Your emergency broadcaster - except when you're not

Hello, I'm James Cridland, the radio futurologist, and this is Radio Land, my international radio trends newsletter for February 1st, 2026.

This podcast is sponsored by RSS.com, which is a great podcast host. It's got an API, so you can get stuff from your playout system directly into a podcast from that, and it's also got a thing called paid, so you can get advertising in there and pay its way as well. It's very good. RSS.com is where to go.

Your emergency broadcaster, you've probably heard that line from Radio, and I've often been a little bit nervous about shouting that radio works during emergencies when others don't.

In Portugal, on January 28th, one of the big masks in the country operated by RDP was brought down by strong winds as part of Storm Christian, which pulled 8 FM radio stations off the air.

And after a grass fire near Bendigo, large parts of regional Victoria in Australia lost access to all of their television and most of their radio stations after two transmission sites caught fire, impacting as many as 356,000 people.

Yes, there are temporary lower power transmitters now in place, but when we say that broadcast radio is resilient in emergencies, what we often mean is that broadcast radio has one point of failure better than others perhaps, but all you need is that one thing to fail.

Multi-platform radio, which is certainly the future, mitigates this somewhat.

US broadcaster Odyssey has removed a number of third party podcasts from its radio and podcast app, including my own pod news weekly review, which used to be there.

And Odyssey spokesperson told pod news, which also run, we've removed a number of lower engagement third party podcasts from the app, which accounted for a very small percentage of overall listening, but I'm sure they weren't talking about my show.

Last week, it was reported that the ABC in Australia were coming off the I heart app in the country.

From what I can work out, the ABC in Australia is also coming off tune in shortly, according to a conversation I've seen between ABC audience support and a listener.

They're coming off I heart and tune in quotes for quite a variety of reasons around fault resolution and licensing, according to the ABC audience support person.

In my book, if your radio broadcaster that everyone in Australia pays for, I don't have a choice where my tax goes, then you should be available for your audience in as many ways possible.

Consistency isn't the ABC's strong point, it'll remain on radio app apparently.

Anyway, it's a disappointing decision and it'll harm the ABC's audience figures long term.

One of the biggest Brisbane radio names has been reportedly forced away from the ABC, after apparently falling foul of its conflict of interest policy.

Spencer Houseon is said to have been offered a permanent slot on Saturday breakfast for ABC radio Brisbane, but only if he walked away from one of his Monday to Friday jobs as a media trainer for a company called Media Potential.

A potential workaround that he'd not interview anyone he'd trained wasn't deemed acceptable.

Consistency isn't the ABC's strong point, Chanel Vella, who co-hosts ABC Radio Melbourne's Monday to Friday breakfast show, hardly a part-time gig, is also a media trainer.

Anyway, it's a disappointing decision and it'll harm the ABC's audience figures long term.

The SEC has told broadcasters that if a candidate appears on a talk programme, they may require equal time for other candidates.

According to media lawyer David Oxenford, the ruling appears to target shows like Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert.

Now, Letterman was once broadcast on the radio, I don't know whether these shows still are these days, but it's certainly something to be aware of for radio as well.

I don't know how Stern has also got a mention in terms of this too.

Independent podcasts are set to be available on the Radio France app after a new agreement with the PIA, the syndicate of independent audio producers.

Podcast inclusion is based on a principle of dual consent studios put forward their programmes, while Radio France retains full editorial control over the final selection.

It's worth comparing Radio France's strategy with the BBC. The BBC puts selected first-run shows onto BBC sounds before anyone else, but the archive is available to all.

Radio France puts all of its stuff everywhere, but keeps the archive within the Radio France app only.

One difference, here's another one, the BBC either commissions shows for itself or very occasionally licenses old versions of third-party shows for BBC sounds.

Radio France seems to have a different view here as well, although I don't see anything in the PIA's press release talking about money or about advertising, so I wonder how that works.

The former breakfast show on Hot 97 in New York, Ebro in the Morning, has popped up as one of the first signings for Creator X, who call themselves a creator-led advertising exchange.

It's run by a man called Matty Stout, who is managing director of Creator X, who I've been pronouncing Matty Stout for the last three years, but when I chatted to him a podcast a couple of weeks ago, it turns out it's Matty Stout.

So now I know. Anyway, he said in a statement that creators today are operating as independent media companies.

Our role is to provide the infrastructure and advertising access that allows talent to scale without sacrificing control.

Now, Radio might have quite a talent drain on its hands if it doesn't get this sort of thing right.

It's clearly behind many of I Heart's savvy deals to work with their talent on networks like The Black Effect Podcast Network,

which is a joint venture between Shulamay and The God, a syndicated radio host and I Heart Media itself.

Hot 97, on the other hand, is owned by Media Co, which appears to be doing nothing in the podcast space,

at all, apart from a show called Ebro in the Morning, which they obviously no longer have.

Not quite sure what's going to go on there, then.

And at last, a radio group that can organize a piss-up in a brewery.

The big commercial radio talk stations in Australia, 2GB Sydney and 3AW Melbourne,

as well as the less big, 4BC Brisbane and 6PR Perth, have been sold by nine networks to a man called Arthur Laundy,

for 56 million Australian, that's 39 million US dollars.

Mr. Laundy owns 40 pubs in New South Wales, and he's worth $1.75 billion.

So these radio stations cost him small change, he presumably found behind the polky machines.

Seven years ago, nine took control of the group at a valuation of $275 million.

Hmm, 56 million, not really a massive return, is it?

Now most media commentators have talked about whether this is an acquisition that will pass the pub test,

but I won't be doing that.

Talk has much more of a future, the music intensive radio in my book anyway,

though these are old stations with old audiences.

And those stations used to stream live video online throughout all of their programming,

but those streams were yanked a few weeks ago for some reason, which is weird.

And thank you, ARN, for listening.

I mentioned last week that the I Heart Radio app said that Gold Brisbane played just great hits,

although the radio stations said that they played just great songs.

Anyway, it's been about two hours for this newsletters ago last week,

before that was hastily changed.

So thank you for listening, ARN, and I'm loving what you're doing with Gold, I should just clarify.

Now, where am I speaking next?

I am speaking in New Delhi, in India, in early February, although I'm doing that on a video.

I'd like to go to Delhi, actually, it'd be fun.

I've never been.

But video, it will be.

I will be talking about the future of radio and AI's part in it.

I'm busy trying to work out how excited I want to be with the video,

and whether or not I go anywhere, or whether I just sit here at my desk and record it,

like everybody is going to guess that I will.

So who knows?

Looking forward to that, also looking forward to Radio Day's Europe in Riga in Latvia.

One of the things I'm doing, Peter, is I'm doing a talk about the future.

A talk about the future of audio being people powered very much looking forward to that.

It's the end of the first day.

I highly recommend that you come.

It will be excellent, and also, you know, mark the speech very highly in the survey that will be kind of you.

Now, thank you for that, and very much looking forward to being there.

And very much looking forward to learning anything else that I might be doing for Radio Day's Europe.

It's a fantastic event, and you should be going to Radio Day's Europe.com is where you can buy tickets.

And I'll also be talking at the podcast show in London in May.

I'm doing a keynote, doing a podcast weekly review live.

The show's so good that Odyssey got rid of it.

And various other things as well.

That is a great show too, and you should definitely be there.

And thank you to our many supporters, including Studio with two eyes,

including Wade Kingsley, the often right, often wrong creative coach,

Rupert Brun, from Brun Audio Consulting Limited, and Clyde Broadcast, the Radio People.

Thank you to you for your support.

Also, thank you to Greg Strassel, Sam Phelps, Richard Hilsen, Emma Gibbs, Jocelyn Abbey,

and James Masterton for being regular supporters.

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You'll find me on Masterton at James at BNE.Social.

And my website has more details about who I am, what I do, and whether I can help you further.

And until next time, keep listening.