“The audio landscape is more creative, diverse and alive than ever.”
These were the words of Katja Wildermuth of the Bayerischer Rundfunk, who was joined by Thorsten Schmiege of the Bavarian Regulatory Authority for New Media, after an exciting opener to 2024 and a heartfelt welcome from CEO Peter Niegel, all linked by hosts Paul Robinson and Sabrina Lang.
This diversity shows at Radiodays Europe. With more than 1500 people expected to visit this year’s conference, the power and interest in audio is very strong and even increasing. Bavarian Minister of State for Media, Florian Hermann, knows how important Radio is for society, “You work at the heart of democracy because you inform people.”
During the opening session, Lars Bastholm, Founder Bastholm Creative Consulting showed the possibilities of A.I., but there is also a lot of risk in having this opportunity, and there are still things that A.I. can’t do. “We can be weirder and much more odd, than a computer can ever be.” The creativity of humans can never be reached by Artificial Intelligence. Stefan Möller, president of Association of European Radios, and Edita Kudlacoa, Head of Radio at the European Broadcasting Union, talked about the importance of trends, like A.I., in the audio industry. Stefan Möller pointed out: “Radio is the drummer in the band called total audio. It keeps the rhythm, everyone relies on it, everybody needs it.”
The risk of A.I. is obviously the growth of fake news. This is, where Marianna Spring comes in. She is the first disinformation and social media correspondent at BBC. In our society, audio will be very important for climate change. Kara Oehler is working at the Institute for Climate Sound & Society at metaLAB Harvard. It is possible to monitor whales, species which we can’t hear with the human ear. Those are the key topics at the Radiodays 2024.
