The sound of no hands clapping

At the risk of being called a Geezer Boomer (see Thursday's News-Gazette letters to the editor) it is now time to permanently turn off the 'new' 92.5 -- the "Chief,' which replaced Oldies 92.5

To steal someone's old quote, there's no there there.

I understand what they're trying to do, to appeal to a slightly younger demographic, the one that lives with their earpods and iPods plugged in at all times. You know, those folks desperately trying to look trendy while attempting to block out a world that either offends them or that they cannot relate to. (Or a world that cannot relate to them).

From Wired News:

In the tradition-strangled world of commercial radio, all eyes are on that rarest of breeds: a bold new idea.
From Seattle and San Diego to Baltimore and Buffalo, more than a dozen big-city radio stations have converted to a format known as Jack-FM over the past two months.
Boasting they're "like an iPod on shuffle," the new stations typically dump their disc jockeys in favor of huge song playlists that mimic a well-stocked portable music player.
The Jack format, which is already spawning imitators, could be a key to FM's survival as an alternative to satellite radio, internet radio and MP3 players.
"There's an understanding (in radio) that you have some new competitors and you need to be more creative," said radio consultant Dave Van Dyke, former general manager of L.A.'s KCBS-FM, which just flipped to the Jack format.

I understand that radio, facing the threat of satellite radio, has moved into a change/upgrade-or-die mode, but is this the answer? Is it the answer for an oldies station which played the oldies of the '50s, '60s and '70s to now start playing the oldies of the '80s?

Again from Wired:

"The appeal is that it reminds you of music you might have forgotten existed," said Scott McKenzie, editor in chief of Billboard Radio Monitor. "We all have our libraries of music sitting in our iPods. You recognize a song and say, 'I love that.'"

Then again, when was the last time a '50s-'60s-'70s music fan heard an '80s song and said 'I love that."? There may be reason we've forgotten some of that music existed.

This may work for some stations, but I think the Cheeef may have moved in a rather counterproductive direction. (Not to mention the station's obnoxious name 'Chief,' which is bound to offend at least half its potential listeners, but that's another rant altogether)

Again from Wired:

Some observers are skeptical of the mix-and-match approach. "It assumes that someone will set their dial to one radio station, leave it there all day and be thrilled with the randomness," said Darrel Goodin, general manager of several Jefferson-Pilot stations in San Diego. "It runs extremely counter to the way the radio has been successful over the years. Maybe someone has found a way to defy gravity, but the odds are against it."

Even my wife has reprogrammed her car's radio buttons. 92.5 is gone, replaced by 99.1, which is better, but not by much.

And so it goes