Radio “On the Cloud”: New Author Approaches in Creating Internet Radio

Abstract

Technological development, and thereby technological revolution in its duration, initiated changes in the media environment and its characteristics, as well as our habits in the consumption and reception of content - from transmission and distribution of information, through reading news, watching TV program, to music listening. This paper will try to provide basic insight into the changes made by digitization, focusing specifically on the radio and its relocation "from the air" to the "network". Investigating phenomena associated with the radio exiting analogue frames, such as podcast, cloud and streaming, which comprise the digital infrastructure of the Internet radio, the paper emphasizes the changed role of the audience which, from "passive recipients" becomes a network of active "producers-consumers" (prosumers) or producers-users (produsers). In the contexture of social relations and consumer practices, "new amateurs" are distinguished, amalgams of audience and fans/creators who nowadays have the opportunity to “do themselves” a radio program, along with the listed tools (DIY). They blur the boundaries of the "traditional" jobs division between the radio "producers" and "consumers", and the relations between professionals - established "radio stars" and beginners, evading controlled production frameworks and encouraging an active process of creating a culture from the bottom. In addition to offering an analysis of the mentioned phenomena, this paper will consider whether the radio by the convergence has changed its characteristics and indicated it can (again) start, with the "PLAY" sign on the screen.