Still ga ga over those radio days

Work in Progress by Ivan Morgan

Back in the day I had three different shows on CHMR, otherwise known as MUN Radio, but my student number starts with 77 so we can all agree that wasn’t yesterday.

I thought about my own ties with CHMR recently when I read there was a flap over the current student union deciding to cut funding for the station. Having graduated almost 45 years ago, I have no intention of second guessing the decision these young people made. I loved my time at the station but that was then, and this is now.

I always loved MUN Radio (a channel I suspect most of you never listened to) ironically for many of the same reasons I love streaming and social media now. The station offered liberation from corporate control: liberation from the “Top 40” control of the music industry; liberation from annoying ads and DJs, and an introduction to other types of music and programming.

MUN Radio never made sense, never had much of an audience, and rarely spoke for the majority of students it claimed to represent, most of whom never listened to it. When I was there it was a cesspit of infighting, cronyism and radical political bickering – in short, like most places. I learned early on to keep my mouth shut, get to the studio, not hang out with the regulars (who seemed to always be there) and close the door to the booth when I started my show. Once the show was over, just leave. The odds of anyone in charge listening to your show was very small. That worked for me.

Is CHMR still relevant? Was it ever relevant? Was it ever supposed to even be relevant? These are not questions for me to answer. It was relevant for me when I was part of it, giving me a chance to develop on air chops which helped in my various careers and led, eventually, to a national radio comedy show which ran four and a half years. Just sayin’.

But things are changing. I see traditional radio and television broadcasting dying. Not broadcasting itself, just the venues. Commercial broadcasters will give you their market share, but not their numbers, which I suspect are dwindling. Regular readers may remember my phone book rants; they get smaller and less relevant every year, but no decision made yet to discontinue them. But who uses them? I think radio and TV broadcasting are going the same way.

In the age of social media where people are free to broadcast what they want and listen to what they want when they want, all from your kitchen table, why would you want to listen to or work at an old-fashioned radio station? And more to the point, why would those at the student union keep funding it with precious dues from students? Just asking.

Things are changing for sure, but the skill of broadcasting is still a vital one. An argument can be made that with social media more and more people are broadcasting. So maybe the current venue is dying but the content isn’t. Nor will the need for training dwindle. Like hundreds of others, I didn’t know what I was doing my first night. That was the point of CHMR to me. I learned there.

CHMR may need this latest challenge to shake them into remodelling what they do. Get with the times, so to speak. Who better than a student organization to embrace the future?

People say newspapers are a thing of the past, but you are reading one right now. While the old MUN Radio might be a dying concept, I am excited to see what will be next. News articles on the issue last week quote staff and supporters saying they are not going anywhere. Good for them. As the cliché goes, where there’s a will there’s a way.

Maybe old-style radio is a thing of the past. Maybe old-style TV is a thing of the past. I’m excited to see what comes out of this new experiment called social media. Do I mourn the old way of doing things? Maybe a little in a nostalgic way, but I am chomping at the bit to see what’s next.

Having said all that, long live VOWR!

Ivan Morgan can be reached at ivan.morgan@gmail.com