To Debut to Broadcast Entire “Talkers New York 2013” Live. TALKERS magazine announces the launch next week of “TalkersRadio” – a 24/7/365 streaming spoken-word internet radio station that will be available to listeners on the trade publication’s website, www.talkers.com and feature a unique brand of stationality that, as publisher Michael Harrison describes, “views the world through the lens of the talk media industry.”
TalkersRadio’s mission will be to serve as:
- a laboratory for interesting new concepts and talent in talk;
- a farm system to help develop deserving up-and-comers;
- a real-time stage for talent to audition for specific jobs and opportunities;
- a platform for “bridge shows” – a new device by which suddenly terminated AM/FM talk show hosts can do a series of final shows to say goodbye to their listeners and/or announce their upcoming plans within a radio show context;
- a vehicle for “orphan shows” – programs that do not conveniently fit into prevailing AM/FM station format categories;
- a showcase for new and adventurous programming concepts and ideas; and
- a medium to exclusively broadcast TALKERS magazine live events such as the annual convention next week and Talk Radio Day at the United Nations the following day.
TalkersRadio will also carry several “regularly scheduled” programs to give it, as Harrison describes, “the feel and consistency” of a real radio station. Some of these will be talk shows about the industry and others will just be talk shows about life in general. “The key,” according to Harrison, “is most of the programming will be the type that is unavailable elsewhere.” TalkersRadio has been in development for the past year and a half and is a joint project betweenTALKERS parent company Talk Media, Inc. and Westborough, Massachusetts-based firm Backbone Networks Corporation. It will feature a leading-edge concept in broadcasting technology developed by Backbone that makes it extremely convenient and affordable for talk show hosts to do a fully produced program – with live callers and guests – from an amazingly simple technical remote and portable set up.
According to Harrison, “Our partners at Backbone are technical wizards. Having them power this operation will give us the flexibility and means to really make a significant contribution to talk radio as both a cultural art form and a 21st century-rooted business — the ongoing mission of TALKERS magazine.” Further developments about TalkersRadio will be posted in the coming days and weeks.