The Australian reported yesterday that ABC’s Radio National is achieving great success with its podcast trials with 75,000 downloads achieved last week.
The report in today’s Australian, pg 22, asks the question “Who said no one listens to Radio National?” Hmmm, people downloading are probably selecting the downloads based on content rather than being connected with Radio National. Their content is referenced widely outside the ABC website. Check it our here, and here, here, here and here. I could go on. There are many non ABC references.
The viral nature of news and information on the internet gets information on subjects to those interests in faster ways and reaching ever widening circles.
Trawling through the many links for ABC Radio podcasts is a lesson in itself in the power of the Internet and the power of the blog and other online content publishing forms which give people voices.
This is the lesson for the Australian and other mainstream media outlets. It is the interactivity, immediacy and personal connect with news and information on the internet which makes it attractive to some than the traditional mainstream media offerings.
This, to me, is the story. The ABC with no real promotional budget has a runaway hit on its hands.
Footnote: as a newsagent I keep asking myself how I can connect with this. It’s hard living in a purely bricks and mortar space. But there must be a way to build relevance for the newsagent channel in the ways consumers connect with new media.