Do You Still Hear Bloopers?
Written Apr. 22, 2008 by Sean Ross in Content with 3 Comments
I'm listening to a radio station in Toronto at the moment. The afternoon host just tried to hand it off to the traffic woman, but stopped himself mid-sentence, saying, "Ah, she needs a moment or two. We'll just give her that moment." He padded for a second or two longer, then the traffic report began. It was deftly handled, but no less noticeable for that.
First I thought, "No matter how little air-talent talk these days or how much voice-tracking you do, there's still not much you can do if the traffic person isn't ready."
Then I wondered, how often in this less foreground era of radio do we still hear mistakes? Not just traffic reports that aren't ready but news at the top of the hour that hasn't been well backtimed? Or more serious bloopers? And how many of those on-air bloopers these days are tied to automation systems?
So I'm curious about how often you hear mistakes these days. And in a spirit of "praise in public, humiliate in private (or at least anonymity)," please don't use this as an opportunity to single out rival stations, personalities by name.
Reader Comments
Your 2¢, in chronological order — add your comment below.
I make plenty of mistakes. Most are unintentional.
I don't really worry too much about it. I'd rather be real and human and make mistakes on the air, than be a voicetracked DJ-O-Matic.
I'd attribute the majority of the mistakes/dead air in the last ten years or so to PC automation left unattended.
While things have significantly improved with better hardware, software and backup systems, there's still times when you can tune across the AM broadcast dial late at night and hear some station from somewhere running network test audio for hours nonstop.
Making a mistake is a good way to show your voicetracks are more human.
Nevertheless, today I heard a (live) station with several audio sources - all voice - at the same time for maybe 5 seconds. The PD still in my blood is straining to run to the batphone...