I don't know what to think right now.

I mean, okay, I just spent the week at Podcast Movement, and on the surface, not much has changed. There was a good crowd (although I think the nail polish convention that moved into the hotel as we wrapped things up has more people), there was no shortage of enthusiastic folks talking up the medium, there were the same rosy projections of gold at the end of the rainbow, which is, apparently, in 2021 or 2022...

Something wasn't quite right. I don't know what it was, but it felt a little off. In fact, it felt like (CUE OMINOUS MUSIC)... a radio convention.

That might be a reaction to so many radio people having discovered podcasting and the convention. Or it might be the way some panels and presentations are starting to have that we've-been-here-before feel, with an undercurrent of that feeling you get when you don't really know what's coming next but you're praying it comes soon, whatever it brings. I can't really tell what's giving me that reaction, but I know I wasn't the only one who noticed it. The overwhelming earnestness -- that's a word, isn't it? -- of the podcast attendees, combined with the opportunism of folks here to latch onto what might be a gold mine someday, or to climb into what seems like a convenient lifeboat while their previous business is listing in the water, gave me an uneasy feeling. (And the lack of representation from some categories -- where are all the comedy podcasts? Why was there little about political podcasts in a politically-charged era? -- was striking.)

Things change. Used to be that talk radio, and radio in general, were a simple matter. There were ways to do the job right, and there were things that were just taken as gospel. You followed the formatics, you included all the elements, you met expectations. Simple. One ...

Thursday morning, the newspaper didn't get delivered. It was 2 pm by the time I realized it hadn't been delivered. I subscribe to the paper edition of the Los Angeles Times not because I want the actual physical paper, but because taking the hard copy was, when we first ...

Stay in your lane. Give them more of what they came for. Superserve the P1s. The sentiment gets phrased in several ways, but they all mean essentially the same thing. Give 'em what they want, and they want the same, reliable thing all the time. Be McDonald's, or, ...

Iím not going to pile on the New York Times article about the overabundance of podcasts. You probably at least saw people tweeting or posting on Facebook about it. You donít need me to tell you that focusing on some deluded podcaster who thought that all she had to do ...

It's interesting that in 2019, the marketing industry has caught on to something radio in general and talk radio in particular has known for decades. It's also interesting to see that the radio industry has managed to... (audible sigh). Right now, there's a convention ...

It's been interesting to see the reaction from radio people on social media to the sale of WABC/New York, and by "interesting" I mean that I'm not seeing the one thing I really hoped to see. The reactions were what I expected. Some people focused on the (low) price and ...

It's hard to hear people tell you all is well when you know all isn't exactly well. It's harder when you know things can be different. This year's Conclave Learning Conference was a fine event with great people, and it's always worth spending a couple of days on the ...

The radio industry has always reacted to competition with a combination of defiance and fear. There's nothing wrong with what WE do, the industry seems to be collectively saying. The other guys -- they're deficient, not what people want, cheating, evil. All we need to do ...

The problem isn't that people don't want radio content, or podcasting content, or audio content, national or local, good or bad. It's not that there isn't a hunger for the shows and features and music you create. In fact, for creative people, this is the Golden Age, the ...