Request (broadcasting)

Last updated

A request is a frequently offered feature by some form of broadcasting entity, initially started in radio. It is an effort by the broadcaster to become interactive with their audience, allowing a means for members of the audience to ask for something specific to happen; usually the playing of a specific song. [1]

The most common form of this is the telephone request line, where listeners are encouraged to call a specific telephone number to a radio station to give their request. Disk jockeys then would use various forms of identifying that the song they were about to play had been requested, either by playing a jingle to that effect, mentioning the requester by name, playing back a recording of the request phone call or even taking the request live on the air. Many disk jockeys have built their entire act and reputation around their method of dealing with requests. Similarly radio stations have built their format around taking requests. Some stations have even billed themselves as "All Request Radio" which frequently results in them playing the current top 40 or other patterns of most popular songs, interspersed with old songs.

As technologies have advanced, both the methods of the broadcaster accepting the request and the form the broadcast entity distributes its content have changed.

Anticipated by the success of some local TV stations, MTV took the concept to the broader television market with Dial MTV and subsequently the long running Total Request Live .

Tallies of the number of requests (for specific items) are frequently kept as that is an indicator of what is popular or a set period of time. [2] Many radio stations have published weekly surveys and based entire components of their programming on the statistics of the requests they receive. Since 2012, Billboard magazine has kept track of On-Demand Songs as one of three components of the Billboard Hot 100.

Related Research Articles

Music radio is a radio format in which music is the main broadcast content. After television replaced old time radio's dramatic content, music formats became dominant in many countries. Radio drama and comedy continue, often on public radio.

Payola, in the music industry, is the illegal practice of paying a commercial radio station to play a song without the station disclosing the payment. Under US law, a radio station must disclose songs they were paid to play on the air as sponsored airtime. The number of times the songs are played can influence the perceived popularity of a song, and payola may be used to influence these meters. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) treats payola as a violation of the Sponsorship Identification Rules, which requires any broadcast of paid material to include a disclosure.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Broadcasting</span> Distribution of audio or audiovisual content to dispersed audiences

Broadcasting is the distribution of audio or video content to a dispersed audience via any electronic mass communications medium, but typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum, in a one-to-many model. Broadcasting began with AM radio, which came into popular use around 1920 with the spread of vacuum tube radio transmitters and receivers. Before this, all forms of electronic communication were one-to-one, with the message intended for a single recipient. The term broadcasting evolved from its use as the agricultural method of sowing seeds in a field by casting them broadly about. It was later adopted for describing the widespread distribution of information by printed materials or by telegraph. Examples applying it to "one-to-many" radio transmissions of an individual station to multiple listeners appeared as early as 1898.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alan Freed</span> American disc jockey and rock-and-roll figure (1921–1965)

Albert James "Alan" Freed was an American disc jockey. He also produced and promoted large traveling concerts with various acts, helping to spread the importance of rock and roll music throughout North America.

The Billboard Hot 100 is the music industry standard record chart in the United States for songs, published weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on sales, radio play, and online streaming in the United States.

Voice-tracking, also called cyber jocking and referred to sometimes colloquially as a robojock, is a technique employed by some radio stations in radio broadcasting to produce the illusion of a live disc jockey or announcer sitting in the radio studios of the station when one is not actually present. It is one of the notable effects of radio homogenization.

Broadcast automation incorporates the use of broadcast programming technology to automate broadcasting operations. Used either at a broadcast network, radio station or a television station, it can run a facility in the absence of a human operator. They can also run in a live assist mode when there are on-air personnel present at the master control, television studio or control room.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cable radio</span> Sound content transmitted via signals on coaxial cable

Cable radio or cable FM is a concept similar to that of cable television, bringing radio broadcasting into homes and businesses via coaxial cable. It is generally used for the same reason as cable TV was in its early days when it was "community antenna television", in order to enhance the quality of over-the-air radio signals that are difficult to receive in an area. However, cable-only radio outlets also exist.

A record chart, in the music industry, also called a music chart, is a ranking of recorded music according to certain criteria during a given period. Many different criteria are used in worldwide charts, often in combination. These include record sales, the amount of radio airplay, the number of downloads, and the amount of streaming activity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Box (American TV channel)</span> American television network

The Box, originally named the Video Jukebox Network, was an American broadcast, cable and satellite television network that operated from 1985 to 2001. The network focused on music videos, which through a change in format in the early 1990s, were selected by viewer request via telephone; as such, unlike competing networks, the videos were not broadcast on a set rotation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Airplay</span> Frequency that a song is broadcast on radio stations

Airplay is how frequently a song is being played through broadcasting on radio stations. A song which is being played several times every day (spins) would have a significant amount of airplay. Music which became very popular on jukeboxes, in nightclubs and at discotheques between the 1940s and 1960s would also have airplay.

Audience measurement measures how many people are in an audience, usually in relation to radio listenership and television viewership, but also in relation to newspaper and magazine readership and, increasingly, web traffic on websites. Sometimes, the term is used as pertaining to practices which help broadcasters and advertisers determine who is listening rather than just how many people are listening. In some parts of the world, the resulting relative numbers are referred to as audience share, while in other places the broader term market share is used. This broader meaning is also called audience research.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Martin Block</span>

Martin Block was an American disc jockey. It is said that Walter Winchell invented the term "disc jockey" as a means of describing Block's radio work.

This glossary of terms used in broadcasting is a list of definitions of terms and concepts related to both radio and television broadcasting, along with the industry in general.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Radio personality</span> Person who has an on-air position in radio broadcasting

A radio personality or radio presenter is a person who has an on-air position in radio broadcasting. A radio personality who hosts a radio show is also known as a radio host, and in India and Pakistan as a radio jockey. Radio personalities who introduce and play individual selections of recorded music are known as disc jockeys or "DJs" for short. Broadcast radio personalities may include talk radio hosts, AM/FM radio show hosts, and satellite radio program hosts.

Music television is a type of television programming which focuses predominantly on playing music videos from recording artists, usually on dedicated television channels broadcasting on satellite, cable, or Streaming Platforms.

In broadcasting, rotation is the repeated airing of a limited playlist of songs on a radio station or satellite radio channel, or music videos on a TV network. They are usually in a different order each time. However, they are not completely shuffled, so as to avoid varying the time between any two consecutive plays of a given song by either too much or too little. When measuring airplay, the number of times a song is played is counted as spins.

Brokered programming is a form of broadcast content in which the show's producer pays a radio or television station for air time, rather than exchanging programming for pay or the opportunity to play spot commercials. A brokered program is typically not capable of garnering enough support from advertisements to pay for itself, and may be controversial, esoteric or an advertisement in itself.

A request line or contest line is a telephone line which allows listeners to a radio station to call the radio studio or TV studio directly. In radio, this is usually to request a song, win a contest, be a part of a talk show, or to ask a question of the disk jockey, such as what the name and artist of a recent song was. Used occasionally in television, it is typically for telephone voting for an unscientific opinion poll in relation to news events, for a talk show, or sometimes to win a contest.

Censorship of music refers to the practice of editing of musical works for various reasons, stemming from a wide variety of motivations, including moral, political, or religious reasons. Censorship can range from the complete government-enforced legal prohibition of a musical work, to private, voluntary removal of content when a musical work appears in a certain context.

References

  1. "request | Definition from the Television & radio topic | Television & radio". www.ldoceonline.com. Retrieved 2021-05-22.
  2. "Mobile Beat Top 200". www.djintelligence.com. Retrieved 2021-05-22.