Playlists on radio

I used to have office job. I wrote stuff from papers to computer - for easier data handling and storage. It was pretty easy, routine stuff, that after a while started to be boring. Was cool to put the radio on and listen to some music.

Im pretty sure that around Finland I was not the only bored employee to do so. This was the first time I truly realized what 'playlists' meant on radio. They are pretty ok, I guess, as long as you only listen to radio that 20 minutes on your way to shopping, or listen on background while waiting for something. But when you start to listen it more or less regulary eight hours a day, five days a week, you start to notice that there are three songs that are playing the whole time. Sometimes the songs are good, sometimes.. not. But even a song most awesome and exellent becomes annoying after listening 50 times in a week (thats ten times a day during workweek, if you suck in maths).

Now Im in outdoors work. I have MiniDisc, so not really listening to radio, expect while moving from one place to second. Thats about 1,5 hours each day. Listening to Radio City (Rock and Sport - I still dont understand why the "and sport" is part of the description, dosent go well with the imago, imho), mostly because it means no Britney Spears and friends. There are several good songs going on. Sometimes the playlist plays older music, sometimes even decades old. But mostly it plays three songs over and over again. I dont feel that 1,5 hours of radio a days is that much - not compared to the eight to ten hours many people do. If I get annoyed, what do other people feel?

Read somewhere that there are over 50 000 songs in the world. I think thats underestimated number, but even if its about right... why does radio only play about 50 songs a week? Surely they know that listeners dont care to hear everything all over again - and change channel. Maybe Britney Spears is smaller evil, sometimes, if it means you get to hear 200 songs a week (by swapping channels every few hours), instead of 50.

Considering how many people hate playlists, it would be natural to assume that there would be a channel without playlist or with playlist that has hundreds - thousands - songs playing and which circles those songs more or less evenly. It might suprise you to know that there isint one. Even Radio Helsinki, which was long against playlists, and trusted into the ear of the person in duty at the moment, recently went to playlists. Or so I have been told (I have not seen this on print).

I have been further told that creators rights with playlists are much smaller than with "independent" selection. That using playlists is many times cheaper. Maybe true. But who gains from this? Not the listeners. Not the advertisers - if you are going to swap channel anyway, you can as well do it at the beginning of commercial break. Not the channel - people are leaving the boat. Maybe artists - people will buy CD's instead of listening radio. But somehow I doubt this.

Please, enlighten me.