Overview

I expect the day will come when, for those who wish it, in home or office, the news of the world may be received direct from the mouth of the radio reporter in any quarter of the globe. With this there may be mechanical devices for permanent record when the set is unattended.

(John Reith, 1924, p. 113)

The broadcast radio scheduler s craft involves connecting together the two ends of the transmission chain: the way audiences listen and the content created by programme makers. It has evolved over time in response both to technological changes in the receiving equipment and social changes in the lifestyles and attitudes of the listeners. In the industrialized world at least, the reverberations from digitalization of the mass media industries are producing a new set of challenges, the implications of which we are only just beginning to comprehend.

In the very earliest days of radio, the most pressing need was to develop the skills of making programmes: creating content using whatever resources were to hand. The novelty of receiving anything through this magical device meant that the audience s critical expectations of what they heard were not sophisticated by today s standards. Listeners in the 1920s were in the position of giving their full concentration to the act of listening and they had far fewer competing distractions than today. Hence the focus was on the programme at the time rather than the flow of programmes across the (much shorter) broadcasting day. The above...