Inflection Points: Some History, Some Speculation

[peristaltor]

I have to admit, I was a bit shocked when a simple observation of mine, that the GOP has a plank in its platform stating its aim to "explore a greater role for private enterprise in appropriate aspects of the mail-processing system", blew up into such a kerfuffle. The GOP, after all, has long been the party supported by anti-union forces in

Comments

[peristaltor]

There are more and more software engineers every year and average wages are rising.

Software is a growing industry, so the amount of work for programmers is growing, just not as quickly as programmers are trained. Supply and demand. If a major software provider started resorting to sweat shop tactics to whip the code monkeys into faster coding without more money, you might start to see coder unions (if they can pry Atlas Shrugged out of their RSD-numbed fingers; seriously, what is it with Rand and code monkeys?!?)

Depends on what stations you listen to.

True. I should have noted that most of the music I hear (when not from my own collection) comes accidentally-from the phone hold music, from the market, blasted out of others' radios. Most of the accidentally heard music fits that ten-year window. Really, how many times when you were a kid did you think Creedence, the Beatles, the Stones, or even "Seasons in the Sun" would be played when your hair was grey?

Oh, and my condescension is the primary factor, the one directly causing my mindset. I just didn't bother elaborating the source. :-P

[gunslnger]

If a major software provider started resorting to sweat shop tactics

If? What do you think the outsourcing to X-istan or Taiwan or India is?

I would question your summary of the accidentally heard music, as there is likely to be some selection bias going on there.

[peristaltor]

Actually, I suspect the bias is more to do not with my hearing but with the consolidation of the radio industry. As more and more stations are owned by fewer and fewer, the formatting of programing has become more formulaic, leading to a narrower and narrower band of content options.

Furthermore, those options are generally aimed at more and more well-researched demographic niches, and the Boomers are the biggest.

[gunslnger]

http://radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/locate?select=city&city=San+Diego&state=CA

Let's see, out of 40 (one of the KBPS stations is a repeater) FM stations in San Diego, there are 3 that could potentially play songs from the 70's a large part of the time.

[peristaltor]

Hint: Think like an advertiser. Only three? Looking at that list I see:

• Adult Contemporary (radio code for mellow and older);
  
• Hot AC (Adult Contemporary);
  
• Adult Hits;
  
• Classic Rock;
  
• Rock; and of course
  
• Oldies.

Five others are Top 40; three different flavors of Alternative; 10 different Spanish Language; a couple of religious stations; and the rest from the demographic niche grab bag.

If we discount the Spanish language stations from the mix as demographically significant specifically to San Diego and remove the non-secular and non-musical as well (Religious, Christian Contemporary, News/Talk, and Public) this leaves 6 out of 24 FM stations catering to musical tastes solidified between 1960 and 1980. When one further considers that this age group is mostly far from the "under 35 professional" crowd ad marketeers covet, dedicating 25% of the FM band to them is significant.

*Edited for math derp.

[gunslnger]

The AC and Adult Hits stations do not play anything from the 70's. They rarely play songs from the 80's. I listen to them often enough to be able to tell you that. The Rock stations do not play the old songs often enough to be relevant.

[peristaltor]

Right on the first; wrong on the second (Jack FM). The internets has been very helpful, showing that indeed '70s content does creep into even your life. I've gone through the last three hours of logs and seen at least one, sometimes two '70s tunes (from my high school or jr. high years, easy to spot) per hour.

You are making my point. I remember the radio of my childhood. It was bereft of fifties tunes until Happy Days came on the air in the mid-seventies (a spin-off from Love, American Style and rooted even more in American Graffitti). The bunch of songs played in that show, most especially the Bill Hailey and the Comets theme, most of the kids in my grade school had only heard in their parents' collections, if their parents ever played those singles.

The radio didn't really play that stuff; the generation pulse of the sixties had warped the sock hop tunes of the decade before dramatically. I suspect that's what made the show a success; those from the '50s really did regard those times as "happy." Ah, nostalgia.

Here we are over thirty years after the '70s and the nostalgia has never left us long enough to become actual nostalgia. Jack FM can play the Ramones in the same hour as the Cars and none of the kids in the room will go "Ooh, that sounds new!" simply because they've heard it all their lives.

I am happy to admit that Adult programming has changed, it seems, since I've gone from being an Adult to . . . something else. ;-P Oh, and that 105.3 station looks better than the crap we have to call rock around here. Danzig? Can't hear that much at all in Seattle. A pity it's probably commercial.

[gunslnger]

So, in an hour of programming, which is around 12 songs, there might be 1 from the 70's. Boy, those boomers are really running the show there. I guess those 6 or so from the 80's are just meaningless.

You are making my point.

Only if your point is that the 70's are close to irrelevant music-wise to most people. My wife's parents are boomers and they moved on to listening to 80's music a long time ago.

Rock & Roll songs from the 70's are sprinkled into the mix, but not from nostalgia. The nostalgia songs from the 60's and 70's are long gone. It's the 80's songs that are nostalgic now. I listened to 70's music growing up in the 80's and I can't find any of those songs on the radio anywhere any more.