When the Internet radio network (Live 365) turned off its server and went dark on January 31, 2016 it ended my 4-year affiliation with them and "Heartlites" ceased being an alternative for listeners that simply couldn't find the music they craved on AM or FM radio dials. "Heartlites" came about in the first place because I felt as they did, that the big commercial broadcasters had given up on their listeners a long time ago and no longer strives to entertain the masses but instead catered to other big businesses to grow their own financial greed.
Gone was any sense of local broadcasting or content of interest to Columbus radio listeners and in its place was whatever was dictated by far away broadcasting corporations that were only in the business of selling syndicated programming to compliment a barrage of commercials. And for the most part it was only in those commercials where listeners could hear anything they could relate to on the local level, like goods and services that were on sale and where to find them.
In most instances the only live programming ever on any station is during morning rush hour periods and sometimes in the early afternoon while the rest of the day and night there is only a computer receiving and sending to make a station available. Gone a long time ago is a human being that is somewhere in town talking to local listeners about local topics, and from a business sense the big companies make out very well because they needn't pay a staff of personalities to get done all they really want done; that is to make lots of money. It is all about profits and bottom lines now.
But even though what can now be produced on the Internet is very similar to whatever is usually found on AM & FM stations the major difference is that it isn't about sacrificing quality programming for more and more financial rewards, it is about delivering the programming listeners might expect; whether it is the music they want to hear or if it is the likelihood that a real person might show up in real time and actually connect with them.
And when it comes to music, or as I like to think of it, "The Soundtrack of Your Life", small town broadcasters needn't worry about pleasing big bosses or advertisers, we can search through thousands of tracks, whether they were the same tired oldies that have become mainstream oldies heard everywhere else or songs that haven't been heard anywhere on any radio station in decades.
In short, I call it "Radio with no Boundaries" and once the walls and fences of real creativity have come down, then producing something the fat-cats with all of the corporate money behind them cannot is what really makes us different. If you are listening for only the music you will discover more of it on Internet stations; a wider variety hat hopefully leaves you asking, "Where has that song been all of these years?"
But I believe the real payoff is when someone like me wants to invest the hours, days and weeks into producing programs and tweaking them as often as possible to not only keep it all fresh, but to remind everyone that listens that this is where radio had to go to be good again! Breaking the chains of bondage that would otherwise hold me down and render me someone Else's puppet; like locking the studio door where program directors and station managers cannot touch me or stop me from breaking their silly rules and giving listeners something entirely different than what was on the operating logs.
In a way I see Internet Radio as a 21st Century form of Underground or Pirate Radio. But whatever it is, it is different and that's what you cannot expect from the larger and more organized giant broadcasters that in most cases have absolutely no ties or any loyalty to their listeners or to the community they serve. Their loyalty is to investors and anyone else that shares profits with them. We have none of those so our reasons for doing what we do should be easily understood.
When "Heartlites" died it was a bump in the road in my efforts to keep broadcasting from my litle home studio, but that pot-hole has been paved with new material that is now called "Heartlites Radio" and for as long as someone else likes it and understands the motive to do it that motive will keep being as strong as ever.
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