News – Page 19 – John Vincent

Will podcasts overtake broadcast radio? It’s a question that it had not occurred to me to ask until yesterday. I’ve not been a first adopter as far as listening to podcasts. There’s a routine of turning the radio on at a particular time of day to listen to news and current affairs. That daily routine or habit is born of a long tradition. The morning starts with the Today programme on BBC Radio 4.

Yes, I’m way behind the curve. Go into any large electrical shop, one wall of the warehouse will be filled with earpieces and headphones of every size and shape. The variety of choices is staggering. Sit on bus, train, or aeroplane and more than half the people around will be turned into a source of audio entertainment. Music and talk fight for our attention.

This is great for the streamers and downloaders but lossy for conversation. Sitting next to an interesting person on a long flight is a wonderful way of occupying a couple of hours. That opportunity is diminishing as people become absorbed in digital media. Even the smallest of phones has become a multipurpose entertainment system.

I have long been converted to digital media. FM radio is great for its universality but with less DAB[1] blind spots its life expectancy must be diminishing. Broadcast digital radio based on DAB is a global standard even though coverage is not universal. The digital avalanche is pushing aside any remaining analogue system that populate our lives. Ironically, as far as physical media ownership is concerned, vinyl and even cassettes are resurgent. On the airwaves it’s less likely there will be a romance for analogue radio.

Why have I reassessed the virtues of podcasts? Yesterday, I listened to The Rest Is Politics[2]. This podcast has a conversational style. It’s Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart talking about current affairs in the UK. Two people who have had their moment in the political sun but remain articulate and inquisitive. They have something to say and it’s engaging.

This is a bridge to podcasts from broadcast radio in that the material is up to date. The topics discussed are wrapped around the news. It’s refreshing too. The ability of the two to argue in a calm and collected manner is unusual in our time. So much of the presentation of news is calamitous and confrontational that this is shocking to say.

Maybe that’s the role of podcasts. Reflection and analysis can be better done in slow time. Broadcast radio news is crammed full of snippets of what’s happening. It would loose its edge if it drifted off into too much extended investigations or drawn-out interviews. So, what may seem like competition between two forms of readily accessible media should be viewed as complementary. Both can fulfil an appealing role in the digital media landscape.

[1] https://www.worlddab.org/

[2] https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-rest-is-politics/id1611374685

It’s accurate to say that there will be a new leader of the British Conservative Party. An announcement is expected and there’s not much that can derail it. Up and down the country the members of that national political party have been twiddling their thumbs and marking ballot papers.

To me, the use of the word “new” is to stretch the langauage to the far corners of the Earth. The politician backed by the pollsters to win is nowhere new on the block. What’s fascinating is the two Conservative candidates for Prime Minister (PM) have been spending their time rubbishing the record of the last decade of Conservative Government. Funny old world.

In a huff from starting blocks The Mail, newspaper, has screamed unfair because mainstream comedians love to mock the likely winner of the Conservative Party’s selection process. This is mega silly. Mocking our leaders is as British a British can be. Recently, I was in the V&A[1] in London and I couldn’t resist a look at the Spitting Image puppet of Margaret Thatcher. If anything, in terms of mockery, we are getting tame. Leaders of any poltical creed are fair game in a free country. Often the humour is spiky but shines a light on a truth. That is so much better than the playground bickering and insults that are gaining momentum among the far right and left.

Exercising a lot of media pundits is the question of when there will be a General Election. The drop-dead date is at the end of 2024. So, practically, any new British PM will have not much more than 18 months to make a big show, and shift the agenda onto their ground. Tough task at any time.

Today’s News suggest that this natural poltical ambition will be incalculably difficult to deliver. The phrase: “Events, my dear boy, events,” comes to mind. When asked what troubles a PM, former PM Harold Macmillan[2] answered with those words. It’s become a popular quotation and so true.

Past events linger. Banking crisis, Brexit, COVID and international tensions. Current events are unpredictable. War, Energy prices, Inflation and the Climate Crisis. Future events often give no notice. None of these are small. All we need now is another troublesome Icelandic Volcano to burst into life.

By the way, Harold Macmillan was the target of wonderfully sharp mockery by a cartoonist called Vicky[3]. His works are a good study of British culture and society in the 1950s – 60s. I expect poltical cartoonists will be happy to mark this day as a good one for future work.

POST 1: There are 605 days until the 2nd May 2024, a likely date for the next General Election. The last one was 998 days ago, meaning we are 62% of the way through the current Parliament. Much can happen.

POST 2: It is my great pleasure to introduce the new British PM Liz Truss ‘Cheese Speech’ to Conservative Party Conference 2014 – video Dailymotion

[1] https://www.helenacurrycreative.co.uk/margaret-thatcher

[2] British Conservative politician who was Prime Minister from 1957 to 1963.

[3] https://www.cartoons.ac.uk/cartoonist-biographies/u-v/VictorWeisz_Vicky.html