This crazy controversy about Denise, the artificial intelligence “DJ” being tested at KROV radio just took an interesting turn.
Alan Cross took on Denise in a recent blog. A couple of days later, we opined in this space about how seminal personalities can have great impact on local communities. WCSX’s Steve Kostan, recently inducted in the Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame, was our poster boy for personality radio done right.
Then last Friday, Denise’s Dr. Frankenstein, Dominique Garcia, responded to Alan’s blog. Garcia took a more defensive approach, and I’ve taken the liberty of lifting out a couple paragraphs from his response to Cross:
“The first thing I have to say is as much as personalities on the air do not want to believe this… listeners do not care about jocks. PPM proves once a jock starts to talk they flip stations. Statistics [PPM] clearly prove this. It is the egotistical mind frame of human personalities that makes them want to believe that radio cannot survive without them. Or that people listen solely for the jock. That is not the case and if you believe that you are mistaken.
Anything you can say on the air Denise can as well. She is not a robot, she is an artificial intelligence program. There is a big difference. The concept was simply an alternative method of achieving automation. It was a one time deal to show the proof of concept worked. Sure it can be perfected to be even better but still none the less a proof of concept.”
You can read his entire letter here.
Look, Garcia and other inventors have the right to create whatever kind of product they like. And the industry will determine whether they are viable enough to be successful.
>EMAIL RECIPIENTS: CLICK HERE TO VIEW DENISE VIDEO<
But his assumption that radio listeners don’t care about DJs is an extreme statement. It is true that a percentage of the audience would rather hear music without any other spoken word content. For them, there are Jack stations and other outlets that make it a positioning plank to be music-intensive. But to suggest that PPM “proves that once a jock starts to talk they flip stations” is simply incorrect, and demeans great personalities and the stations they represent.
Look at who’s on top of PPM ratings in market after market and you’ll find engaged, personality-oriented stations that reflect their community values. Last December, Arbitron’s most successful 18-34 and 25-54 year-old stations in PPM were two very personality-rich stations, Entercom’s KRXQ in Sacramento (Dog Face and Joe Maumee – pictured) and Clear Channel’s WDVE in Pittsburgh. Denise couldn’t break into a weekend airshift at either of these stations.
Radio will either commit to great local radio and personalities that matter, or succumb to music outlets like Pandora or iPods. We limit ourselves and our business if we make the assumption that only spoken word formats will have success in broadcast radio in the coming years. In the meantime, the invention of Denise should serve as a rallying cry for programmers and jocks around the country.
It is less about how Denise sounds and more about how you sound. Get in the car over Labor Day Weekend and listen to radio – in your town, in smaller markets where your cottage is located, or wherever you are – and tell me whether you’re hearing live, local, engaged radio. Or are you hearing voicetracked breaks, random content, and the lack of accompaniment as you enjoy your holiday?
The decision is in your hands. Your vision of radio – today and in the future – is very much going to determine whether Denise (or her next generation of DJ bots) is a part of your on-air lineup. This isn’t a debate about automation, voicetracking, or even artificial intelligence jocks like Denise. It is a fundamental conversation about how radio will survive down the road.
Garcia and Cross deserve credit for creating a point-counterpoint. So what do YOU hear? Let’s see some comments from personalities, programmers, and manager/owners about how you see radio’s future.
Jacobs Media has consistently walked the walk in the digital space, providing insights and guidance through its well-read national Techsurveys.
In 2008, jacapps was launched - a mobile apps company that has designed and built more than 1,300 apps for both the Apple and Android platforms. In 2013, the DASH Conference was created - a mashup of radio and automotive, designed to foster better understanding of the "connected car" and its impact.
Along with providing the creative and intellectual direction for the company, Fred consults many of Jacobs Media's commercial and public radio clients, in addition to media brands looking to thrive in the rapidly changing tech environment.
Fred was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2018.
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Great topic, Fred. I tuned into to Denise’s debut and heard…well, a computer-generated voice. Didn’t matter that she gave away a prize or had some content on a song she played.
And, being totally honest, we also hear ‘live’ (or Memorex) talent that may as well be computer-generated. Radio peeps often complain about how repetitive radio is but it’s almost always in reference to the music. How often do we hear the same jocks on the same stations say their calls/logo, positioner, name, etc. exactly the same way at the same pace & intensity ever break, every hour, day after day? Far too often. I’ve referred to this as “McDonald’s Drive Thru Syndrome”, where the voices on those little boxes are often just noise because they say their greeting hundreds of times a day and just rip through it as fast as possible so they can take our order.
There are some wonderfully talented personalities on-the-air these days who aren’t being coached and encouraged to break out of the “by request”, “partly cloudy”, “register to win”, “keep it here” mindset and go for sounding fresh, using words as colors to make their canvas unique and different every time they grab a brush.
Many things in our business have changed a lot in the past 10-15 years but something that should never change is inspired talent using their skills, heart and words to be anything BUT programmed, predictable and assembly- lined into a digital delivery system.
No ‘preachiness’ intended here, simply encouragement to keep voices like Denise irrelevant by making sure we aren’t…ever.
Thanks, JJ. You’ve nailed it. Denice is viable because so many in radio have given up on live and local personality, opting instead for voicetracking, automation, and the easy and cheap way out. The controversy surrounding talent utilization is at the core of radio’s ultimate survival, especially in music formats, where it has become too easy to automate. We can all agree that spoken word is a great radio strength, but to throw in the towel on music formats by using canned DJs woud appear to be a short-sighted strategy. Thanks for taking the itme.
Thanks, Fred. I think we’re silly (as an industry) to concede encouraging and developing great talent simply because of voicetracking. That feels like an excuse for stations to avoid sounding topical, relevant and inspired.
Live or tracked, WE have the choice. I suppose if somebody’s OK with their jocks just mailing it in, they’ll get out of the speakers what they’re putting in- not much.
This is exactly what all those sci-fi movies warned us about! First in the
words of the Big Lebowski “I still jerk off manually” The simple fact is you
still have no real contact with your audience. Radio has become so stagnant,
there is no real want to give the people what they want. Most PD’s follow
idiots who think they no it all. That is why Pandora and others have done
so well. Face it Clear Channel you are numb to the reality we all live in. I
still remember working for Clear Channel a few years back when my PD says
Dave we have to start writing down what we do on every show. I told her I do
that now it’s called show prep. So Clear Channel, you others like you can
buy what you want but if you want to win trying listening to your station
once and awhile, think, and try interacting with your dwindling listener
pool. Creative thinkers will prevail. As far as this Denise being a cool
program. Well she does have a little more personality then most CC
properties. It’s still not real. hang on I’ve got a use for it, maybe our
next president could be Denise!
Dave Out!
Dave, thanks for the rant and rave. Based on Bob PIttman’s speech at The Radio Show yesterday, it feels like there’s a recognition of the fundamental appeals that makes radio compelling, great,, and as he called it, “America’s Companion.” Great talent rises to the top, and if you look at the most successful radio stations in most markets, they almost always feature compelling, local personalities. Thanks for taking the time, “dude.”
The question is what is behind the creation of such of thing? Why is there a need to spend hours and hours on such a project? I can only assume it stems from the thought that talent pools are drying up, why train when you can program …and to be truthful young talent pools are drying up not from lack of talent but lack of opportunities…. Not everyone can be in this industry that want to be,granted but the current environment is not hospitable to those with passion the deserve to make their mark to break in…I think that catch 22 has to be addressed in the discussion of the future of radio…There has to be a better strategy.
Paul, there ARE lots of contradictions surrounding this issue. Is talent drying up? Or are the avenues that were once available – nights, overnights, weekends – evaporating? How can radio operators advocate the cost savings but impersonal savings generated by voicetracking as the industry tries to prove that local and personal beats Pandora? There has to be a better strategy, as you say, and hopefully, some industry conversations at conventions like the upcoming Radio Show in Chicago. Thanks for commenting.
Thanks for posting “her” demo, Fred. I was reserving judgement until I could actually hear what we’ve been debating. I was actually hoping for more. Expecting something a little bigger than what I’m hearing. It is a cool experiment, though.
Most part-timers, even the weaker ones, are easier to listen to than this; and I judge part-timers pretty harshly these days. Even the most ill-prepared part-timer has an ability to match the mood of their town on a given day. How lame would it be to hear this the day after your team wins the World Series? Or, after your city experiences some form of tragedy? Not to mention, I’m guessing her social media ability is weak at best.
At my worst, I can only hope I was better than this. At my best, I hope I reflected the mood of my station’s listeners faithfully.
I would stop worrying about Denise, and make sure my management doesn’t have any reason to consider hiring her.
Besides the very real comments above, it sounds to me like Denise is miscast: a robot in the role of a human. It’s a jarring disconnect. “She” can’t fool anybody — she’s a robot trying to be a human with poor human scripting. If she was fed some decent and appropriate lines for her robot character, she might come off as an interesting personality in “her” own right…like one of the characters in Blade Runner.
Fleet, thanks for taking part in what’s becoming a major issue in radio – the role of the personality, scipting, and keeping it real. Denise isn’t real and doesn’t pretend to be. Can today’s talent do better? Will they be allowed to be?
The personalties of live djs are only half the reason why they’re important. Song selection and variety is the other half. If jock can’t pick what they want to play, they may as well be eliminated in favour of Denise-like robots. And in the current corporate ownership environment where stations have a very small list of songs that they are obligated and directed to pay, the dj is made powerless, and inherently boring. Radio, just like rock and roll, is dead.
Andrew, not everywhere, but Denise wouldn’t exist if everyone was doing compelling, personality radio. Thanks for chiming in.
Denise?
She sounds very much like my first radio gig did, in 1979…mixed in with a little Max Headroom.
She IS cute, though.
Yup, like a bad aircheck, but NOT a face for radio. Thanks, JC.
I agree that personalities that are ACTUALLY personalities will always win, in a PPM world or not. People have plenty of music options without radio.
BUT…let’s all take a step back and recognize the brilliance of this move by Dominique and his team. This is the best publicity stunt in the digital age. Look at how many people are talking about this. Imagine the buzz it created in San Antonio.
Dominique is right, he didn’t create the mess radio is in right now, he adapted to it. Radio is not in trouble because of Denise, it is in trouble because MAJOR players in the radio world decided no one cared about personality and so they watered down stations so much that now, literally, nobody cares about personality.
I think it was a great move by Dominique and he should be applauded for stepping outside of the norm and doing something that far too few PDs are capable of doing these days and that is adapting to the “new world order” of radio.
Yes, Adam, we’re talking about it. I’m thankful to both Adam and Dominique for making this an issue. It is something that requires conversation at the global level, and companies should be having this conversation, too. Thanks for reading our blog and participating.
Passion. That is the key. If you create “passion” in a listener you will have a fan. Fans look at you as a friend and radio is an election: the person with the most friends will win!! Through social media there are MANY ways to interact with your listeners. Be real and honest with them and you will develop that relationship. That’s something Denise CAN’T do.
Thanks, Danny. There is value to being “real.” Thanks for commenting.
Interestingly, the msnbc article on this mentions the overhead savings by eliminating live personality, but never even touches on the revenue and advertiser losses from such a foray into “AI”. IMHO, any decent-sized commercial station considering this may just want to send the engineer to Home Depot for a chainsaw and ask him to chop down the tower.
The article also refers to needing a script writer/operator to tell Denise exactly what to say, write her jokes and type up traffic. In other words…she still needs us “humans.” The best personalities are (and will always be) human, they can talk about the music, hold their own between the songs and relate with emotion. A call to current human jocks – coach your hungry interns to relate to listeners, and if you ever get one named “Denise”, get her a different on-air name.
Spot-on, Michael. Yup, GIGO, and without a human writing this copy, Denise has nothing to say. Appreciate the contribution.
I should point out now that no one can actually listen to this station. KROV is an HD2 station that operates on the subchannel of KRTU a college station that dayshares with KOOP. It is therefore only on air part time, and by broadcasting in HD, ensures that about 1% of San Antonio can listen.
True, Jose, but it’s the conceptual question that has everyone buzzing. Thanks for commenting.
I see it as an inevitable descendent of voice tracking. The Max Headroom jokes are all-too accurate. What I want to know is if they have adequate legal footing to patent any part of the idea and potentially lock out major players from doing the same.
Good question, Jose. Is it proprietary technology? And WHO wants to know? Thanks for taking the time to comment.
I am the person listening to the radio, I do not work in radio. I listened to Denise because I am a huge tech geek and this really interested me. I hit the stop button after 10 seconds. She is a robot.
Jocks were the first celebrities I looked up to as a kid and they are still what adds life to radio, beyond the music. I still remember how nervous I would get when I actually got through and talked to a jock. That relationship will never happen with a robot.
If I only want music, that is what I have iTunes and my iPod for. If I want some life added to my music I listen to radio. Both have their place and time.
If I don’t want to listen to a jock why would I want to listen to a very obvious robot? You can use the term artificial intelligence, but she is still a robot. She sounds like a robot, I know immediately she is fake, turn off. I don’t care what you can teach her, she is a robot. Come back to me when she sounds exactly like a human and acts like a human, meaning not perfect.
Will Denise ever say something on the air and breakout laughing at what she just said? When she does I will be interested.
Thanks for the “end user” perspective. Part of the issue here is that radio sometimes need to be reminded why listeners are there in the first place – and how iPods and other Internet radio channels fill different needs. Appreciate you weighing in.
I thought I would add a little bit of color to this conversation in defense of “real” talent on the air…
Earlier this year, I did some analysis for the morning drive daypart under the umbrella of PPM Top Performers. The best of the best for morning shows revealed that WDCG-FM (P18-34) and WDVE-FM (P 25-54) had very little music airing during their shows. About 98% and 84% of the programs’ content respectively was talk (outside of commercials).
Additionally, Bob and the Showgram is a huge part of WDCG’s overall success by having double the share compared to other dayparts on the station. This stat reveals that the show’s wit and character lead by Bob Dumas is part of this station’s overall ratings success. The same can be applied to The DVE Morning Show headed up by long-time team of Jim Krenn & Randy Baumann.
These real-life DJs are creating relevant content and connecting with their local markets. And they aren’t the only ones out there doing this. They are one of the many perfect examples that when the mike is on, the listeners stay.
If you want more details on the study, you can contact me at jenny.tsao@arbitron.com.
Straight from Arbitron – the power of personalities on PPM ratings. Thanks so much for commenting, Jenny, and adding crediblity and color to the conversation.
exactly, fred! more personality is needed. not less!
richard sands
the sands report
Richard, as someone who has worked with legends like Alex Bennett, and who now has a 35,000 ft. view of our industry, your comments are appreciated. Thanks for reading our blog.
Kudos, Fred. Good post. At the risk of being repetitively redundant, what we have here is a leadership problem and with it an incredible opportunity.
Not that long ago it was possible for someone with little more than a pleasant speaking voice to get work. The era of the journeyman disc jockey (“tight board, no drifter”) is practically over. Looking back it’s hard to imagine people were once able to make a reasonably good living in exchange for reading the cards, following the format and completing their assigned production. Truth be known the “that was, this is” liner jocks were never personalities, certainly not talent, there was no fist in their glove, they had no “act.” When radio started to prize bean counting more than bean growing, the fate of liner jocks was sealed. What did they contribute to the enterprise aside from making sure the commercials ran as logged? My sense is former liner jocks are among the most vocal, bitter critics of what has happened to radio (hint: they can no longer get work). Denise 1.0 may not sound good when compared to the experienced out of work announcer but it’s a safe bet she one day will. We need only recall how Garry Kasparov vanquished Deep Blue in 1996. It was said Deep Blue lost because while it’s AI could assess 100 million positions per second it didn’t have the sensitivity to grasp subtlety. In 1997 the machine beat the legendary chess genius in their second match.
Personality radio is alive and well (and paying better than ever). As Jenny says above “when the mike is on, the listeners stay”
Once upon a time the great Paul Drew taught program directors to mind the second word in their job title. It’s easy to delegate the blame here and say there’s no one out there, it’s popular to invoke the so-called “talent puddle” argument. But it’s wrong. Leadership must take responsibility for producing results. The over-worked program directors need to spend more time learning how to work with and develop talent, less time obsessing over the latest secret F key shortcuts in their music scheduling software.
Penn Jillette perhaps said it best “In all of art it’s the singer not the song” or as we say around our shop: All that’s important is what’s coming out of the speakers and on the screens, everything else is a footnote.
Dave, it IS an industry problem – what companies want from their stations and what they demand from their program directors. You are right – Denise and those who follow her – will sound better and better. The live jocks out there need to step up their games, too. Programmers do need to become more effective coaches because the ratings and brand equity is in building audience connections – not just in scheduling perfect hours. Thank for bringing your expertise to our conversation.
I was a little disturbed by the “parody” of an emergency alert message. A live jock would be reprimanded and possibly terminated and the station potentially fined, and justifiably so. To me, this points out that whether or not the technology is a listenable attribute of present or future radio – it’s the maturity, experience and good judgment behind the voice & facade that’s crucial. I fear that the willing downgrade of air talent to artificial intelligence and synthezised voices will be preceded by a downgrade of the puppeteer(s) behind them.
I recorded and scoped the entire three hours of Denise – you can listen or download at http://www.jayphilpott.posterous.com
Jay
Jay, thanks taking the time to do this. It is a matter of what you write for Denise is the content – good or bad. Of course, with the time it takes to do that, you could prepare your OWN show.
Version 1.0 of anything is typically crude and seems almost cartoon-like a few years later when using 3.0 or 4.0. Note how clunky the original iPhone looks now. Apply the same kind of progress the iPhone made to Denise and how good is she in 4 years?
Denise is a natural outgrowth of radio’s efforts at “scaling”. She will get better and someday in the not too distant future, could take the place of the talent that voicetracks most of post 10AM radio now. The more radio embraces the things that marginalizes it, the faster it will be further, well, marginalized. Before too long, live entertaining people could be the only thing that separates radio from Pandora and its equivalents. A word to the not so wise…
Exactly, Bob. Everything gets smoother, cleaner, more user-friendly with next generation technology. Denise may be clunky now, but it won’t be that long before her “reading” skills improve. As we’ve discussed throughout this long comment thread, it’s “the man behind the curtain” who will determin whether she’s informative, fun, timely, current, or entertaining. And if you separate your thinking from what she sounds like now and the larger issue of what radio will sound like in five years, then you more clearly the see the horns of the dilemma. There will be entertaining, compelling personalites on the radio in 2015. But how many stations will invest in this talent, especialy on the local level? Thanks, Bob.
I will say my so-called quotes on this article was taken out of context. You better grasp the overall message of what I was speaking of if you read the entire rebuttal. Sure maybe I was being a tad defensive however you must understand I was being attacked in every direction.
I want to clarify something here. Many members of the media have attempted to dumb Denise down and simply pawn her off as nothing more than a text to speech program. That could not be further than the truth. Sure she has that ability yes. However she is truly an artificial intelligent program. She can learn the things taught to her. If I were to train her about my musical format, there would be little need for using the text to speech feature. For example, if I played a heavy amount of Michael Jackson in my playlist I could teach her information about him that I wanted her to remember for future airshifts. Then I could say tell me about Michael Jackson and she would tell me what she has learned. If she needs additional info she can reference the internet. If I need her to say something that she does not know I could then use the text to speech feature to completely control what she says. However if I did not want to take the time to train her I could just use the text to speech then entire time when recording her airshift. A text to speech program cannot manage my emails, update my social media, use face and voice recognition, etc etc.
I do understand the bottom line here with this controversial issue and I do realize it has upset many people. However does it make me the bad guy for pointing all this out? Telling the world of something that could be used in our industry? I do not believe so despite what many radio professionals may think.
No matter if people like it or not she has the ability to be on the air. If voice skins were purchased (or not) she could do an airshift today. My concept and project on KROV proved that point and that was all it was designed to do. Be a proof of concept. A proof of concept that worked!
Dominique, no argument here. I’m sorry you felt your quotes were taken out of context but you did make some sweeping statements about what doesn’t work in PPM that I felt needed to be refuted. In fact, Jenny Tsao of Arbitron did a better job than I could. I hope you did not miss the point of our post. It wasn’t about whether Denise is good, bad, simply text to speech, or the Second Coming. What IS important is the way that establishment radio absorbs what you’ve created. Whether Denise or later versions of her become viable is very much a product of how broadcast radio opts to approach their product. I was not making a value judgement about Denise, nor was I reviewing her. Thanks for being part of the conversation, and again, I credit you and Alan Cross for making it possible to have this debate.
That is perfectly okay Mr. Jacobs. I was just speaking in a general and board sense in my previous response. I was not implying that you were being judgmental. As far as my statements concerning PPM are concerned, again I was frustrated by the obvious disrespect directed towards myself and I wrote a rebuttal without fully thinking it through. I did catch what Mr. Tsao had to say and it was an honor to be apart of a conversation with someone who has such a vast amount of knowledge on the subject.
I felt your site has done an excellent job in recognizing how this (gonna quote you) “IS IMPORTANT TO RADIO INDUSTRY.” Remember she is version 1.0 Plus she is less than a year old in existence. The voice issue is quickly becoming no issue at all. Since my project I have perfected the project and can already pull off a much better on air shift if given the opportunity again. Being able to remotely access Denise from anywhere in the world is also essential. After all, a program director cannot always be at the radio station 24/7
It is clear there will be people on both sides of this debate. However one thing is very clear. Denise has arrived. I have several stations already interested in her. And the great thing is, her on air performance has and can only get better. Thank you Mr. Jacobs.
Thank you, Dominique, for innovating and engaging. You cannot stop the moving train of change. Not everyone is going to be happy with what you’re doing, but you have successfully created something of interest, and you have stirred the pot. Most people can spend entire careers doing none of those things. Congratulations. I am sure that 2.0 will be worth talking about, too.