Let’s get something straight right now.
The so-called “connected dashboard” is a myth created by desperate radio owners and a terrified auto industry.
Radio groups have been pushed out of the car by smartphones and Bluetooth.
And auto manufacturers are being pushed out of the car business because to many Millennials, being connected is more important than driving.
You see industry conferences and conventions focus on this mythical space in the car of the future and they can’t even see that no one really needs it.
In fact, Millennials more than any other generation since Henry Ford prefer public transit over driving.
When you put two desperate and scared interests together you get what?
Freaking HD Radio!
Remember that snake oil that was supposed to be the future of radio? The industry fought over it, delayed it until it was totally irrelevant and they’re still hanging onto the corpse even now.
The connected dashboard is the new HD Radio.
An infinite number of programming sources from paid, to terrestrial to Internet and only 6 pre-sets that no one really needs anyway.
Asking automakers and radio groups how to invent the digital dashboard of the future is like asking morticians for health tips.
If you want to push forward in ways that cooperate with 80 million Millennials coming of age, think this way:
- Millennials don’t listen to radio. They have been left to their own “devices” thanks to consolidators who had more passion for monopoly than making radio a part of Millennials’ lives. And now this is what they get for it. Payback is a bitch.
- Radio “hot clock” must be reinvented – not just changed. Blown to shreds. Today’s short attention spans don’t work even for 15 minutes. Short, 5 minutes or less modules of programming content is a good way to start. I say start because 5 minutes is the max attention span available. Radio is based on continuous music sweeps and other fallacies that no longer apply.
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