I’ve been told many times that radio is dead. My standard answer is that radio isn’t dead; it’s the people who control it who don’t register a pulse. Over the last two decades, corporate conglomerates and their pawns in government have systematically eviscerated our once vibrant, culturally diverse airwaves to create the smothering homogeny that is the pitiful listening state of radio today. This business logic of the good of the few outweighs the needs of the many pervades every aspect of our capitalist culture. As we have seen from the housing market bubble bust to the looming credit card crisis to the never-ending wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that you and I are going to have to pay for, enabling the tyranny of the rich has had dire consequences for those of us who aren’t corporate CEOs, military contractors or are having our homes featured on MTV cribs. We pay the price while they plan luxury vacations. This fascism is painfully evident on our radios. Outside of low power stations, we as a people, the rightful owners of the nation’s airwaves, are locked off our country’s bandwidths.

Then a little thing called the Internet happened. You can tell how liberating and essential this invention is to the average citizen by how hard all facets of the music industry and titans of industry are fighting against it. These bullies of commerce don’t want you to have viable listening alternatives. They want you to remain docile sheep.

The rise of Internet radio offers listeners a welcome reprieve from the one-size-fits-all mentality of corporate mandated play lists and genre specific formatting. The problem with Web streams is that you can only listen to them while you are on the computer. That’s about to change. Recently, Internet radios are being introduced to the marketplace that will allow consumers to listen to their favorite Web based broadcasts anywhere that has a Wi-Fi connection. While there are still kinks to be worked out in the new technology, in five years’ time (and possibly less) you’ll be able to tune in to a URL the same way you tune into a terrestrial radio station. Cell phones are already ahead of the game. Many carriers already allow customers to listen to Internet radio. Given these advancements, the days of corporate America’s tyrannical reign on the ear are mercifully coming to an end.

As I said before, the industry is doing everything in its power to maintain its stranglehold on our means of communication. It’s been over a year since the Copyright Control Board dramatically raised royalty rates for Webcasters to play music online by 300-1200 percent and Congress has yet to act on the board’s recommendations. In that time, deals have been struck between SoundExchange and Internet radio’s closest competitors – satellite and cable radio – that set their royalty rates at less than half of what Webcasters pay.

I bring this because I am throwing my hat into the Internet radio ring. Starting Monday, April 21, you will be able to listen (and download) the Bopst Show on rvanews.com. A new one-hour show will be available on the site every Monday (for 6 weeks at least) after that. Given present circumstances on our local radio dials, the Web is the only place where a show such as mine can exist.
And that’s why the big boys are trying to do away with it.