Decentralized discussions about public radio and new media

The more stations in the Public Radio Tuner, the better it gets. So we’ve been inviting public radio stations to submit their streams and promote the Tuner. You might understandably think that there’s one central way to do this. But no. Public radio was a decentralized system well before the Internet came around to show us what the word “decentralized” really meant. Of course, the Web has countless sites. But public radio has hundreds – that’s still a lot, given the cost of entry!  Once a non-commercial station gets the required government licenses and gets their transmitter up and running, they can become members of networks like NPR, PRI, and APM in order to purchase programming, while also producing their own work or licensing it from places like PRX.

Public radio is a loose confederation. Ever tried communicating with a loose confederation? Not so easy. That’s why we ask you to directly request your station’s stream. That’s also why we’re getting the message out in every public-radio-related blog and mailing list we can think of.

As the Tuner continues to develop, we also are refining and clarifying the purpose of the collaboration that developed it. A recurring conversation in the public radio system is how stations can work together while retaining their own unique identities. In short, we’re expert experimenters. For the long version, here are some thoughts.

CPB funded this collaboration as an experiment in sharing resources, knowledge, and harnessing a beneficial network effect for each station and the public radio system as a whole. Communication is an important part of this. Our only preset idea about the Tuner is that we want to bring public radio to mobile media listeners while promoting station’s unique identities. So station input will truly help shape future releases of the Tuner (next one scheduled for May 2009), as well as how we guide stations on submitting their streams and information.

The Tuner is not meant to supplant individual stations’ — nor the networks’ — mobile efforts. It will support them. We’ll be sharing code and other materials so public broadcasting entities can make their own versions of the app as well. That said, judging from the enthusiasm of the Tuner’s users — nearly all reviews are 4 or 5 stars since the January release! — there is a lot to be said for giving people one portal-style app with which to explore the system. As a former mobile user researcher, the top request of all I interviewed was ‘give me one place to get everything.’  As of Friday, Public Radio Tuner has had 133,213 downloads – that’s more than 30,000 a week.

Does an individual station get lost in this? Not necessarily. The Tuner retains the last station listened to, so it’s only one tap – the launch of the app – to get to a station. The Favorites and Nearby functions also get people to stations quickly. If we hear that stations want more visibility beyond the branded station pages, there are ways to work that in — for example, by putting logos in the directory list, or letting people set a “home” station that opens automatically when the app is launched. We can be creative in striking a balance between familiarity (show the stations I know and love) and discoverability (give me something new). Maybe we let people shake the iPhone and land on a random station (see the Urban Spoon app for an example). The next release will have a ‘What’s On Now’ program guide. If your station is airing what someone wants to hear at that moment, you might get a new listener.

Other plans for the next release include on-demand content (kind of like podcasts) for station and network programs. We’re also exploring the possibility of some sort of call to donate to individual stations.

No one knows yet if individual station apps can bring more listeners than one consolidated app, or if that’s even the goal. That’s another reason the collaborators embarked on this experiment. There has been talk of creating a template for a single-station app, but that of course depends on available resources and level of interest.

Public radio, as we all know, is a loose confederation. Standards generally don’t emerge on their own. This expresses in the app in differing stream formats, connection times, and even searchable metadata. The Tuner uses what the stations provide. Searching by format will usually get you results… but you won’t get every possible result because the metadata isn’t there. The Tuner is a great exercise for revealing these needs. We can then communicate back to stations on how to address them for an optimal mobile experience.

Again, we encourage everyone – stations as well as anyone using the Tuner -to contribute ideas so we can set this app apart from the other iPhone radio tuners. The content already does that. But so can public-radio-specific features… as can the message that there’s a huge and engaged public radio community working to make the app better with each new release. We’re scanning blogs and mailing lists as best we can, but the surest way to get your ideas heard is to post them at PublicRadioTuner.com. Here’s the link for general feedback and discussion: http://www.publicradiotuner.com/?page_id=165 And watch this blog for updates.