AI is possibly a fairly cheap option, though I honestly don't know what costs and other factors might be involved. But I do wonder what stations might do about overnight or other on-air talent. My first thought would be to engage young people to do overnight drives. Give them a range of music options, with parameters, but acknowledge it's overnight hours and the CRTC isn't fussy and the listenership is low. Hire responsibly, give them some training on the equipment and what to do on air, and give them increasingly free rein. Maybe tie in with high school and college co-op and college education programs or internships. I realize overnight is a burden because students need to be awake and functional during the day. But there may be ways to deal with this - for instance, some internships and co-ops are / could be in segregated blocks or periods of time. But I do see benefits from engaging local community members in your operation. I'm not purporting to have a neatly packaged idea here - more that management thinking needs to change. Betcha some of the young punks would pick up on the technology really fast and even eventually eclipse what the regular personnel know.
torontostan wrote: