Full Transcript for Talking Vision 846 Week Beginning 24th August 2026

his career, and he said the movement from wire recorders to tape recorders and then the satellite. And I thought, wow, okay, there's a guy with perspective. So now skipping forward to my generation, you look back and the internationalization of radio and media via satellite, I think started a trend that we've continued today. I guess you would say what I could see now, the biggest change that sits behind every other change we're currently experiencing is the digitization of radio. And so digital radio. But the fact that once radio output was digital, it could be streamed on the internet and then metadata could be added and then vision could be added, text could be added. That digitization of radio has allowed all the things that we now see. Really the fact that I can be standing here in a green field in Western Sydney talking to you on a little earbud with my phone in my pocket, and you're recording it on a digital recorder for replay, for streaming online, for hosting on your website. There some of the unbelievable things that who would have thought we would be doing 20 years ago? 00:04:53 S3: Yeah. And absolutely. And by the time this is edited, it's going to sound like you're in the room with me, right? 00:04:57 S4: Indeed. 00:04:58 S3: So what hasn't changed in this time, Steve? What do you think remains the same? 00:05:02 S4: Oh, that's a great question because the technology is just about delivery. Really. I think the heart of radio is the people and the connection. Um, the elements of particularly live radio and the 1 to 1 relationship, an audio relationship. Now I know that we're adding vision. I know that Kyle Sandilands is doing amazing things with a live radio show streamed first week that it's been on air. But at the heart of radio is audio. You can add everything you like, but the primary sense is audio and radio. People build out from that and add lots of things. But when you think about audio and you think about that 1 to 1 personal connection, then it's words and images and thoughts and arguments and interviews that can go straight from your ears to the brain without the interruption of looking at something. Of forming opinions by the way somebody looks. Or by seeing signs of protesters holding up a message. All those visual aspects are taken out. And I think you get more to the heart of the issue and to the heart of the person when you hear them speak on radio without the distraction of images. 00:06:32 S3: Yeah, absolutely. It's certainly a very personal medium. When you've finished leading the radio faculty at Aftrs in 2009, like you touched on this, all the different types of platforms that are now available. Did you ever imagine that we would get to this place so quickly where radio, podcasting, streaming video, social media all connected? 00:06:53 S4: Yes and no. At Aftrs, we were seeing that convergence of skills. It became very evident that the old segmentations of the person with the perfect voice as a radio announcer and

the producer behind the scenes, and the newsreader and the journalist and reporter, the editor, all of those were separate skills. And you kind of had to specialise because the technology limited you. But as I saw the change of technology, I could see that those skills would converge. And people who could do a lot of all those skills all in one person would have the advantage. And that's certainly what's happened. 00:07:37 S3: I can hear it in your voice, Steve, that you're not bored of the industry yet. What still gets you excited? 00:07:41 S4: Oh, I used to ask that question of John Laws. I used to say, what was the the best program you've ever done? And he would say tomorrow's show. 00:07:50 S3: Yeah. Right. 00:07:51 S4: And it was that joy of chase, of the connection, of being part of what was happening on the day. And I feel that that's what gets me excited that we're in the middle of inventing the next generation of radio. It's really, you know, radio has been around for a bit over a hundred years. It's going to be around for another hundred, but it won't be the same. None of us really know what it's going to be like, especially the technology. But what I find exciting is we're right in the eye of the storm right now. We can't see it. We can't see what's next. But what I really enjoy is tracking the trends and trying to pinpoint, okay, this is a trend that's a game changer here. That's going to make a difference. And instead of the straight path we're on, it's going to change or we're going to go a slightly different path and then something else will happen that'll take radio on a slightly different path again. So what I love at the moment is trying to understand and capture and then explain those things that are making a difference to the future, while everyone's doing their daily radio show and doing a great job. They're not going to change the future, but a piece of technology or a new trend or a new way of audiences consuming us, they're the little things that are going to all add up and change the future. 00:09:20 S3: Given our radio is now presented across so many different platforms Dab+ apps, podcasts, websites, smart devices, is it is it still right to call it radio or are we just playing out, you know, in the business of audio now? 00:09:31 S4: Look, I think in reality, we are in the business of audio, and we should understand that it's a much bigger business than just the idea of radio broadcast transmitter. So when we talk about the business in our own industry, I don't have any objection to using the word audio because it goes beyond broadcast. It encompasses podcasts and all those other things. But the one thing I would say is the word radio is very powerful. It has a market position that's been built by in 100 years of history. And even though we might recognize that the business has changed and we might describe it as audio, we have to hang on to that powerful word radio because others are trying to steal it. I have on my Spotify, I can get any singer a sequence of songs by any singer I request, and they'll call it Merle Haggard Radio, say, because it's not radio, it's a playlist of songs by Merle Haggard, and it puts in other country artists that it thinks I might like. Yeah, it's not radio. Not at all. It's a playlist. But they want to try and own that word radio because it's a powerful marketing word, so we should never give that up. We own radio, and broadcast radio is the core of that value that we own and however we deliver it, we should still own the word radio. 00:10:59 S3: Absolutely. Speaking of which, Vision Australia Radio recently switched off am broadcasting across our capital cities in an effort to provide a more financially sustainable service. Obviously, we're a not for profit community radio network. So, you know, money's always a concern, a bit of a greater emphasis on Dab+ and streaming and apps and so forth. Do you see us as an early adopter of a digital first approach, or as a part of a broader transition that's already underway in the sector? 00:11:29 S4: I think it's part of a broader transition. And congratulations to to all the amazing work that your network does, because it serves a really important purpose, which is at the heart of community in community radio. AM transmitters cost a lot of money to run a kilowatt hour. If you think about how much you pay for your quarterly electricity bill. And you look at, you know, how many kilowatt hours have they charged you for at so many cents per kilowatt hour? Well, AM transmitters gobble up lots of energy, and the price of kilowatt hours to power AM transmitters is huge. Also sustainability. They consume much more energy, much more heat than the newer forms of transmission. So it's logical and sensible. Networks, especially networks that are have tight cost controls, would look for cheaper ways to do the same thing, and FM and DAB, and then adding streaming and other things is absolutely the right business decision to make. The only thing I would say about that, though, is that there are some big transmitters, mostly run by the ABC. That will be the cockroaches of broadcasting because even though they're very big sites, they use a lot of power. If things go wrong, storms blow down the transmitters, DAB feeds go off, then am broadcast radio will be the one that will stay on the longest and will cover the most of Australia. So I think there will be a place for some big AM transmitters to stay on air or to stay air ready. Shall we say? Even if they don't, they're not on air every day because there's a kind of an emergency sustainability, last resort of communication kind of role for those transmitters to play. But of course, you know, that was the technology that Marconi invented a hundred years ago that was built on spark technology, like the same kind of electrical energy that comes from a lightning bolt. When FM came that improved that kind of transmission. And now that we have DAB, that's

even better. So of course, the technology has got better. But the old analog AM broadcasting, I think, still has a purpose of broadcaster of last resort. 00:14:19 S2: You are listening to Talking Vision on Vision Australia Radio. In today's programme, Jason Gibbs is speaking with Steve Ahern about Radio Days Asia 2026 taking place in Jakarta. Now back to our interview with Steve Ahern. 00:14:32 S3: People think are quite rightfully about the amount of energy and environmental impact that goes into new platforms like data centres. But very rarely people talk about the energy that goes into an AM transmitter. 00:14:44 S4: Yeah. That's right, that's right. And it's useful to think about it in these times when we're more aware of those sustainability aspects. 00:14:53 S3: So well, moving away from those traditional broadcast methods, kill the radio star or breathe in new life. 00:14:59 S4: I think it'll breathe a new life because think of all the things we couldn't do when it was just am point to multipoint broadcasting. Now we couldn't put pictures of the radio announcers face. We couldn't put the words of the song or the name of the song now playing. We can do that in FM using RDS text and even better in DAB using metadata, putting pictures. Once we have that digitized, we're on all sorts of platforms to websites and to phone apps. So there the the value adds that the new types of broadcasting can add that the old types didn't have. 00:15:43 S3: Are the cost. Pain points experienced here in Australia are similar to those of broadcasters across the region? Or is this a uniquely US problem at the moment? 00:15:53 S4: A bit of both. Australia is a huge landmass and we have to cover huge geographic areas with our transmission, and so that means we've got to have a stronger, higher towers and we've got to expend more energy putting more power into those transmitters to cover the vast distances. Whereas in Europe and in most countries in Asia, excluding China, you don't have that. You've got much less area to cover. You usually have a capital city, a second large city, and maybe a third large historical city. And then you've got a lot of villages and towns quite close to any of those main city centers. So right across Asia, that distance geographic factor isn't a significant. In that case, you don't need the kind of setup we have. You don't need to spend so much money on power. And you don't need to think about repeaters or having a whole lot of stations to cover areas where there might not be coverage from the capital city. There are other factors. For instance, in the north of India where the Himalayas are, it's hopeless to put small scale dab there because there's a lot of mountains. You need medium wave am. You may even need shortwave to cover all that mountainous area. But Singapore is a tiny nation centered around one big city, and you can cover everything with a few transmitters for each of the networks from the capital city. 00:17:38 S3: Lucky ducks. 00:17:39 S4: Yes, indeed. 00:17:41 S3: So which of our Asian neighbors are best transitioning to modern audio platforms? Who's doing a really great job of thinking outside of the box? 00:17:49 S4: Great question. The leaders in experimentation, risk taking and technology are Malaysia and Singapore. From our radio industry point of view, Indonesia, where radio Days will be this year, is catching up, but it's behind Malaysia and Singapore. And then for various historical and political and geographic reasons, I think the rest of Asia is a little bit behind in pushing into new technology. And then as we go north from Southeast Asia, through Central Asia, India, the stands, as I said, a little bit behind. Then when we go all the way up north to China, well, there suddenly is a very forward looking country. Again, from the technology point of view, and they are also experimenting and leading in a whole lot of broadcast technology areas. So it's quite mixed across Asia. 00:18:48 S3: Yeah, right. At Vision Australia, we approach access to news and information as an issue of equality for people who are blind or have low vision, or cannot simply access printed information. Audio may be an essential service rather than simply entertainment. So, Steve, do you believe the wider media industry treats equal access to information with the seriousness it deserves? 00:19:09 S4: I think probably not. Um, we're in radio. And so the core of what we do is audio. And that's automatically perhaps the first sense that someone with limited vision would want. But we generally are not forward looking in the very few of us supply our metadata, our text, the name of the songs that I was talking about. Very few of us have the ability for that to come out the end of a machine of the consumer in Braille, for instance. It can be done. The technology is there, but we don't do it in our industry. I think we're we're ahead and we have some thought about that, but there's not that much that we're doing for the consumers inside our industry, I must say. I've been really impressed with some of the technology in the studios playout systems. There's a company called RCS that plays out songs in automation mode, and they used to use touch screens, but now they've adapted so that somebody who needs to, to touch can either touch Braille or use a different kind of keypad to activate things that they would have had to see and touch before. So yes, in our industry, some people are doing it, but we could do more. When you expand further to media, I think probably television, newspaper companies and social media, digital companies are not thinking about that very much, but they are relying on the technology of consumption to do that for them. So it's very easy to put a screen reader on your computer or on your phone, and for you still to scroll through your social media feed and just have that read to you. Is it that media companies are neglecting it, or is it just that the technology at

the consumer end now is just allowing the consumer to consume that content without the company having to think about it, the consumer can set it. 00:21:23 S3: Yeah, I think it's a bit of a team effort. And, you know, working within a blind and low vision service provider space, I can absolutely assure those listening today. If you have anything to do with human resources, there are absolutely workarounds to help support blind or low vision staff members in radio stations, and we've certainly helped implement some of those things to make life a little bit more accessible. 00:21:44 S4: Now, in fact, a lot of the work that you've done in your network has been pulled out into the wider media, because you guys have really pushed it and made people aware that it's needed. So well done. 00:21:57 S3: Thanks, Steve. How will you be involved in Radio Days Asia in 2026, and which conversations or sessions are you personally most looking forward to? 00:22:06 S4: Yes, I my main contribution will be an afternoon workshop on the first day. So that's the workshop day before the conference proper begins September the 1st. And I will be giving the case study of Kyle and Jackie O's program with a view to illustrating how radio stations should build a team show. And the reason I'm doing that is because I was the expert witness for the court, for the Kyle and for for the Kyle case that was recently settled where I had to, um, explain to, for the judge and, and the barristers and others how radio ratings worked, how team formats are developed, and a whole lot of radio expertise. So I thought, well, you know, constantly from all over Asia, people know about the Kyle and Jackie O story and they know what Kyle Sandilands is doing now in his own way to reinvent radio. So why not use that? Go into a workshop which will help people work out how best to form teams, particularly breakfast teams, on their radio stations. So that's something I'm working on at the moment. I've still got a couple of weeks to get it together, but that'll be a three hour workshop and hopefully people will come along and, uh, listen and learn from that one. 00:23:33 S3: I may very well be at that one. Yeah. 00:23:34 S4: Yeah. Great. Look forward to seeing you in the audience. So why should. 00:23:39 S3: Someone working in radio, you know, podcasting, journalism, advertising, digital media make the trip to Jakarta for radio days this year. 00:23:46 S4: Because it's a slice of the best thinkers of radio who are trying to work out what's happening going forward, just like we've been talking about who are somehow participating or making that happen. The beauty of the Radio Days organization is that they can call on the best minds and the best examples from all over the world, and that's what we've tried to do in Radio Days Asia. I'm part of the organizing committee. We've tried to give a snapshot of everything that's happening from the best people in the world if possible. And that's the reason to go, because you'll just find out new things, and then you get the benefit of bumping into people and having further conversations and making connections that you do. When you go to an in-person conference, that's always the extra value add, but it's the content and the expertise of the speakers that is the reason to go. 00:24:49 S3: Yeah, good for a coffee or a tea on the sideline as well. 00:24:53 S4: Definitely. 00:24:54 S3: Finally, Steve, if you could co-host a one off drive show with any radio personality, dead or alive, who would you choose and why? 00:25:02 S4: Uh, that's a hard question. I think it would have to be John Laws because he was such an icon in his time. He became old fashioned and countercultural in a way, but he still kept turning up and doing his radio show. And I think he was curious. He was opinionated and I was always able to have a good conversation with him. I'd love to do a radio show with John for what we could talk about, and also for just being part of that beautiful flow that he used to create in his radio shows. I know he wasn't a favorite of everybody, and I'm. I'm not saying that I agree with everything that he thought, but from a radio point of view, if you get to share a studio with a legend, then you would do it. 00:25:54 S3: Thank you so much, Steve. That was fantastic. I really appreciate it. 00:25:57 S4: Great questions. Thank you. And hopefully I gave you what you wanted. Thank you. 00:26:02 S3: See you in a couple weeks. 00:26:03 S4: Yeah, see you there. 00:26:04 S3: Steve Ahern will be among the speakers at Radio Days Asia 2026, taking place in Jakarta from 1 to 3 September. The event brings together radio, podcasting and audio professionals from across the Asia Pacific and beyond to discuss new technology, journalism, audience growth, digital radio and the future of broadcasting. I'll also be attending as a Radio Days ambassador, representing Vision Australia Radio, and encouraging greater discussion around accessible audio and equal access to news and information. Learn more about the conference and get your tickets now at Radio Days asia.com. I'm Jason Gibbs. Thanks for listening. Bye for now. 00:26:47 S2: Thank you for listening to Talking Vision on Vision Australia Radio. Join us at the same time next week for another episode of Talking Vision. 00:26:58 S1: You can contact Vision Australia by phoning us anytime during business hours on 130847466. That's 130847466 or by visiting vision australia.org. That's Vision australia.org.