Broadcasting Media Radio Association

If you analysed the probably types of activity of organisations based in the following areas:

STUDENT

COMMUNITY

HOSPITAL

How would you group them with these activities?

MEDIA

BROADCASTING

RADIO

Your answer possibly might not be how you come to name the representative associations.

Today on my twitter timeline I’ve been keeping tabs on events at #cracon – more formally known as the Student Radio Association (SRA) conference. This comes hot on the heals last weekend of #hbauk2012, or the Hospital Broadcasting Association (HBA) conference, and while we look in anticipation of the forthcoming Community Media Association (CMA) conference in a couple of months time, erm, not sure what the ‘hashtag’ for this is.

The most stand out name for me is the SRA, as a now outsider to the world of the student, I’d have thought that students are embracing a wider multi-platform world than *just* radio.

Naturally there is more in it than just a name, I’m sure there are still plenty of student newspapers and web-sites up and down the country, just interesting they are not represented by a combined ‘media’ association, much as how the Community Radio Association changed into the Community Media Association many years ago to represent a wider remit of ‘media organisations’.

The HBA uses the ‘broadcasting’ tag because as well as radio stations there are an very small handful of Hospital television stations, which begs the question of if there are any dedicated Student TV stations out there? I’ve heard of university ‘radio’ societies that are filming stuff and putting it on-line in a YouTube channel.

The motto is don’t always judge a book by it’s cover, I just find it quite ironic that the body with arguably the most ‘dated’ name is representing the fresh new talent which could be transforming the ‘broadcasting’ industry of the future into a new multi platform world.