We listen to music almost daily, or at least, we hear it while going throughout our day. Whether someone else is listening to music or we are listening to it intentionally, there is music all around us. The go-to way for listening to music and discovering new and popular music was the radio.
Radio waves have been around for the entirety of the universe’s existence, most likely, but we found out about them in 1867 when James Clerk Maxwell had a breakthrough. Today, when we say the radio, we mean the device and the music and voices coming out of the device.
Are radios going to die, are they a thing of the past? Let us take a look.
Streaming is More Popular
To get things out of the way, almost immediately, streaming is more popular than listening to the radio, and that much anybody will be able to tell you. Spotify, YouTube, Deezer, Tidal, and many other applications that stream music, not to mention online radios, have become the new norm for listening to music. Hard media like CDs and vinyl records have taken a couple of steps back on the popularity list.
Radios as devices are still used, but most people like to stream music because then they choose the playlists and the songs that are being played.
Streaming Radio Music
Is listening to a radio station the same as streaming the radio station? Well, yes and no. You are listening to the same broadcast, but in a different way, entirely. While radio stations transmit data through radio waves, streaming music is done through the internet, with digital to analog conversion. Radio stations can be picked up by a metal rod and a receiver.
Listening to the radio is still a thing, even though most people have turned to radio streams because they own devices that can stream music. Today’s phones don’t have headphone jacks (most flagship phones don’t, except Sony) and as such, they don’t have an antenna, where the headphones are used as an antenna.
Listening to the Radio
When you get into a car and you don’t want to connect your phone, you instead turn to the radio. Listening to the radio has a nostalgic feel about it, particularly when the 80s hits start blasting on the stereo. Radio stations also have news reports and often, interviews with musicians and other personalities.
Some radio stations don’t have anything to do with music, but are podcast stations or talk shows, as they are called.
What Does the Future Hold?
Like most things in life that are circular, the love for radios will most likely come sooner or later. We typically go in circles when it comes to trends and using technology, so there is no doubt that the radio as we know it, will make a return at some point.
Radio stations are still operating just fine and most of them have adapted to broadcast using radio waves, as well as the internet. While radios were created in the past, they are still present and being listened to.