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iHeart Radio? The child of Clear Channel? The conglomerate that bought up all sorts of regional stations and homogenized them to the point of seemingly choking

iHeart Radio? The child of Clear Channel? The conglomerate that bought up all sorts of regional stations and homogenized them to the point of seemingly choking regional sounds and styles in the favor of slick, corporate approved campaigns to consolidate listeners into pens like cattle to the slaughter[1]? My take, as a musician, is that this isn't about helping listeners find "Music they love" - if it does happen, a lucky accident for the listener. It's fundamentally trying to exploit algorithms and human nature to be able to charge more for ad space. The business hates risk, and this modelling and "learning" is simply to reduce their risk of playing a track that might encourage a person to, you know, change the station. This may sound extremely cynical, but it's hard to deny that Clear Channel is a very spurious company playing the same old "We love music and musicians" card when they're really talking about their own profits. [1] Just one article - it's been covered time and again. http://www.daveyd.com/articlesclearchannelbyjeffpearlstein.html http://www.daveyd.com/articlesclearchannelbyjeffpearlstein.h...

kafkaesq 10y ago
Agreed. They seem to have some pretty smart people behind the curtain, and I imagine the work is probably quite interesting on an abstract, technical level. But I've always found iHeartRadio to be one of the most obnoxious listening experiences imaginable every time I've been a captive audience of it.
jamminontheone 10y ago
From what I remember Clear Channel purchased a company called Thumbplay and rolled it into iHeart Radio to build out their web app. The developers that they acquired with that purchase whom I've met legitimately are music fans and had very mixed feelings about having to work for Clear Channel. Just an anecdote, I totally agree with your sentiment.
- 6stringmerc 10y ago
  Oh I can understand! I'd feel for their plight too; it took me a while to get out from a couple gigs that I had principles in conflict with, so "doing it for the paycheck" isn't a light subject. Thanks for sharing, especially as a reminder that where we start and why we start may not be where we end up in the long-run.

kafkaesq 10y ago

Agreed. They seem to have some pretty smart people behind the curtain, and I imagine the work is probably quite interesting on an abstract, technical level. But I've always found iHeartRadio to be one of the most obnoxious listening experiences imaginable every time I've been a captive audience of it.

jamminontheone 10y ago

From what I remember Clear Channel purchased a company called Thumbplay and rolled it into iHeart Radio to build out their web app. The developers that they acquired with that purchase whom I've met legitimately are music fans and had very mixed feelings about having to work for Clear Channel. Just an anecdote, I totally agree with your sentiment.

6stringmerc 10y ago
Oh I can understand! I'd feel for their plight too; it took me a while to get out from a couple gigs that I had principles in conflict with, so "doing it for the paycheck" isn't a light subject. Thanks for sharing, especially as a reminder that where we start and why we start may not be where we end up in the long-run.