2024 has been a dramatic year of challenges, struggles, and measurable change for the nation, society, and our industry of talk radio and its related talk media platforms. The chart below lists the 10 most talked about Stories, Topics and People discussed on talk shows across the nation during the past 12-month period, according to the research of TALKERS. In some cases, we listed several items as ties – because words and ideas overlap and can be somewhat amorphous. None of these items were discussed in a vacuum – the connections between individual stories and news items, the topics they cover, and the people who played them out under the spotlight of public scrutiny are quite entangled to say the least. We describe some issues as “umbrella” topics. Talk radio also has its own unique focus on populist issues that in many cases tend to be ignored by what is still referred to as the so-called “mainstream” or “legacy” media. (For example, talk radio was talking about public concern over immigration reform long before Donald Trump came down that elevator in 2015.) Conversely, there are “big” stories out there that talk radio leaves to the other media and generally ignores.
The biggest and most challenging issues that faced our industry in 2024 include:
• Economics of the radio industry. Major companies continued to be preoccupied with financial survival and avoiding bankruptcy. The growing preponderance of layoffs across the industry has been heartbreaking. Can radio afford to do “radio” properly anymore? Talk radio is subject to the trials and tribulations of the larger radio industry. It is not surrounded by a protective force field simply because it is important.
• Podcasting and fractionalization. The burgeoning digital media ecosystem originally spawned and inspired by talk radio’s lead now competes with the medium within the interactive marketplace of ideas. Talk radio faces the challenge of expanding to a multi-platform environment such as podcasting and video streaming while maintaining its special “radio” esthetic.
• Growing demographic divide. With each passing year, radio (including talk) faces increasing abandonment by the new crop of adults who weren’t born until after 9/11. This is a major problem no matter what pro-radio research and ratings company report.
• Freedom of speech. Not only was the First Amendment under assault in 2024 from a number of directions – but so was an increasing level of intolerance by corporate America and the disease of hyper-wokeness for controversy. Not good.
• AM radio in the dashboard. The stated intention of the automobile manufacturers to eliminate AM radios from the dashboards of new vehicles is at least five years premature and extremely damaging to the interests of the public as well as the radio industry. The problem is compounded by the damage this issue does to radio’s image in the business world simply by having it being a much-discussed issue at all.
Let’s resolve to overcome some of these challenges in 2025. Happy New Year!