Radio News Station is the Thing of the Past

KUHF, which was the classical music station in Houston for 24 years, killed its own broadcasting by narrowing the reception to 1/10 of what it was before. Instead, they broadcast news-only around the clock.

Sorry, but radio news are so much the thing of the past! This is counterproductive. Whatever the station's and its host, the University of Houston, goal is, they are achieving the opposite.

Today, people get their news from the Internet in larger numbers than from the radio, in proportion of 61% to 54%. The online news share only grows, with Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Bing adding to their news audience. Recently LinkedIn has introduced its news source - after a spectacular IPO. That is not even mentioning the RSS readers, which allow people to selectively track their news sources. What does the prominence of a news-only station tells you? That its owners are out of touch with reality and are insisting on it.

Meanwhile, the classical radio station provided not only the music. It told us about all cultural life in Houston. How many concerts did we visit because Elaine Kennedy mentioned them! I remember my favorite harpsichordist Andreas Staier coming to Rice, quite unexpectedly, and we went to hear the legend.

The American Festival for the Arts, which our six kids attended for ten years, reached its audience with concert announcements through KUHF. Now this is all lost. The Houston Symphony has lost its promotions on KUHF. The switching of the stations is a blow against all arts. This is politics gaining prominence at the expense of the beauty, and it should not happen. Society and politicians should cherish and nurture art, because art has no one else to do it. Flowers must be planted, they cannot fight with business models.

What should you do? Write to all friends, art lovers, influential people, and politicians that you know. Join the Facebook group. Get in touch! Everyone who fights for art will see beauty.

Image source: Telegraph UK