Alternative Voices of Reason

I find something in common with what Yinka Odumakin and Tunde Bakare are saying about the February elections. They sound like voices of reason. 

I listened to separate interviews by two notable south west politicians – Yinka Odumakin (the activist) and Tunde Bakare (the pastor.) Both are being “accused” of discretely or openly supporting Candidate Jonathan in the 2015 presidential elections. The interviews provided them a platform to respond and to defend their positions. I found something in common with the position of both men.

Odumakin, Buhari’s spokesman in the 2011 elections, says he is not the spokesman for Jonathan for the 2015 elections, but that he has been presented with an option that makes it difficult for him to choose Buhari for support. According to him, Buhari belongs to the APC, a party that does not have the restructuring of Nigeria in its manifesto or as a matter of urgent national concern. Odumakin is interested in the implementation of the National Conference Report. Since Buhari's APC did not believe in the conference, did not make recommendations for and was not represented at the meeting, and since the party has so far said nothing along the lines he needs to hear about how this country might get it right before the February election, he is forced to think that electing Jonathan gives him a better chance to hold the President responsible for implementing the report – as he promises to do.

Therefore, to Odumakin, what will determine his vote is the readiness of any of the candidates to commit to implementation of the Constitutional Conference Report. Then he added an important caveat – if tomorrow Buhari or his APC begins to talk about what Odumakin considers important for Nigeria right at this moment – how to restructure the polity to introduce equity, justice and peace – he is most likely to “move to the centre (become neutral.)”

Tunde Bakare, Buhari’s running mate in his 2011 run, says he still supports the candidate “100%.” However, this support does not stop him from wondering what will become of Nigeria - after the election is won and lost in February 2015. Will the North be at peace if Jonathan wins in 2015? Will the South South be at rest if Buhari wins in 2015? Such questions, he said, transcend the power struggles of the moment.

According to both, it makes sense for the political elite to consider coming together and deciding, for instance, to postpone the February 2015 election in order to put the right structure in place, which would give Nigeria a fighting chance for survival as a united country.

I would suggest that these are alternative voices of reason, which deserve a proper hearing.

Unfortunately, we have entered propaganda mode. Therefore it makes sense, in the madness of the moment, for politicians to seek to recruit any and everyone who has ever had anything to do with any of the two candidates and their camps, and to castigate any potential recruit that dares to present a sober reflection of where we are today and where we are heading to tomorrow.

The bulldozer of ambition is rolling across our land, in search of naked power. And it is crushing reason and common sense along the path.

Happy New Year.

"Merry" or "Happy Christmas?"

President Goodluck Jonathan just wished Nigerians a “happy Christmas.” Is it merry or happy Christmas, Mr. President?

Like many others, I’m left wondering whether we should actually be greeting “Merry Christmas,” or “Happy Christmas” at this time.
I wanted to upbraid the President for choosing to go against the grain, but decided to do a simple online search first.

What I found surprised me a bit.

I found out that the greeting has been caught up with religious affiliation, colonialism, and morality all in one.

Beyond Buhari and Jonathan

It is no news that President Goodluck Jonathan and General Muhammadu Buhari have been selected by their respective parties as the gladiators for the President’s crown in 2015.

What should be a matter of concern are the indiscreet noises that we are beginning to read and hear from the social media regarding the two warriors.

I am concerned by the fact that the unrestrained praise singing and objectionable putdowns that we have come to witness now will have the intended effect of making citizens miss a golden opportunity to really understand the two men in order to vote wisely.

For Buhari, we are beginning to hear and read that he is a religious fundamentalist, has some connection with Boko Haram, displays open disdain for non-northerners, is an inflexible iron ruler, and so forth. None of these truly describes the man or his essence.

On Linda Ikeji's N24m Toy

I couldn't help paying attention to a trending conversation on premier blogger Linda Ikeji’s latest toy - a N24m Range Rover Sport - which she promoted on her blog. 

I want to join in.

I’ve visited the Linda Ikeji blog twice before. The first was to study the strategy she uses to attract heavy traffic that qualifies her to be paid by Google. The second was to read what she put up about a funny radio episode where one of my colleagues stalked and “punked” her. Linda decided to be a good sport - I was told she put up the audio on her site and I went there once again to verify that Linda indeed is a good sport. She is. However, beyond those two

Fashola's Disingenuity

I finally got around to reading Gov. Fashola’s “take-away” on the Ekiti polls. After going through it, I shook my head in awe. The Governor’s intelligence is legendary, but on this take-away, I thought he was simply disingenuous.

For instance, since when did it become a given that being cerebral or a performing technocrat guarantees a win in an election? Just look at Obama in his first and second term presidential runs and probe the possible reasons why Senator McCain lost to him in the first and Gov. Romney the second, and you may be tempted to stylishly abuse the Americans as Fashola appeared to have done with the people of Ekiti. 

7 Trends Radio Missed

This is a very interesting article that I found on the net on the management of radio stations. You will find the original article on Jerry’s Blog: Inside Music Media; http://insidemusicmedia.com/

It seems that almost daily we witness another miscalculation by the CEOs running the radio industry (into the ground).
And, another missed opportunity.
The New York Times Thursday reminded the business world that radio's largest consolidator, Clear Channel, has a critical cash flow issue. And the article deals with whether Lee & Bain should have spent $20 billion for the company in the first place.
Now I'm thinking that we have at least two tragedies here.
One: that so many talented people in many radio companies have been let go or compromised (more work than they can handle).
And the other is: the missed opportunities that would have fit nicely into a new age business plan where radio could harvest its huge free cash flow ability to invest in the digital future.
All that free cash flow never went to pay dividends for shareholders because it was busy trying to pay down what I call irresponsible debt that consolidators ran up when they purchased their stations at highly inflated prices.
But, look with me at just a few of the trends radio missed that could have made all the difference in the world:

1. Internet Streaming
The penny pincher's that they are, radio consolidators missed the real meaning of streaming radio.
They saw it as a chance to repurpose on-air formats without spending a dime. All it took was software to cut out local commercials and insert Internet spots.
What they got was chump change for revenue, maybe 3-4% increase in total listening above the terrestrial stream and a big bold sign that told the next generation "I don't know or care about how you really use the Internet".
They missed the chance to go to their clients and build Internet radio stations for them. But in radio, the consolidators own the stations and they wouldn't like the idea of renting stations to advertisers.
Maybe they should have pictured the money coming in every month.
They missed the chance to get out of 24/7 programming online and create content that streams for a specific purpose other than general consumption. Because in today's world, listeners want programming on-demand. They don't need to sit and wait for you to broadcast it to them -- especially online.

2. Podcasting
Adam Carolla gets a half million people to listen to his podcast after he is axed by CBS Radio, but is that a business?
When stations cut up morning show content for distribution as a podcast, is that the future?
You know what I'm going to say.
Of course not.
Podcasting is personal radio -- the kind that the industry flirted with early in its history and has abandoned today. Any damn fool can do a podcast -- and I'll bet you've heard a lot of those damn fools. There are also many people who have unique talents and communications skills that do not do "radio" on a podcast -- this is encouraging.
The difference between radio's version of podcasting and the one I think would provide numerous revenue streams to broadcast owners is the ability to make podcasting a franchise.
Radio missed the podcasting revolution because it doesn't know how to make each podcast a franchise -- funded by revenue derived in ancillary ways (not commercials) and grown by viral social networking tools.

3. Apple Apps
There is nothing hotter or more relevant to the future than Apple applications.
Apple, the only real communication company that understands the next generation, made it possible for one billion app downloads to happen. Many are priced 99 cents or more.
Consumers are voting with their wallets. Apps are worth something and music is nothing -- thus, the piracy. Apple controls the app store and prevents theft of its applications which is more than record labels can do with their music.
The radio industry and the music business should be into this not as an adjunct to over the air radio but as a business model for a future revenue stream. These guys think I'm speaking a foreign language when I talk about this, but broadcasters should be developing apps and monetizing them in ancillary ways. (I did a piece on how creative Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor is in adapting apps for his fans -- if you'd like, you can read it here).
Consolidators are cutting back air staff and can't even deal with the fact that the hottest device (an iPhone) doesn't need an FM chip, it needs apps to feed the appetite of rabid mobile fans willing to spend money and participate in marketing strategies.

4. Ringback Tones
Ringtone sales have peaked but ringback tones (the music you hear while you're waiting for the other party to answer) is booming.
Record labels are getting in on this because that's all they have -- the rest of their ideas have laid an egg.
But, I'm suggesting that radio broadcasters have missed an opportunity to use local acts under a rights-free arrangement to sell reasonably priced ringback tones to listeners and fans. The labels won't do this because they think it undermines their core business (whatever that is).
But radio stations could if only they knew where these acts were -- which brings me to the next missed opportunity.

5. Music Discovery
Think about it -- CBS has a whopping two million listeners according to People Meter ratings for its new AMP in Los Angeles playing the same hits their competition is playing over and over again. Thank you People Meter for accurately reporting radio listening.
Radio broadcasters have missed the trend to once again become the facilitator of music discovery for a new generation. I know, I know -- playing the hits gets ratings.
Get over it.
If you want to be relevant to the 80 million members of the next generation, you'll also have to get them -- and they are used to discovering a wide variety of music on their own, through social networks and through music piracy.
Radio missed a chance to blow out the same old repetition that has helped seal its fate by refusing to commit to new music and lots of it. (I didn't say "stiffs", I'm saying promising new music from local artists).
They won't listen but the next generation discarded radio and finds its own music online.
Hell, the iTunes store on Tuesday is what radio stations used to be Tuesday nights -- the source of music discovery. Now radio stations can't compete with Apple.

6. Social Networking
Again, radio thinks social networking exists to help it salvage terrestrial radio listening with a new generation, but it is more than a replacement for the telephone in ticket giveaways.
Radio missed many chances to build its own entertainment network(s) and cultivate an audience that could be marketed to advertisers and sponsors. Instead, local entrepreneurs (not radio) have developed sites like Dirty Scottsdale (which I'm using an as example not a specific recommendation).
Perez Hilton is a radio station -- even includes music. He is a snarky, bitchy gossip columnist for the next generation. Radio could have done this -- locally and cashed in. That train has left the station when the banks robbed it to pay radio's debt service.
Local social networking -- what a concept.
And who better to do it but a local radio station if only they could see that this venture will be a new form of revenue to their broadcasting business.

7. Video & Mobile Devices
I hate to say it but someone should tell Lew Dickey or Fagreed Suleman while they are busy saving their necks and padding their compensation, radio operators are going to have to get into the video business.
If you're not creative -- just imitate Disney.
They are buying 30% of Hulu -- the popular new form of television embraced by high school and college students who lay on their sofas or beds and watch the same TV shows you and I watch on HD screens.
They have more fun.
They can do other things -- right on their computer while the shows are on.
They are subjected to fewer commercials.
Radio missed the opportunity to be in the local video business -- not as an appendage of local terrestrial stations but as a standalone business.
Some stations have experimented with interesting off-air projects, but the big groups that own the majority of stations are still living in the past.
There are endless ways to use a local platform with video derived from local sources.
The world wide web may be worldwide, but it is only a delivery system not the programming destination.
Handheld mobile devices, smart phones, iPhones, touch screens, Kindles, iPods (the rumored new mid-sized tablet Apple is working on) are your future. Radio is stuck in a dashboard or is an ugly box. We're going to have to do better than that if we want to be part of the future.
The problem is that while the radio industry bet the ranch on owning clustered station monopolies in cities across the nation, that "ranch" is in the process of being repossessed due to failure to make the mortgage payments.
And while consolidators are fighting for a way to hang on to antiquated technology, stifle innovation needed to build out the digital future and squander its readymade, already-employed talent, it's missing the very thing that could save the industry.
·          Innovation.
·          Mastering generational media.
·          Discovering new marketing opportunities.
When you snooze, you're old news.

Good News for the Criminal Poor

Have Nigerian judges now decided to treat the criminal poor like the criminal rich?
On Tuesday 13 March 2014, a magistrate, Mrs. Chinyere Nwacheonwu, handed down an unusual sentence to a man accused of stealing money from an Abuja Church: she asked one Augustine Bala (27) to sweep and clean for one month a church where he stole N27,950 from a tithe box.
Bala lives at Mpape, a slum that was to be pulled down last year but for the intervention of human rights activists. He however travelled to Holy Trinity, the Catholic millionaires’ church in the high-brow Maitama District of Abuja FCT, to perform the act.
An eagle-eyed security man in the Church apprehended Bala and handed him over to Police at the Maitama Division. Brought face-to-face with the judge, he quickly accepted guilt and begged for mercy:
"Please, my lord, have mercy on me; I have made a great mistake. I would have asked the church members for help instead of committing sin onto God.’’
There are at least three possible explanations for Bala’s “heavy” punishment. It could have been the simple but profound acceptance and plea that melted the judge’s heart. It could be that the judge doesn’t care much for the new-found craze among some Catholic Priests to collect tithes – like other prosperity-preaching religious movements. Or could it be that our judges are listening to the social media argument that they are unfairly punishing the poor who steal peanuts while letting go the rich who steal in millions and billions of Naira?
Are we then getting into a new era where the criminal poor can now expect to also be treated like the criminal rich – with slap-on-the-wrist judgments?