation? Networking. Hmmmm – is this really investing in content? More on that to follow I think…

"Float...Float... Float On"

In a crowded radio market, it’s often new and different angles on classic ideas that grab the audience’s attention. What are the things that would make you say “Wow – that’s a fun idea”… or “That’s different”. Ultimately, what makes people notice something in a sea of available content?

Virgin Radio in the UK have just delivered one of those moments for me. I’m sure we all appreciate the classic idea of getting an artist to perform an ‘up close and personal’ gig to a select number of prize-winners. It’s tried and tested. How can you make it different? Well… varying the venue is the easiest way. Bring the artist to a listener’s house, take them to a local pub, go busking with them on the Subway. There are lots of variations.

The one which caught my eye this week was getting the great singer / songwriter Newton Faulkner to perform “Unplugged and Airborne”. Take the artist, some lucky winners, a DJ and a film crew up in a hot air balloon… and fly it over the Swiss Alps. “

“Wow – that’s fun idea!”

Its things like this that get radio stations noticed, talked about and add to the brand image. Think about what twist on a classic idea you could run on your station and have the confidence to make it happen. I’d love to hear of other great examples like this.

Well done Virgin Radio. A nice bit of attention grabbing radio. The session isn’t bad either! Take a look for yourself...

'Unplugged and Airborne' by Newton Faulkner

Global Dominance?

Richard Parks' appointment as Executive Director of the new Global Radio consortium is an interesting development for a number of reasons.

From a programming perspective, How will Magic 105.4 fare without him? How much of it's success was derived from the magic-dust that he sprinkled on the output... and how much was derived from the focused, dedicated and hard working team at Mappin House. (Let's remember that Graham Dene is moving over to Smooth Radio shortly too, so it may be hard for them to keep the momentum up losing a couple of key staff... despite being Number 1 in London!!).

Parky going over to the company that owns Heart, one of Magic's main competitors, will no doubt benefit Heart a great deal, with all the knowledge that Richard will bring with him!

As Global Radio sets out its stall, the reports of a deal to be done with Richard Branson to buy Virgin Radio back are also circulating.

Suddenly Global Radio has a potential group made up of the Heart, Galaxy and LBC branded stations, plus Virgin Radio too! And it's obviously very serious about it's ambition when it recruits someone whom many people see as the "Uber-Daddy" of Commercial Radio for a place on its board.

(By the way... Will the new Exective Director of Global Radio discuss the potential aquisition of Virgin Radio with the Virgin Radio Chief Executive? "Hello son.... Hello Dad!".)

The commercial radio consolidation game is still in full swing, and I predict there's a lot more to come too!

The Future of Radio...revealed!

So what is the 'Future of Radio' then?

That was the question posed to a panel of the finest minds at the cutting edge of broadcasting last week, as part of a Radio Academy sponsored session at the music industry conference 'London Calling'.

After persuading the technical guy that "Yes - it is pretty important that we have the sound working" (!) Chris Kimber, who is Managing Editor of BBC Audio and Music Interactive gave an excellent demonstration of what the BBC is currently very good. Namely, producing content that may start in the radio sphere... but morphs seamlessly onto other platforms.

Radio One's 'One Big Weekend', Glastonbury coverage and 6Music sessions were all paraded in front of a salivating audience who started to realise what their licence fee got spent on!

Chris believed that the future of radio would involve producing content that sat on lots of platforms and virtual places, like MySpace and Facebook... and that creating more engaging content with visuals was an integral part of how radio needed to progress.

James Cridland, the Director of Digital at Virgin Radio and soon to be the BBC's Head of Future Media and Technology, Audio and Music, tended to agree. He eloquently delivered a record 46 slides in 7 minutes explaining that the visual element of radio needed to develop further and that 'glanceability' to a screen whether online, on a mobile device, or a fixed point radio was essential to the future of the medium. Just displaying the frequency is no longer an option. Consumers want, expect and can deal with more visual content. James also delivered a passionate defence of FM radio, rubbishing suggestions by some sections of commercial radio that there should be an analogue switch off by 2015. FM works well and consumers still like it. Commercial radio are trying to tip the scales in their favour and using it as a ploy to gain the upper hand in the ratings battle. And he's got a point...!

Finally, the soothing tones of Tim Westergren, founder of Pandora took to the podium to tell us that online bespoke music services were the future. Well he would say that wouldn't he! He shared some great stats about the growth of Pandora and how he really viewed it as a 'music discovery' service, which helped disenfranchised music lovers in their late 20's and 30's still discover new bands and purchase products. He saw the movement of these services into the mobile environment as offering the consumer more choice, but did realise the distinction between a content rich, information led, 'DJ' radio station... and a wall to wall music offering. Yet it's all radio really. Well... just about!

I've listened more and more to Pandora recently and creating about a dozen custom stations (with my Marvin Gaye / Bananarama hybrid being a particular favourite!) and to me it is radio, but radio that is driven by your mood. If you want no interruptions, but a few musical surprises along the way, give it a go. It's like Magic without the DJ's... or ads... or repetition... or news... or weather... or Michael Bolton. Actually, it's nothing like Magic. Scrub that!

So what can we glean from staring into our crystal ball then? I believe traditional radio, web, TV and mobile will all converge (as they currently are) at a greater rate. The consumer will dictate what technologies they want and the responsibility of programmers worldwide will be keep pace with the technology and create cross platform content that works in these different arenas. A 2 tiered system will be created based on the level of content. Those who opt out of the content game will have a harder job to compete, but can do so providing they have a USP top their product (e.g. Last.fm / Pandora).

One final thing. If you can start a company that can do 'conference sound' that...

a) works
b) is audible to humans... and
c) doesn't feel like you're trying to conquer the north face of K2 by asking someone to connect it up

...then you'll probably be able to retire to a large island in the Caribbean by this time next year, as the demand for your services should be enormous! Good luck with it.

The Future of Radio!

So what is the “Future of Radio”?

We’ve got an explosion in non-liner radio. Podcasts, listen again and time-shifting listening are now really taking hold. Listening on multiple platforms is growing massively across the UK. Not only DAB, but mobile environments, games consoles, IM applications. You name it, there’s probably a radio station broadcasting on it. And we haven’t even mentioned satellite radio, and the wealth of other platforms that a global perspective brings us!

If we had a crystal ball, what would the world of radio look like in 10 years time? Would changes in technology drive the programming sector? Would the conventional mass-market format still work? Would people still have their trusty old clock radio to wake them up in the morning?

Fortunately there’s a chance to pick the brains of some very informed individuals on this topic coming up soon!

‘London Calling’ is the UK’s largest music industry conference that gathers attendance from worldwide delegates and addresses a whole host of hot topics from the explosion of user generated content sites and what they mean for the music industry, through to the changes in marketing music to a variety of generations.

Naturally, the record and radio industries are so closely connected that putting a radio session on at this conference was a bit of a no brainer. So under the patronage of The Radio Academy (as it was Trevor Dann’s excellent idea!), I’ll be chairing a session called ‘The Future of Radio’.

My guests will be…

James Cridland, Director of New Media at Virgin Radio (and soon to be head of Future Media and Technology for BBC Audio and Music)

Chris Kimber, Managing Editor of BBC Audio and Music Interactive,

Tim Westergren, Founder of Pandora - the US based online streaming portal for customisable radio stations.

All 3 have a great vantage point to help us work out the radio roadmap, and give us an insight as to where we are all heading.

If you want more details of the conference, head to http://www.londoncalling2007.com/

If you can’t be there, I’ll report back on what our future-watchers have to say, and how we can all act now to ensure that we’re ahead of the game when it comes to shaping the radio of the future.