Strengthening radio communities with digital media

Prof Christo DohertyHead of Digital Arts

University of the Witwatersrand

Community building

• New media/Digital media?• Christian broadcasting in a good position to

harness digital for community building

• This is because, regardless of whether we talk about cellphones, emails or websites, all digital communications media are about networks = communities

Tim Berners-Lee

• “The dream behind the Web is of a common information space in which we communicate by sharing information.”

• “The whole spread of the Web happened not because of a decision and a mandate from any authority, but because a whole bunch of people across the 'Net picked it up and brought up Web clients and servers, it actually happened.”

Lessons from a networked world

• Unlike radio & TV which are systems set-up to make a profit, the Net has come into being in a more spontaneous way

• Broadcasters who understand the centrality of connections and communities to the Net will find a way forward

The prehistory of the Net – there once were portals

Yahoo – when a portal wasn’t enough

Google – the significance of SEARCH

The consequence of search – disaggregation of content

Napster and the rise of Peer2Peer networks

• Napster connected people to each other’s music, bypassing the distribution systems of the record companies

• It’s not just about free content – it’s about escaping the control of gatekeepers – and people making their own connections to each other and content

Facebook etc connecting people to people

• Once people are connecting to each other, the Net is born

• Facebook etc stimulates the proliferation of networks

• Web 2.0/Social Networks are the realisation of the Net as imagined by Tim Berners-Lee

The Net as the network of connections

• The Net is about maintaining connections

• Not about content (even UGC) but about staying connected

• Connection is life

No medium has been entirely replaced by new medium, but the old media are transformed by the arrival of the new medium

Radio is personal medium conducive to community building

Using digital media effectively

• Enhance relationship with listeners through digital channels

• Use networked digital media to build audience investment in your programming

• Recognise that networked media are social media = feedback loop

In Africa: what digital media are available to the radio broadcaster?

– Internet usage in Africa has grown faster than in any other region

– Internet users in Africa are estimated to total 32.8 million, a rise of 625% since 2000

The reality of internet use in Africa

Internet penetration in Africa

Internet penetration varies from country to country in Africa

– But when we examine internet penetration in Africa on a country by country basis there are great differences.

Malawi - 0.9%

Seycelles - 37%

Know your telecoms context

– At present Internet technology is concentrated in a handful of countries

– Any strategy for using digital media must take into account the particular situation of the country or region in Africa that is being addressed

Mobile phone penetration

• Mobile phone penetration in Africa is over 50%

Malawi Telecoms

South African Telecoms

Botswana Telecoms

Nigeria Telecoms

Kenya Telecoms

Cell phones offer new medium

• The increase in the use of cell phones across Africa has been phenomenal

• In Africa, people use more than one cell phone and different networks to get complete coverage

• SMS messaging is used as a new medium for communication and interactivity

• Cell phones offer viral marketing opportunities to spread “word of mouth” messages faster than ever before

• “Arguably SMS and the mobile phone hold the answer to Africa’s digital neglect, of bringing African civil society fully into the new world.” - Dubussi Tande, Cameroonian blogger and activist at the Highway Africa Conference, Rhodes University, 2009

Experiment to find channels which work for your station

Low cost of digital media, invites experimentation to craft custom solutions for your building connections with your radio community

Classic FM

Thank you

christo.doherty@wits.ac.za