Next week, the UK’s Global Radio will slash local programming on their Heart and Galaxy station networks. Outside of the breakfast and afternoon shifts, programming will be mainly fed to all stations from a central location creating a quasi-national network.

Is this a bad thing? Is it a surprise? Will listeners even notice? My answers, in no particular order are no, no and no.

Business side first. Heart and Galaxy have been quasi-national brands for some time both on air and behind the scenes. The stations have shared the same playlists, management and jingles for years. However having several local versions of the same brand has made it difficult to sell advertising cross-network. By sharing the same presenter and output across all the stations makes sense, especially during mid-morning, mid-afternoon and evening slots. Crucially it means the group now have a real advertising and sponsorship proposition. The bottom line is costs are down, sales are up and that’s good business.

What about the listeners? Let’s face it, they buy into these stations for the music. They’re still getting local content in the key morning and late afternoon dayparts, when time and relevancy are key, while during busier times they’ve got great music and a great talent presenting it. A win for them too!

But how could it be made even better? Technology allows us broadcasters to do many things many ways. With some creative planning there is nothing to stop the centralised dj hitting a jingle, promo or information spot and have different versions play in different locations. So Heart dj hit’s button in London and Londoners hear the Heart “London” jingle, Brummies their Heart “West Midlands” jingle and so on. Roll that out to promos or even info slots such as traffic or info slots relevant to each local area … and bingo - high quality networked “local radio”! Something tells me though this won’t happen

Finally on networking, great note from Matt Deegan concerning the CN Group. CN are networking their Touch radio stations with the exception of the new Warwick station which has to wait two years to keep with it’s application proposals. Matts solution - broadcast all the networked shows from Warwick!

Like Dr Emmet Brown from the movie Back to the Future we’re trying to give you a taste of tomorrow today.

We’re very excited about our new All 80s website because we belive it’s the most advanced radio site in Ireland and it’s how we envisage DAB radios being in five years. Soon as you land on the front page of the site, you’ll see what song we’re playing and the latest news on that artist. You can rate the song, comment on it or just read other peoples comments. There’s also links to the artists website, to their CD’s on Amazon, downloads from iTunes or even watch the song video on YouTube. All right there on the front page and updating every three minutes as the songs play out.

Another key feature of the site is on-demand content where you can hear our library of interviews with artists, get all the latest news or take part in the discussions of the day.

Relevant information, on-demand programmes and interaction. It’s all there. What would life be like if we could broadcast this to peoples actual radio sets? It’s not a dream … it’s what we’re doing.

Watch out early May when our new All 80s website comes online and takes you back to the future!

The clip below is a Tomorrows World type clip from the year I was born. Though initially funny it is actually uncannily accurate.

So what of our vision for radio? How about a day where if you want some extra info on what you’re listening to, you just browse relevant content on the radios screen. Or if you miss a programme you like, even Livelive, three clicks and you can hear it on-demand or transfer it to you mp3 player docked to the radio. Or get real interactivity and have your say immediately by hitting a “red button” to vote yes.

I’m not some evangelist peering another 40 years into the future just another five or maybe ten. Close enough to be called Tomorrows World