wax&wires

LA’s Indie 103 Goes Web-Only “Effective Immediately”

This is crazy. I was just listening to this station last night, thrilled that there was still independent radio somewhere.

From Indie 103:

Indie 103.1 will cease broadcasting over this frequency effective immediately. Because of changes in the radio industry and the way radio audiences are measured, stations in this market are being forced to play too much Britney, Puffy and alternative music that is neither new nor cutting edge. Due to these challenges, Indie 103.1 was recently faced with only one option — to play the corporate radio game.

We have decided not to play that game any longer. Rather than changing the sound, spirit, and soul of what has made Indie 103.1 great Indie 103.1 will bid farewell to the terrestrial airwaves and take an alternative course.

This could only be done on the Internet, a place where rules do not apply and where new music thrives; be it grunge, punk, or alternative – simply put, only the best music.

Much like Indie 103, we used to have a great station in San Diego called 92.1, The Independent. They were great supporters of local music, and simply had good taste. One morning, San Diegans woke up to a commercial country station on 92.1. No announcement or warning, none of the DJs you remembered, just a complete overhaul, overnight.

I later heard that 92.1 was bought out in the dead of night, and the offer was just too good to refuse, so the indie owners caved. That was quite a few years ago, before internet radio was as common as it is now, leaving no outlet for 92.1 employees or fans.

If anyone can make the transition to net-only, 103.1 will. Deemed the nation’s best radio station in Rolling Stone, and the only station worthy enough to preview Prince’s new songs, Indie 103.1 has enough street-cred and followers to survive on the net.

It is frustrating that independent radio can’t seem to find a way to succeed via traditional radio though.

The glimmering hope in all of this is that it may just have pushed Indie 103.1 to take a course of action that the rest of the broadcast industry will be pushed to follow anyway. That translates to a momentous head start for the indie station. I say the rest of the industry may have to follow because as wireless broadband internet becomes more accessible from all locations, I strongly believe that people will begin using mobile devices to fetch their favorite content. Would you rather be stuck turning the FM dial to sift through a myriad of commercials in order to find any entertaining content, or hear your favorite artist or podcast anywhere at any time? Easy choice.

Satellite radio was a bust. AM/FM radio is quickly becoming outdated. Internet radio will fly.

The biggest question is, can Indie 103.1 generate enough revenue in a net-only medium to stay afloat until Internet radio becomes the norm?

This entry was posted on Friday, January 16th, 2009 at 12:36 am. It is filed under wax and tagged with indie, internet, la, radio, streaming. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.