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Youths turn off the radio while tuning into the Net

Radio broadcasting companies are losing their younger listeners to the growing popularity of the Internet, according to a survey released yesterday.

The annual survey, entitled the "2001 Television and Radio Rating Survey," also suggested that television stations could develop "viewing loyalties" if they could clearly define their fixed positions on program selection.

The survey was conducted from May 24 to June 13 by the Broadcasting Development Fund (廣播電視事業發展基金會, BDF). Its purpose was to evaluate the trends among radio listeners and TV viewers and to serve as a reference for the local media in their program management.

Two different groups of randomly chosen interviewees above the age of 13 were polled in the survey. The radio listenership survey queried a group of 6,237 people, while the TV viewership survey interviewed 6,081 people.

"Last year, 60 percent of the interviewees said that they were radio listeners -- this year that figure has dropped to 45 percent," said Huang Su-ling (黃素玲), a BDF media researcher.

"Among those who turned away from radio listening were many youngsters between the ages of 13 and 18 who have instead turned to the Internet."

"On the other hand, the survey this year suggested an increase in the number of elderly who regularly tune in to radio stations," Huang said.

"The results of the survey should therefore ring a warning bell with the traditional radio broadcasters. They must realize that they are facing growing competition from the Internet media," Huang said.

Among those whom claimed that they were radio listeners, Huang said that "about 40 percent said they listen to radio either out of boredom or for no special reason. This indicates to us that the function of radio has slowly turned from entertainment to companionship."

Huang said that compared to last year, more people had tuned into radio news reports on politics and to receive traffic updates, while news on consumerism had lost listeners.

"The five most popular radio shows were programs on practical life, leisure and travel, health issues, family relations and public relations," he said.

Regarding the television media, Kirsten Huang (黃聿清), chief of the program planning and media research at the BDF, said that TV viewers' five favorite programs "were news and weather reports, Western movies, entertainment shows as well as Hokkien and Mandarin soap operas."

"The survey also suggested that many non-cable TV stations are capable of achieving greater viewer loyalty than some cable-TV stations," she said.

"The reason for this is that many of these non-cable TV stations have a clear and fixed position and focus on subjects such as news and weather, Hokkien programs, cartoons and music."
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