Setting of the day was almost perfect: studio was looking good, atmosphere was enthusiastic and all the connections worked well. In its totality the day went through quite well after few technical problems in the beginning. Unfortunately the live stream started about 15 minutes late, from the middle of Jonas Woost’s presentation. But we got the liva stream up and running and everything is available also as video clips in this site.
What comes to content of the day, we had interesting presentations and a good, long panel discussion:
Andrew Dubber visited us live from London via Skype and he pointed out that we should be talking about public broadcaster media, not just TV or Radio anymore. Fragmentation is ongoing process and for radio it could be a new opportunity. Tomi Saarinen from radio station YleX also claimed that Internet kills only those who stick to old business models. Radio has been a mass media but now it need to cater to smallest audiences as well.
There was a lot of discussion about owning music. Jonas Woost from Last.fm said that ownership of music is fading: labels need to concentrate more on marketing and distribution while music itself needs new kind of finance system. Timo Kuoppamäki from EMI Finland reminded that Internet could also be distribution from hell and it’s going to be totally different after five years. Big issues to deal with, but how much can we as a public broadcaster effect on this evolution?
Our Swiss guests Dominik Born and Samuel Vuillermoz have found nice way to integrate old school radio to new features on the Internet. They presented their innovative cube player and new “mx3 linear” that gives everybody a change to be radio dj. Just make playlist on the internet with a cool user interface and listen to it from the traditional radio.
Riku Vassinen made a point about opinion leaders in music: do we need traditional radio or have the peers and bloggers replaced radio in this sense? Many of the panelists defended the traditional music journalism: alongside with playlists and peers we need music criticism, backgrounds and deep insights to music. That could be quite natural role for a public broadcaster to have and develop.
Radio will survive this evolution if it finds new ways to reach people. Tomi Saarinen from YleX pointed out that public broadcasting wants to have impact on culture. Radio must give people want they want and even more.
Dominik Born said that a public broadcaster should have the balls to make things differently. I definitely agree. Public broadcaster could and should take care of minorities, develop music journalism and also take care of development of radio and internet as media. Jonas Woost suggested that public broadcaster should concentrate on less known music, new talents and niche audiences and let the commercial channels deal with hit music. Saarinen pointed out, that they need hits also to reach more people. Vappu Verronen from Finnish copyrights organization Teosto was asking also how to find the balance between hit music and bringing out less known music.
Alex Nieminen concluded the discussion well: we need depth and public broadcaster could make cooperation with companies like Last.fm to built new smart tools and platforms. That could help us to find the week signals that could be used on radio.
This is only bits and pieces from very interesting day, worth watching.
Arttu Silvast made an excellent job with Twitter and the feed worked out very well, it’s all in here.
Total amount of tweets were more than 100 and here's a few of them:
"jussimantysaari Embracing the Music: m3x.ch guys pretty much answered the question I asked. How yle, internet and music can work together #yle_music"
"T_A_R What is quality music journalism really? Stories? Are good music critics storytellers? #yle_music"
"laurila @dubber makes point about servicing tiny niches as public service. I agree, why Yle should compete with mainstream channels? #yle_music"
"tuija #yle_music @alexnieminen The most important thing: music's role in people's lives and entertainment that can be enjoyed passively."
"suomela #yle_music I share Mikko Siren's concerns about quality in music journalism vs. net - I want to think that quality rises to top in all forms"
"laurila I do not need experts to teach me about my music taste - I need my friends and social surrounding to do that and experience it #yle_music"
"jussimantysaari #yle_music Thank you panelists. Insightful opinions for us on the commercial side of music media also."
"arttuextra RT @dubber: Enjoyed that panel session for #yle_music - good range of views and interesting ideas. Great moderator too. Thanks all... :)"
We also had channel in Qaiku open in Finnish, thanks to Suvi Korhonen and Tiina Raekallio:
Our great host of the day was Nicklas Wanke. Without his professionalism this day wouldn’t be as successful as it was.
Discussion will be continued and we’ll develop this new concept of getting people together. Again: thank you all!