Aaron Rand The Last Montreal Radio Legend?

There has been a lot of reaction to Aaron Rand’s last week at the “Q”. It’s amazing how many people have been revisiting their 1980s radio nostalgia in preparation of Mr. Rand’s departure. And it is well worth looking back to one of the “golden“ eras of English radio in Montreal which was the 1980s. Aaron Rand told CTV today that creativity is pretty much stifled nowadays in favour of more music.

You can’t argue with his point of view. It must be very difficult to do a purely music show now, especially when you have no control over what you are playing. But then again, it’s been like that for a while. I tend to believe that people tune in to be either entertained or informed. The only difference today is how there are so many other options. You now pretty much have access to just about any song ever recorded on your mobile device. There is much less dependency on someone choosing what you should be listening to, even though that is how a lot of music still gets exposed in the first place.

As for Aaron Rand, he has all but promised to resurface in the near future. Whether that will be on a traditional radio station or not remains to be seen. From all that has been said, it appears Mr. Rand will be remaining in Montreal, which is great news. Rand has set up a web site where you will be able to stay informed on his future radio endeavours.

Aaron Rand’s “legacy” goes way beyond Montreal. I wrote a little blurb about his departure from the “Q’ a few months back and it has become one of the most read blog entries here. It has been drawing search engine inquiries from far beyond the borders of Montreal. Does that indicate that people are nostalgic? There seems to be an appetite for old air checks of the famous CFCF 600 show. The "Aaron Rand Show" has had such a lasting impact on what were then a group of young radio listeners. For a couple of years, it was so good that you could have easily set it up as the standard to which all other radio shows ought to aim for.

Times have changed. It is no longer 1986. We’ve lost so many Montreal radio legends over the past decade. We ought to appreciate the ones who are still around. It would be great if a new generation could be inspired by the creativity and yes - genius - that has been displayed by people like Aaron Rand and Paul Zakaib over the past three decades.

UPDATE: Check out this wonderful recap of Aaron Rand's last morning at the "Q" on Steve Faguy's Blog.

Téléhoraire Vidéotron - 1988

Canadian Radio in 1960

Twittersphere 1 Elections Canada 0

Radio stations were forced to pull their feeds on Monday night. All this was done to keep election results in certain areas from reaching those who had yet to cast their ballots. The Canadian law concerning election results dates back to the late 1930s. The premise is an obvious one: it is believed by some that people may be influenced by the results in other areas of the country. No doubt that may be the case, but why is that any different from posting opinion poll results up until a day before the election? Surely those have far more influence.

In any case, the original law has been on the books for a very long time. It came into being when radio was the only means to obtain updated election results, other than making a long-distance phone call. Well, since then TV had become the king of all media. They too have had to adopt the same policy. Make no mistake about it, today’s traditional media nearly unanimously hates the law. They would much prefer to broadcast results to everybody as they become available.

Still, the law was effective in keeping people in the dark since it was implemented. Broadcasting was the only means of informing large masses and unless you had contacts in the areas in question, you simply had to wait until the polls closed in your part of the country. That all began to change with the advent of the modern Internet.

As far back as 2000, people were beginning to challenge the law. This was years before the explosion of social media. A Vancouver resident was actually fined that year for posting election results on his blog. Paul Bryan was fined $1000. He appealed the law all the way to the Supreme Court and lost. The Court voted 5-4 to uphold the law.

Enter the 2011 vote. Twitter may not have been a huge factor in swaying public opinion during the campaign, but it would become a huge story in reporting its results. Elections Canada had warned people not to tweet early election results, or face the consequences. Those could include fines of up to $25,000. Well, it didn’t take long for the law to be openly challenged. Within minutes of the closing of polls in Newfoundland, results were being posted for all to see. Shortly after, the hash tag #tweettheresults overflowed with not only results, but with plenty of Elections Canada bashing, comedy and sarcasm.

By 9 o’clock Monday evening, #tweettheresults had become the top trending topic on Twitter in Canada, and amazingly, the third highest trender in the world. Now this should in no way indicate that the entire world was fixated on the results of the Canadian election. On the contrary, most probably had no idea we were having one. It did show the incredible penetration of social media in Canada right now. And yes, there were several people down south and in other parts of the world who found the blackout rule fascinating and decided to join in. Some even asked people in Canada to forward them results so that they could in turn tweet them.

Elections Canada is now grappling with how to respond to what happened Monday night. It was clear going in that with the rise of the Internet and new media that such a law is not enforceable. They do say that in order to go after someone for posting results, they would first need to have received a complaint. It remains to be seen if the law will be changed in time for the next election, now scheduled to be no less than 4 years away.