The Infinite Dial

I will be sending along a number of thoughts from spending a few days in the wonderful city of Barcelona where I was on two panels at the NAB Europe Radio Show.

The first is the marked general optimism and upbeat attitude as compared to the NAB Radio Show in Charlotte a few weeks ago. European Radio is not without its challenges, but it clearly is not suffering the general malaise that has gotten so much ink in the States.

Secondly, there was continued talk on the theme of American irrelevance when it comes to innovation in radio. It was mentioned on some panels, and several others talked about how they used to fly over to the states or listen to US online streams to learn what was new, and they don't feel they have to do so any longer. While American non-radio companies like Google, Pandora, Facebook, MySpace, and eBay all came up regularly, few are looking to America for radio-centric innovation. A surprising number of Europeans are now coming to me asking for help in cracking the US market for their products or services, something almost unthinkable in the past.

Finally, it's so exciting to see the response to all the changes in media be: "Gee we should do MORE research!" Obviously this is a self-serving perception, but important nonetheless. Europe is working to manage and control the Infinite Dial, instead of having it work upon them. They are making change, and indeed there is much that American broadcasters can learn from them.