ABSTRACT
Due in great part to industry consolidation and the ever-increasing availability of new media, such as the Web, iPhones, Blackberries, etc., broadcast radio news has witnessed a decline in audience size as well as the size of station news departments. Notes Ed Shane, “The diminishing number of news people and news broadcasts is alarming.” It was not always that way. Indeed, the medium of radio was used to convey news before news of the medium had reached the majority of the general public. Ironically, it was the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 and the subsequent rebroadcast of the ship’s coded distress message that helped launch a wider awareness and appreciation of the newfangled gadget called the wireless telegraph. It was not until the early 1920s, when the “wireless” had become known as the “radio” that broadcast journalism actually began to evolve.
