Is Vocalo onto something good, or going down a dead end?

[Matt Fleeger]

I've been very interested in :Vocalo ever since the idea of it was first mentioned (through an essay from Torey Malatia) here at Current over 2 years ago.

The two articles about the station on the front page of the site are written from a fair and objective stance. Maybe a little too fair.

Personally, I really like the idea of :Vocalo. However, I think the product sounds terrible.

I don't want to go too far in making assumptions about reasons for this, but there are some trends that I believe are making this station sound so bad:

1. A conscious decision to hire staff with little or no radio experience or background.

2. An attempt to reach a diverse audience by pandering to them in an "LCD" manner.

3. “On-air” programming that is very difficult to listen to. The “worse-than-college-radio” stereotype is spot-on.

There are many interesting pieces on vocalo.org. However, much of the good material never makes it “On-air.” This means that if the user wants to access this content, they must dig on their own through the site.

Overall, I’m still rooting for :Vocalo. It’s one of the best ideas anyone has come up with in a while for public radio. I just wish it hadn’t been so poorly implemented to this point.

[Imre Fitos]

Personally I like Vocalo and I think they can succeed. If they vigilantly and radically minimize all their expenses.

[Mike Janssen]

One thing I think we have to keep in mind is that most people opining so far in print and online about Vocalo -- us, people in public media, writers for alt-weeklies -- are not the audience Vocalo's creators want to attract to the service. We're in the demo of people who already like and listen to traditional public radio, even if we bridle against what we hear as a staleness or lack of innovation. Vocalo's target listeners, on the other hand, are mostly younger, not white, and feel excluded by public radio's traditional sound. To them, "NPR" is a bad word.

So I wouldn't be surprised if Torey and Vocalo's creators don't put much stock in our opinions or even the opinions of their own staff. If they did, they'd risk running afoul of the mission they are pursuing. Only time will tell whether Vocalo will succeed in attracting the desired audience -- an audience that, so far, public radio has mostly failed to serve.

[Richard Paul]

Maybe it's just me, but I see a bias at Current in favor of anything that's "new." I've lately read articles about new "aps" (the web-based election map comes to mind) that read like press releases from the makers, with no indication of how many people are using these aps and whether they are living up to their promises. I also detect a willingness at Current to throw around terms ("widget" comes to mind) in a way that suggests to me, as a former editor, that the writer is taken in by newness; perhaps to the exclusion of comprehension. I put Current's embrace of Vocalo in this category. I haven't read anything about Vocalo in Current that suggests the level of hate for it that corresponds with the quotes and posts I read here

http://www.chicagoreader.com/features/stories/hottype/080717/

and many other places.

You say "I wouldn't be surprised if Torey and Vocalo's creators don't put much stock in our opinions or even the opinions of their own staff. If they did, they'd risk running afoul of the mission they are pursuing. Only time will tell whether Vocalo will succeed in attracting the desired audience -- an audience that, so far, public radio has mostly failed to serve." I think we are beyond that luxury now. With the cancellation of the Third Coast Festival and the cutbacks at WBEZ, Vocalo -- which may or may not be Public Radio's future -- is now damaging Public Radio's present. Perhaps Current has an article coming in its next issue that reflects this line of thinking. I hope so.

We are all struggling to find new ways to do what we do; to guess what will come next so that we can jump on the right train (ha, ha, he said "train," what an old coot!). I would welcome an acknowledgment of that fact in writing about "The New," especially in Current; which can still set the agenda in our insular industry.

[John Sutton]

What's success? How is it defined? The Grow the Audience project is using Arbitron data to define success. Should Vocalo be evaluated by the AQH, Cume Rating, or Share it receives outside of the tradional public radio audience? Is success breaking even financially? Even if there is no measurable audience? I think Mike is right, our opinions don't matter. But if Vocalo is to be positioned as part of public radio's future, which some of public radio's leaders are saying, then there has to be an objective measure of success. Vocalo can pick that measurement, but it has to stick by it. Otherwise, it's 1983 all over again for public radio.

[Susan Barrett Price]

As far as I’m concerned 99% of everything of the radio these days sucks. Same old oldies music, right-wing table-pounders, all-Jesus-all-the-time, and sports talk. I like public radio, but the humor is all whimsy and the music, all jazz (unless it's classical). It is totally predictable, clocked down to the second. As old business models are crumbling before our eyes, it’s great to see a group going out on the limb to try something new.

I do contribute my little 2-3 minute stories to Vocalo and enjoy the feedback and the airtime. I don't live in their broadcast area, but I figured out how to stream it into my iPhone. I listen when I can. Even though I'm 60 years old, I love it that I'm hearing fresh, young, authentic voices. It's fun. Why take ourselves so seriously? Can we only appreciate diverse voices when they are part of a professionally mediated "youth project" or "story corps" or "vox pop"? Must the adults always be in the room?

[Matt Fleeger]

Here's a long, looooong read of what unnamed persons in Chicago (and elsewhere) think of :Vocalo and the layoff situation at WBEZ:

http://blogs.chicagoreader.com/news-bites/2008/12/05/layoffs-wbez-v...

I count 147 replies to date. The favorable views of :Vocalo are in the sharp minority. In my town - the weekly alternative's audience is typically younger and more diverse - isn't that the audience :Vocalo is trying to reach? You can also search on the uber-hip Chicagoist site and find these articles on :Vocalo:

http://www.chicagoist.com/tags/vocalo

[Susan Barrett Price]

It's fascinating to track those responses. But from my own humble experience (as a now-burned-out reformer of institutions), the voices against change and for retaining the status quo are usually louder and more strident. They have history on their side -- the old way of doing things has really been perfected. Horse carriages were never so beautiful as they were when the auto industry was born. And think back on all the swooning done when Modernism first made its appearance. Innovators are so easily bullied into giving up because they have no data to show. They are flying by faith. No one knows yet if Vocalo is the leading edge of a grand breakthrough or just another dead end. So I'm sympathetic. Lots of flying machines crashed before the Wright brothers took off.

[Lori chung]

Susan proves a good point. She says she is 60 and active on Vocalo. If you go to Vocalo's web sit, the best stuff comes from people over 40. As the article states North Lawndale round table who are very old, 30 year project( about people working in the steel mills over 30 years), a guy named Spent Cattle 49 years old. You also see Highschool kids active. You just don't get much out of 18- 34.

Vocalo states they are for 18-34 year olds, and are willing to die to get that demographic. As it turns out, that age has very little or no interest in Vocalo. If they want to be around for long, they have to embrace any age group that wants to contribute user generated content, or listen to the broadcast. I also do hope they last, but don't see it happening until they loose this ultimate age focus.

[Susan Barrett Price]

Hmmmm.... very interesting point. I tend to think of 18-34s as superbusy starting careers and families... not much time for reflection and storytelling. And people go through phases of being so terrified of their own VOICES (yet what a lot of video crap they generate for youtube... wonder what that demographic is). Maybe vocalo should reach out to those mature ladies who flock to writing courses with their folders of memoir notes and family histories... those mature women who also want their hip-hop children to think they are cool, not stuffy. What an untapped population! [And they still know how to write checks, heh-heh.]

[Susan Barrett Price]

I know this doesn't get to the people who "don't listen to WBEZ" but I get more focused on the user-generated, interactive part plus the mediation of lively/diverse host/producers. Regular public radio is journalist turf and a professional's playground.

[jeanmari]

I'm curious and this seems like the place to ask the question.

Do you think that Vocalo should be funded with public radio dollars from WBEZ's listeners when WBEZ's listeners aren't told about it?

Because, hate it or love it, the quality of Vocalo isn't the crux of the matter here.

I'm all for innovation and so Susan's points are well taken. Of course, the Edsel and the 8 track tape were also hailed as innovations, so measures of success need to be established. Not all innovations are good. And there are some great ideas that fail because the execution is terrible.

But where is the line in this situation? Currently, Vocalo is being funded by monies obtained during WBEZ's pledge drives since they have gone far, far over their own budget. This is taking money away from WBEZ and the station is feeling the crunch in programming and people. But WBEZ listeners are not told that their pledges could go to Vocalo. And Vocalo is not required to do any fund raising of their own.

When would this be acceptable? And when would it not? What are the alternatives?

(And, I have been told that the 18-34 age group is WBEZ's strongest audience. As someone who is just over the far edge of that age group, I can tell you that it is a pretty prolific group in terms of creating media--through photography, blogging, etc. They have time AND energy. Just wanted to address that.)

[jeanmari]

Will no one from the public media community comment on how Vocalo is being funded?